SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. — Two Seattle-based investors purchased a controlling interest in Blue Sky Cleaners earlier this month, the company announced. The San Francisco-based operation is now set to expand its “environmentally friendly” concept to Seattle and other markets.
“We’re excited about the prospect of bringing earth-friendly cleaning to Seattle,” says Mark Callaghan, now one of three co-owners, with Andrew Johnston and Blue Sky founder Frank Shaghafi. “Blue Sky Cleaners is such a strong brand in the Bay Area, and we’re confident that it will be welcomed in other areas in which people have embraced sustainability and clean technologies.”
Using liquid carbon dioxide (CO2) and wetcleaning technologies exclusively, the company says it is the Bay Area’s only certified nontoxic drycleaner. Shaghafi, an early adopter of liquid CO2 and a 25-year veteran of the industry, operates the San Francisco plant.
“The drycleaning industry has for years gotten used to dumping chemicals into its machines, thinking there was no viable alternative,” Shaghafi says. “But our CO2 drycleaning [makes] clothes cleaner, longer-lasting, and [is] virtually risk-free from an environmental and health perspective.”
The co-owners plan to launch Blue Sky in Seattle early next year. Blue Sky is Northern California’s largest CO2 operation, offering pickup and delivery, gown care and restoration services; Callaghan and Johnston are also minority stakeholders in another CO2 drycleaning enterprise, Denver-based Revolution Cleaners.
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