Laundry service Sneeuwwit (Snowwhite) is a true family business that started late 1939. Laundry service Sneeuwwit started in the city centre of Amsterdam by the name Fijnstrijkerij (witch means perfection in ironing), they tried to establish a customer base at the beginning of the second world war, but this seemed trickier than expected.
Father (Grandpa) Dries en mother (Grandma) Nel Berger started the company together, with much love for cleaning of clothes in Amsterdam’s old town (Jordaan area) in the Oude Leliestraat. With the passion of the founding couple they soon got busy with all sorts of chores related to the business. Shirts and maid smocks were an important source of income. The skirts and shirts were washed, starched and ironed. In those days, that was done with a heated stove and irons. The couple that lived above the shop founded a family there. They had four sons. Over the years, all the sons contributed and collaborated in the laundry business. They each had the ambition for a different direction and were able to go and study for that. The benjamin of the family, Rob, chose the education of being a master pastry chef to follow the example of his eldest brother. Rob always had a lot of fun in his work and was looking for a bakery for sale along with his girlfriend Johanna (Hanni) to start their own cake shop.
In 1978, Dries and Nel Berger reached the respectable age of retirement; Rob and Hanni were still searching for a bakery, and were asked if they were interested in the continuation of the family laundry/dry clean business. After some good thought and conversation the new episode of Sneeuwwit was a fact. Rob and Hanni had a try-out year first, in this year the seniors had enough time to transfer everything to their ambitious successors. And at age of 20…. what could happen?
On January 2, 1979, the follow-up went from father to son and they were under the supervision of the experienced mom and dad Berger. From that day the takeover of Rob and Johanna at Laundry service Sneeuwwit was a fact. After a year of hard work, nobody could think of an Amsterdam laundry world without Rob and Johanna! From that moment on Rob was on the road the entire day for families and businesses, he picked up the dirty and brought back clean laundry. Johanna managed all the laundry in the shop, washing /ironing/steaming of all kinds of textile. Rob still does a lot of baking pastries and cooking in his private time.
In 1980 Rob and Johanna got married. They moved into the home above the shop and raised a family of their own. They had a girl and a boy. They both studied and developed in different areas. Since 2012, their son, Sebastiaan, participates in the family business and gives the family tradition more glory.
For nearly 75 years, experts in washing, ironing and drycleaning. That’s what we call knowledge!