Beating the bank

Shops fill a void marketing money transfer services to immigrants
By Maria Sacchetti
Globe Staff / April 15, 2008

CHELSEA - On the outskirts of this immigrant city, Broadway Laundry is fighting for every dollar it can get. Don't speak English? Every employee is fluent in Spanish. Don't have a car? A minivan will pick up customers for free.


But the biggest attraction sits behind a giant window: A kiosk that allows immigrants to send money to relatives in their homelands - and sometimes it arrives before their clothes are dry.

"You've got to have the edge," said owner Christopher Fazio, the son of Italian immigrants, standing near the kiosk, next to shelves of bulging bags of laundry. "Competition is pretty fierce around here."

Immigrants in Massachusetts are sending home hundreds of millions of dollars each year, and increasingly that money is coming from such places as Vinny's Food Market in Revere, Lam's Bridal in Worcester, and Mundo Evangelico, a religious-goods shop in Brockton. But researchers say one institution is conspicuously lagging in the business: banks. [Read more]