Laundries

Niche industry - more common in North America

The image of the Chinese laundry is a stereotype more familiar in North America than in Australia, perhaps reflecting differences in climate and domestic habits. Nevertheless, Chinese-run laundries did exist in Australia, particularly in Sydney and Melbourne. On occasion, they became targets of anti-Chinese agitation, though not on the same scale as the hostility directed toward Chinese cabinet makers. Laundries, like market gardening, offered a form of small enterprise that was relatively easy to establish. They required little more than a leased building, hard work, and long hours—conditions that suited the bachelor societies of Chinese men who made up the majority of the community.

Sam Lee is a common name for Chinese run laundries and most assume this was the owner's name but it seem deriving from an American tradition many Chinese laundries were named "Sam Lee" meaning "Triple Prosperity" in Cantonese.