Dry cleaners, restaurants, hotels: the ripple effects of Hollywood’s strike

As the actors’ and writers’ strikes settle in, restaurants, cleaners and other businesses prepare for a financial downturn

At first glance, not much seems amiss at Milt & Edie’s dry cleaners, a stone’s throw from the Warner Bros studio where a long summer of labour turmoil in Hollywood has brought production to a shuddering halt.

The decor is an optimistic Barbie-pink, the counters are jammed with customers, even on a weekday morning, and the cavernous rear of the store is so stuffed with freshly pressed clothes snaking along the line it’s hard to spot any obvious portents of trouble.