The days of dragging yourself to do the laundry at home may just be numbered. A host of services driven by the smartphone are rising like soap suds across the city, writes RANJANI RAJENDRA
It’s your day off after a hectic week at work and the last thing you want to do is deal with that gigantic pile of dirty laundry that you’ve been ignoring for a while now. But then, you’re running out of clean clothes aren’t you? Now, before you drag yourself to wash those clothes, pick up your smartphone instead. With a host of on-demand laundry services popping up in the city, getting your laundry done is as easy as one tap on your phone screen. Well, actually a couple of them.
Take, for instance, Big Laundry. The service operates via a website and mobile website, and lets users choose a subscription that suits them. While it started off as a small laundry setup, it now handles a larger capacity. “We are one of the first on-demand services to offer a subscription model to our users, where they can have a set number of clothes laundered each month, depending on the package they choose,” says Richa Ganesh, sales and marketing head at Big Laundry. One of their USPs, she says, is the fact that they steam-wash and steam-iron all the clothes. “There’s a certain level of hygiene and quality that we maintain.”
While Big Laundry was set up in 2015, one of the earliest entrants in this segment was Wassup, which tested waters as early as 2012. Founded by Durga Das and Balachandar R., the now app-based service has a presence in eight cities with 50 stores. According to Balachandar, on-demand laundry services are an emerging segment that they decided to explore rather early on. “People are getting busier and are looking to outsource their laundry on a daily basis. That is how we came up with Wassup. Being one of the first in the segment certainly helped consolidate our footing in the market,” says Balachandar, who has a background in the fashion business. He adds, “When I decided to branch out and do something on my own, I realised that the entire laundry sector was rather unorganised; despite it being a Rs. 2 lakh crore market. There was no single professional platform managing it, even though there was a growing demand for the service.”
One of the latest entrants in the market addressing people’s laundry needs is LaundryBoy, a subsidiary of Casa Grande. “LaundryBoy is an attempt focused on unlocking an individual’s time from day-to-day laundry chores, so that they can do things that truly matter to them. We believe our service is relevant for every time-strapped household today which is unable to spend quality time on things close to their heart, such as catching up with family, working out, etc... This makes nuclear households with young couples, bachelors, families of three to four with both parents working, our primary target groups,” says Ramprashanth Ganesan, COO of the company. The app is currently active in Chennai, though LaundryBoy hopes to make its presence felt in two other cities by the end of the next quarter.
Many of these start-ups also believe that the old model of laundry infrastructure in the country is outdated and significantly under-capitalised. The focus now is on “changing people’s habits”, as Richa puts it.
The rising popularity of these on-demand laundry services is evident in the volume of requests they handle. LaundryBoy, which launched operations in December 2015, processes approximately 1,000 orders a week at their facility, which can handle up to 2.5 tonnes of laundry at a time. “We soon plan to relocate to a larger facility though,” says Ramprashanth.
Wassup on the other hand, is able to process 75,000 pieces per month in the retail sector, apart from the 1 lakh plus pieces from corporates and the hospitality sector. “On a daily basis, we’re cleaning anywhere between 12,000 to 15,000 pieces of laundry. We also happen to be the official laundry service for the Indian Army’s OTA campus,” says Balachandar, who adds that they’ve also tried to bring the traditional dhobis under their umbrella. “Through our Dhobi Partnership Model, we regularly train them and encourage them to partner with us, in a bid to enhance their income. They collect clothes from their regular clients and bring them to us for a wash or dry clean, and we give it back to them to iron and return them. We’ve also provided them with modern equipment to improve the quality of their work,” he explains, adding that they’d soon like to bring these dhobis onto their digital platform.
While both Big Laundry and LaundryBoy operate solely on a home-delivery and pick-up basis, Wassup has 18 collection centres across the city. “We do have plans to set up three stores in the near future though,” says Richa of Big Laundry.
And it isn’t just your clothes that these services take care of for you. Many of them even branch out and offer cleaning services for your shoes, bags, soft toys, sofas and carpets. Now that’s convenience at your doorstep.
Many laundries, One app
While on-demand laundries are many, there’s one start-up that’s changing the game in its own way. The Wish2Wash app acts as a laundry service aggregator; much like a cab-service aggregator. Launched as a website and Android and iOS apps, the aggregator has in its fold 160 laundry outlets pan-India, with 56 of them being in Chennai. All one needs to do is log on, enter one’s location, choose a laundry that suits your needs and place a pick-up request. Launched by city-based entrepreneurs Sameer Shroff and Gaurav Dalal, the app was the brainchild of the latter, who had years of experience in the laundry business. “My family runs Tip Top Laundry, and we’ve been in the business for 60 years. We’ve seen the industry evolve and cater to changing customer needs. In the last five years, there have been so many new players in the market that we began to get a sense of the kind of competition there was. That is when I thought why not bring them all together on a single platform? It makes outsourcing one’s laundry so much easier for the user,” explains Gaurav. The app also lets you choose the date and time for pick-up, as per one’s convenience.
The app, which became functional in May last year, already has a presence in 11 Indian cities, and has plans to clock that number up to 25 (including tier I and tier II cities) by the end of this year, apart from two international ones in the coming months, says Sameer.
Incidentally, they have some prominent names on board, including Fabcare, Big Laundry, WashDoor, Laundro Room, Classic Clean and the international laundry chain 5asec, which has a presence in Bangalore and Mumbai. “We’re in the process of bringing more laundries onto our platform. Though now, we’ve moved from looking to bring them on board to receiving requests from laundries themselves,” says Sameer.
It’s your day off after a hectic week at work and the last thing you want to do is deal with that gigantic pile of dirty laundry that you’ve been ignoring for a while now. But then, you’re running out of clean clothes aren’t you? Now, before you drag yourself to wash those clothes, pick up your smartphone instead. With a host of on-demand laundry services popping up in the city, getting your laundry done is as easy as one tap on your phone screen. Well, actually a couple of them.
Take, for instance, Big Laundry. The service operates via a website and mobile website, and lets users choose a subscription that suits them. While it started off as a small laundry setup, it now handles a larger capacity. “We are one of the first on-demand services to offer a subscription model to our users, where they can have a set number of clothes laundered each month, depending on the package they choose,” says Richa Ganesh, sales and marketing head at Big Laundry. One of their USPs, she says, is the fact that they steam-wash and steam-iron all the clothes. “There’s a certain level of hygiene and quality that we maintain.”
While Big Laundry was set up in 2015, one of the earliest entrants in this segment was Wassup, which tested waters as early as 2012. Founded by Durga Das and Balachandar R., the now app-based service has a presence in eight cities with 50 stores. According to Balachandar, on-demand laundry services are an emerging segment that they decided to explore rather early on. “People are getting busier and are looking to outsource their laundry on a daily basis. That is how we came up with Wassup. Being one of the first in the segment certainly helped consolidate our footing in the market,” says Balachandar, who has a background in the fashion business. He adds, “When I decided to branch out and do something on my own, I realised that the entire laundry sector was rather unorganised; despite it being a Rs. 2 lakh crore market. There was no single professional platform managing it, even though there was a growing demand for the service.”
One of the latest entrants in the market addressing people’s laundry needs is LaundryBoy, a subsidiary of Casa Grande. “LaundryBoy is an attempt focused on unlocking an individual’s time from day-to-day laundry chores, so that they can do things that truly matter to them. We believe our service is relevant for every time-strapped household today which is unable to spend quality time on things close to their heart, such as catching up with family, working out, etc... This makes nuclear households with young couples, bachelors, families of three to four with both parents working, our primary target groups,” says Ramprashanth Ganesan, COO of the company. The app is currently active in Chennai, though LaundryBoy hopes to make its presence felt in two other cities by the end of the next quarter.
Many of these start-ups also believe that the old model of laundry infrastructure in the country is outdated and significantly under-capitalised. The focus now is on “changing people’s habits”, as Richa puts it.
The rising popularity of these on-demand laundry services is evident in the volume of requests they handle. LaundryBoy, which launched operations in December 2015, processes approximately 1,000 orders a week at their facility, which can handle up to 2.5 tonnes of laundry at a time. “We soon plan to relocate to a larger facility though,” says Ramprashanth.
Wassup on the other hand, is able to process 75,000 pieces per month in the retail sector, apart from the 1 lakh plus pieces from corporates and the hospitality sector. “On a daily basis, we’re cleaning anywhere between 12,000 to 15,000 pieces of laundry. We also happen to be the official laundry service for the Indian Army’s OTA campus,” says Balachandar, who adds that they’ve also tried to bring the traditional dhobis under their umbrella. “Through our Dhobi Partnership Model, we regularly train them and encourage them to partner with us, in a bid to enhance their income. They collect clothes from their regular clients and bring them to us for a wash or dry clean, and we give it back to them to iron and return them. We’ve also provided them with modern equipment to improve the quality of their work,” he explains, adding that they’d soon like to bring these dhobis onto their digital platform.
While both Big Laundry and LaundryBoy operate solely on a home-delivery and pick-up basis, Wassup has 18 collection centres across the city. “We do have plans to set up three stores in the near future though,” says Richa of Big Laundry.
And it isn’t just your clothes that these services take care of for you. Many of them even branch out and offer cleaning services for your shoes, bags, soft toys, sofas and carpets. Now that’s convenience at your doorstep.
Many laundries, One app
While on-demand laundries are many, there’s one start-up that’s changing the game in its own way. The Wish2Wash app acts as a laundry service aggregator; much like a cab-service aggregator. Launched as a website and Android and iOS apps, the aggregator has in its fold 160 laundry outlets pan-India, with 56 of them being in Chennai. All one needs to do is log on, enter one’s location, choose a laundry that suits your needs and place a pick-up request. Launched by city-based entrepreneurs Sameer Shroff and Gaurav Dalal, the app was the brainchild of the latter, who had years of experience in the laundry business. “My family runs Tip Top Laundry, and we’ve been in the business for 60 years. We’ve seen the industry evolve and cater to changing customer needs. In the last five years, there have been so many new players in the market that we began to get a sense of the kind of competition there was. That is when I thought why not bring them all together on a single platform? It makes outsourcing one’s laundry so much easier for the user,” explains Gaurav. The app also lets you choose the date and time for pick-up, as per one’s convenience.
The app, which became functional in May last year, already has a presence in 11 Indian cities, and has plans to clock that number up to 25 (including tier I and tier II cities) by the end of this year, apart from two international ones in the coming months, says Sameer.
Incidentally, they have some prominent names on board, including Fabcare, Big Laundry, WashDoor, Laundro Room, Classic Clean and the international laundry chain 5asec, which has a presence in Bangalore and Mumbai. “We’re in the process of bringing more laundries onto our platform. Though now, we’ve moved from looking to bring them on board to receiving requests from laundries themselves,” says Sameer.