Startup idea: easy laundry
I've been thinking and talking to people about this seriously now for about a week, so I figured I'd solicit feedback.
When I lived in PAR, doing laundry just sucked. I always left it until I had nothing left to wear, so I'd be forced to travel down 4 floors with a gigantic basket of dirty clothes, and when I got to the basement, there (of course) would only be one machine available. I could either wait for another one to finish, or come back later. Either way, I was wasting time. And we all know my time was precious ;-)
What if you could go to a website (sort of like campusfood) and just click "Pick Up my Laundry"? We could charge perhaps $1.20 / pound or a certain number per load, or even a monthly fee in exchange for regular service. I've also heard the suggestion of making a clever name "X's Laundry" so then we could distribute free tshirts around campus with slogans like "X washed my panties" or something similar.
I'm aware of two competitors. Collegebellhop.com is present at a number of colleges around the country (not Illinois). They charge a fee at the beginning of each semester and then they do students laundry during that semester. I believe they have a drop box at each dorm for folks to put their dirty clothes.
There's also student-valet.com, which IS on the illinois campus. However, I'd never heard of it, and I don't know tons of others who have used it or heard of it. They must be doing alright, though, because they've opened professional-valet.com for the Champaign/Urbana area.
Anyway, I've done some serious thinking and calculation, and it is quite possible to make a bit of money doing this. Any thoughts?
