As an entrepreneur, Mort Fertel, the CEO and co-founder of Poplin, recognizes a good business idea when he hears it.
One day, his wife offered one.
“My wife was home with our five kids buried in laundry,” he said. “She said, ‘This is crazy. I can tap an app and get to the airport, FaceTime someone on the other side of the world, but I’m still doing laundry like my grandmother.”
Fertel agreed.
“Technology has transformed every aspect of our lives,” he said.
“It makes everything so fast and easy, except for the chore that takes the longest and we hate the most: laundry,” he said. “We’re in the middle of a technological revolution, (but) there’s been no innovation in this space.”
According to Fertel’s research, consumers spend 13 billion hours and $75 billion annually on laundry.
Fertel said three things in life are certain: death, taxes and laundry. He has a solution for at least one.
“Poplin solves laundry,” he said. “It’s beautiful. It’s like magic. You just tap the app, take your laundry, put it outside your front door and you’re done. You can go on and do what you really want to do, which, of course, is not laundry.”
Poplin operates much like the diaper services of old. Put the laundry bag outside, tap the app, and a pro picks it up and returns it clean and folded — sometimes the same day.
At the end of the service, the laundry is weighed, as Poplin charges $1 per pound. Free pick-up and delivery are included.
The professionals are trained to handle delicate items. If a garment needs to be hung to dry, it is placed in a separate bag with instructions. The professionals also manage sheets, towels, slippers, bathrobes and nearly any textile found in a home.
Everything is washed in cold water.
There’s also a guarantee: No sock will be left behind, and everything in a customer’s bag will return clean and folded, in the correct color, undamaged, and distinctly from the customer’s order.
Within one family’s order, each person’s laundry is packed separately.
Fertel’s laundry training programs ensure consistency. They learn how to wash and fold correctly. The more skilled the professionals become, the more requests they receive, leading to higher earnings.
Although it appears to be a laundry business, there’s a deeper purpose to Poplin.
“The company’s mission is to help people improve each other’s quality of life,” Fertel said. “When you’re a customer of Poplin, you are choosing a better life and interestingly, that better life is occurring on both sides of the platform.”
Laundry can sometimes be overwhelming. Those who do the laundry are also benefiting. Fertel said thousands of pros are turning their laundry room into a gig economy.
“Most of our laundry pros are stay-at-home moms and most of our customers are women,” Fertel said. “What we have is a very beautiful community of women throughout the nation who are helping each other live a better life.”
This is useful for seniors because, Fertel said, many injuries occur while attempting the task. The washer and dryer may be in an awkward place, such as at the bottom of steep stairs in a basement. Holding a laundry basket — instead of a railing — compounds this. Additionally, there’s the need for lifting, bending and dragging heavy wet clothes from the washer to the dryer.
“The laundry pros get to know their customers and if they know they’re dealing with a senior, they’ll make those bags (of folded, clean laundry) smaller so it’s very easy for them to manage.”
Fertel also discovered during research that “used” clothing or “used” bed linens can pose a health risk, allowing diseases to thrive if laundry is not done frequently.
“They’re sleeping on a dirty pillowcase or on dirty sheets or using a towel more frequently than they really should,” he added. “(There are) 17,000 times more bacteria found on unwashed pillowcases after a week than on samples taken from a toilet seat.”
Customers can order services online. For those who are not tech-savvy, a hotline is available.
Fertel said Poplin provides an excellent service.
“Our goal for every order is to wow our customers,” Fertel said. “If they get their laundry back and they say to themselves, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m never doing laundry again.’ Why would you ever burden yourself with laundry again?”
Poplin
poplin.com
Seniors’ hotline: 240-226-1515
