When co-founding a laundry related service and promoting it in a photo while wearing a branded t-shirt, wouldn't it be a good idea if that t-shirt wasn't full of wrinkles? ;-)
Prim (YC S13) Does Your Laundry. Pickup, Wash, Fold, Delivery, Awesome
141–150 of 216 posts
Re: Prim (YC S13) Does Your Laundry. Pickup, Wash, Fold, Delivery, Awesome
#142Sheesh. The objections on this thread (SV bubble), expected objections (first world problems) and counterarguments to both (don't worry! time saved will go to raising kids, curing cancer & cooking quinoa!) make this discussion sound so puritan. Curing cancer is great. So is raising children. Exercising. Reading. Etc. But are we saying that a laundry service is only valid if it can be justified with time spent on some…
Do people that start a business doing other people's laundry usually find themselves celebrated as a 'startup' and receive venture capital funding?
This is a news story because it has YC's name attached.
The objections and counterarguments, to me, provide valuable insight into what kinds of startups ought to be both celebrated and funded, as well as to gauging wider public reception for a service that is going to have to rely heavily on some significant pickup and economies of scale to not be a wasted investment.
That, and there are plenty of other social, economic, and environmental impacts a service like Prim poses that many, including myself, consider to be of significant concern and worthwhile evaluation in funding and celebrating such a service.
Also, that's really not what puritan means.
Re: Prim (YC S13) Does Your Laundry. Pickup, Wash, Fold, Delivery, Awesome
#143Earlier quoted context omitted.
It may surprise you to learn that people in cities were able to get laundry done before Prim started. Also, it costs me about $2.50 to do a load of laundry (washer + dryer), which is basically what it costs you (see: http://michaelbluejay.com/electricity/laundry.html ). And it's in my building. So I'm not sure which concept crystalizes this notion for you, but it's not one based in reality.
Using national averages for electricity and water, it only costs $0.76 to complete a load of laundry (washing & drying).
What figures were you using? I'd like to put the current New South Wales, Australia electricity price into the equation.
Re: Prim (YC S13) Does Your Laundry. Pickup, Wash, Fold, Delivery, Awesome
#144Earlier quoted context omitted.
Using national averages for electricity and water, it only costs $0.76 to complete a load of laundry (washing & drying).
What figures were you using? I'd like to put the current New South Wales, Australia electricity price into the equation.
My calculations are here[1].
Basically, $2/1000 gallons of water & $0.10/kWh for electricity (I did not bother calculating for gas dryers) were the most recent US averages I could find, and that was rounding up (e.g., electricity was actually > $0.09 but I used this calculator[2], and plugged in appropriate values where I could find most current data.
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6107020 [2] http://michaelbluejay.com/electricity/laundry.html
Re: Prim (YC S13) Does Your Laundry. Pickup, Wash, Fold, Delivery, Awesome
#145I had an argument about these type of services when Instacart showed up, not a well-thought out one, but here goes. My first thought with these services is always "that's cool!". I'll save time, won't have to bother with some boring task etc, no more inconvenience! Same reaction with Instacart. Then I questioned that reaction. The store where I buy all my food is roughly a 100m away from my apartment, and it takes me…
Not a 'challenge': Are you or aren't you describing the whole of non-medical, non-moon landing human technological progress? (Yes, 'progress' is a loaded word, but depending on your perspective, that may be the point.) Neolithic Rev. onward, it's been specialize, optimize, specialize, optimize. What's Excel do that you can't do with an abacus?
I wouldn't call reinventing the early 20th century progress, at least not positive progress. The service industry is largely the antithesis of a technological utopia.
Re: Prim (YC S13) Does Your Laundry. Pickup, Wash, Fold, Delivery, Awesome
#146Yet another startup that caters to the 20 something tech crowd with too much disposable income and too little free time on their hands. Do people in Silicon Valley ever leave spend time outside Silicon Valley?
If it makes you feel better: pretend you and your wife are immigrants to the United States, speak little English, are raising three children, and work long hours at a laundromat. The Internet, which you're pretty sure one of your kids has on that phone with the white earbuds, calls and tells you that it can offer you $3,000 of business. A month. For the forseeable future. No catch: they just want to pay you money to…
Except the overall effect of this startup will be the opposite of what you just describe. Prim isn’t creating more dirty laundry, it’s consolidating the laundry jobs into batches that will be performed by fewer businesses than would otherwise overall.
If you happen to own one of the laundromats that Prim doesn’t want to use you will see a reduction in your business. There is a saving grace for that situation however, you could apply for a job at Prim.
Re: Prim (YC S13) Does Your Laundry. Pickup, Wash, Fold, Delivery, Awesome
#147First-world problem? Sure. It's pretty hard to not laugh at the image of the surely brilliant Stanford engineer doing laundry for hipsters in the bay area burbs instead of out curing cancer. But, think about what happens if this actually works out. Think about the amount of time that will be returned to people, at scale. Think about the amount of capital that will be freed up. Think about the amount of resources that…
Trucking laundry around, having another worker load/wash/unload/iron and then the sorting / tagging / customer service issues associated with that seems pretty inefficient. It just adds overhead without removing any of the original work. It may be that the washing machines can be more efficient at scale but for that to be the dominant factor the process as a whole would have to be super efficient as well and that is…
No kidding!! With two toddlers I do laundry daily, and frequently the cycle is "remove clothes at bath time and put them directly into the washing machine".
Re: Prim (YC S13) Does Your Laundry. Pickup, Wash, Fold, Delivery, Awesome
#148Earlier quoted context omitted.
If it makes you feel better: pretend you and your wife are immigrants to the United States, speak little English, are raising three children, and work long hours at a laundromat. The Internet, which you're pretty sure one of your kids has on that phone with the white earbuds, calls and tells you that it can offer you $3,000 of business. A month. For the forseeable future. No catch: they just want to pay you money to…
Except the overall effect of this startup will be the opposite of what you just describe. Prim isn’t creating more dirty laundry, it’s consolidating the laundry jobs into batches that will be performed by fewer businesses than would otherwise overall. If you happen to own one of the laundromats that Prim doesn’t want to use you will see a reduction in your business. There is a saving grace for that situation however,…
Presumably they'll choose the companies who can/do service them best. I work for a contract manufacturing company and the same thing holds true for us as a $6b corporation with a presence in 25 countries. Customers pick the partner who provides the right mix of cost, quality, communications, timeliness, location and alignment. Depending on the customer's own business goals and performance, the list of eligible partners ebbs & flows over time. Generally speaking, though, the cream always rises to the top.
Re: Prim (YC S13) Does Your Laundry. Pickup, Wash, Fold, Delivery, Awesome
#149Sheesh. The objections on this thread (SV bubble), expected objections (first world problems) and counterarguments to both (don't worry! time saved will go to raising kids, curing cancer & cooking quinoa!) make this discussion sound so puritan. Curing cancer is great. So is raising children. Exercising. Reading. Etc. But are we saying that a laundry service is only valid if it can be justified with time spent on some…
Do people that start a business doing other people's laundry usually find themselves celebrated as a 'startup' and receive venture capital funding? This is a news story because it has YC's name attached. The objections and counterarguments, to me, provide valuable insight into what kinds of startups ought to be both celebrated and funded, as well as to gauging wider public reception for a service that is going to hav…
You're concerned about the social, economic, and environmental impacts of a laundry service?
I meant puritan in a cultural sense. The kind of impulse that says you should be doing your homework or your chores, not sitting around playing Taki you lazy no good brat.