Growing laundry app startup seeks gig workers, customers in Maine
SudShare is a nationwide on-demand app-based laundry service that works with independent contractors called Sudsters.
A Baltimore-based startup with a high-tech spin on outsourcing laundry is seeking gig workers, and customers, in Maine.
The company, called SudShare and founded in 2018, is an on-demand, app-based service that outsources washing and drying to contractors that use their machines at home — kind of like Uber for laundry. Customers range from young professionals and working parents to truckers and campers.
But unlike the Uber service, where drivers are hired to transport people and deliver food, SudShare "is really the first and only manual labor work-from-home opportunity," Mort Fertel, the company's co-founder and CEO, told Mainebiz by phone from Salt Lake City.
He also said that while the pay structure for Uber, Lyft or DoorDash delivery drivers is complicated, SudShare pays a straightforward rate of 75 cents for each pound of laundry. That translates into a pay rate of up to $20 an hour rather than the normal $10 to $15 an hour for most gig workers, he said.
For SudShare customers who order the service, the price is $1 per pound of laundry that's picked up and returned dried and folded the next day to the customer's home or other location.
Like many entrepreneurial ventures, SudShare started as a means to solve a problem, in this case for the seven-member Fertel family.
"My wife Ari was just buried in laundry, especially since we were home schooling five kids" Fertel said. "She's like, 'I can use an app to book a ride to the airport or FaceTime with someone anywhere in the world, but I'm still doing laundry like my mother and grandmother did.' She's right, technology has transformed every aspect of our lives, yet the chore that takes the most amount of time for most households hasn't changed in 70 years."
That changed when son Nachshon, a 17-year-old tech geek at that time, stepped in to help by developing an app that the family named SudShare and launched commercially three years ago.
Nationwide and growing
Today, SudShare serves over 300 cities, including the Portland area as of late August though not yet Bangor or Lewiston. The tagline on the app is: "Just tap the app and it's done."
Since Sudsters need cars to transport laundry loads and live relatively close to customers, the company shies away from rural or remote areas. It also doesn't cover Manhattan, where there are a lot of residents without cars, or San Francisco, which is very spread out.
"We have found that every other city is accessible enough," Fertel said. "Even if the order is downtown, Sudsters can get into the city."
While the company has a team of 20,000 Sudsters around the country, it remains a family-owned business with now-20-year-old founder Nachshon serving as chief technology officer, triplet brother Moshe as director of operations and the third triplet, sister Shira, doing the bookkeeping.
Father Mort Fertel, a serial entrepreneur since college when he sold student coupon books, thinks of the growing team of Sudster gig workers as extended family. He recalled a story about how he traveled to Las Vegas to visit one who had been injured in a car accident.
"I told him, 'You're my brother, you're family.' This is a family business, and we consider our Sudsters part of the family."
Besides passing an identification and background check, job applicants are required to go through extensive online training and a test on procedures and policies. Hours are flexible since Sudsters are independent contractors and can choose how much work to take on.
Fertel said that while missing socks or machine mishaps are rare, Sudsters sometimes find cash or other valuables in pockets, and the items are returned. Most Sudsters deliver laundry loads in bags tied with colorful ribbons or handwritten notes, he added.
"Even though SudShare is a national brand, because the Sudsters are so individually involved with their customers, you don't get that institutional experience," he said. "You get this personal, friendly, local experience."
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Thank you so much for the lovely article about us! I really appreciate the time and care that must have gone into writing this, and on behalf of the whole SudShare team, thank you :)
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