Want to know a ‘smart’ way to have your clothes washed?

My Laundry Box introduces a smart laundry locker platform that works with an app.

For many busy professionals, carving out time to do the laundry and waiting in line during business hours to drop off or pick up clothes at a laundry shop can be painful. To make laundry matters a bit more problematic, 24/7 laundry and dry cleaning services in Singapore are very hard to find. This is the problem that former investment banker at Macquarie Group Derrick Wu and three other entrepreneurs in their 30s tried to solve in founding a laundry business with a breakthrough locker concept, My Laundry Box.

Aimed at solving laundry woes, My Laundry Box claims it is pioneering several ‘firsts’ in the laundry industry.

Launched in March this year, My Laundry Box bills itself as first of its kind of service in South East Asia. It offers a combination of the use of a smartphone app and a proprietary collection and distribution system.

My Laundry Box harnessing mobile app technology, its app will allow customers to specify or chat with their laundry specialists on their washing preferences and determine the turnaround time. With My Laundry Box app, customers can even pay for the laundry bill directly from their mobile phones without having to make a trip to the laundry shop. Customers can also arrange for pick-up and delivery through the app.

My Laundry Box also takes pride as the first laundry and dry cleaning service that does not feature a physical shopfront, instead, it has a bank of secure lockers. “By eliminating the need for a physical shopfront and front line service staff, My Laundry Box is unlike brick-and-mortar dry cleaners and laundry services. Their lockers are modular in nature and can be installed at any given space at no cost. More lockers can also be added for free to cater to the development’s changing needs and occupants’ demand,” said Derrick.

Prior to founding the business, Derrick spent nearly 6 years at Macquarie Group as an investment banker where he honed his business acumen. Derrick holds a Masters of Management Science from Imperial College. He also graduated with a Bachelor of Law with honours from University of Liverpool.

While the three other co-founders also have backgrounds in investment banking or trading.

How the company started

Inspired by a laundry locker service that founders came across in San Francisco, they started off Lockerfellas in Singapore with a ‘germ of idea’. Lockerfellas is the management firm for My Laundry Box.

According to Derrick, that ‘germ of idea’ led to extensive research and a series of meetings and discussions on how they could deliver a smarter laundry service in Singapore that would provide people with the ‘utmost’ convenience when it comes to doing their laundry.

In pursuit of this venture, one of the co-founders’ partners and Derrick left their successful careers in investment banking and trading, while the other 2 juggled two jobs.

The founders believe that time-strapped professionals and tech-savvy consumers will find My Laundry Box useful as it offers round-the-clock convenience in laundry pick-up and drop-off, allowing them to spend their time more productively and efficiently.

To raise funds for the business, Lockerfellas team went through a competitive pitch process with ACE (part of SPRING Singapore) and finally awarded a start-up grant because of their business’ innovation and potential to scale the business locally and beyond. They also topped it up with a high 5 figure sum each.

Currently, Lockerfellas has a total funding exceeding to $360,000 - a combination of shareholder equity and loans as well as from the founders’ pockets.

“Most of our investment has gone to building a robust, proprietary software system which comprises a customer-facing mobile app as well as a sophisticated system to handle and track orders in real time, analyse sales data and integrate our customer app, driver software and backend systems,” Derrick said.

Today, the number of users continues to grow in tandem with their expansion and increasing awareness of My Laundry Box.

“In the next couple of months, we are planning to roll out a new and proprietary locking system which is controlled via Bluetooth and Near Field Communication (NFC) protocols on the customers’ phones. The system will allow our customers to open or lock the lockers wirelessly through a signal generated by our app,” said Derrick.

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COMPANY PROFILE

Name of the Company: Lockerfellas
Founders: Derrick Wu
Website: https://www.mylaundrybox.com/
Total Funding at hand: >SGD360,000
Source of Funding: ACE and internal funding
Major Investors: ACE
Start of Operation: March 2014

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com