It is a real bummer when more than half of your day off is spent picking up clothes from the dry-cleaners, stocking up on groceries for the week that would follow and some intense house cleaning. Planning for a house party or a more sophisticated soiree will, too, require trips to the super markets, meeting different caterers to pick the cuisine you wish to serve or getting confetti and balloons for your kid’s birthday bash. Alas there is no genie in our bottles or lamps to get it all done with one snap-of-a-finger. But there are ventures willing to run errands for you and also recommend what would suit your demand best.
Goodservice, founded by Vipul Aggarwal and Ruchir Jain in 2014, is one such destination where all kinds of services are provided at your doorstep. All you need to do is download their mobile app and ask away. They operate 24 hours and never say ‘NO’ to ‘any legal requests’.
“We wanted to get all sorts of local services and products to the people by a simple touch on their phone screens. From booking movie tickets to a doctor’s appointment or getting your food delivered from your favourite restaurant, we do it all. There is a team of operators who are more like personal secretaries available 24X7. All the customer needs to do is type in the request and we will get them the best prices after doing the research and checking offline stores as well, Aggarwal told us.
When they say they “will get anything done”, they surely mean it. Aggarwal recalls incidents that “people need specific customisation as well”.
“Once a customer asked for houseplants that purify air so we contacted the local nurseries and got the plants delivered. Then someone was looking for cookery classes but for diabetics,” he shared.
Want to know about the chefs in Delhi NCR who would create the best biryani or chefs who can fire up an American barbecue with the juicy ribs, burgers, wings and hot dogsIJ You must check-out Relisted, a curated directory of chefs, bartenders, bakers and caterers, founded by three high-school friends.
Co-founder Rohit Pillai told us, “Every time we want to host an event, whether it’s a small dinner or a wedding, we run around like headless chickens looking for something yum and different to serve. We speak to our friends, post on Facebook and usually end up with the same old recommendations. A search on Google throws up random results of companies who have the time, money and expertise to market themselves. There are a bunch of social food groups that often have people searching for options of food and desserts but none of them maintain a list that one can access to get the relevant details. Relisted.com serves as a platform to showcase upcoming caterers, bakers and homechefs who are creating magic in their kitchens but don’t know how to reach their consumers. Word of mouth is the best marketing for such sensory experiences — we’ve just put all the words in one place and made it extensively searchable.”
Though members of our residential safai-brigade would knock on the door each day for the bartan-jhadu, et al. but it can be a hassle since they would turn up the moment you lock the doors to go to work or not turn up at all. Broomberg comes to your rescue and turn up with their modern cleaning-up equipments at the time convenient for you.
“The idea of the concept came after a small fire outbreak at my brother’s house. The fire brigade came and after they left the entire house was messy, walls were black, floor had water etc. It was really difficult to live in the space without a good cleanup. We just wanted it cleaned before the next steps of painting et al. We tried reaching out to a few people through online and offline portals but in vain. At last we found two persons ready to do the job and we had to pay 12,000 for a very unprofessional experience. This incident prompted me to think of the professional home cleaning space in India. I realised there is tremendous scope in this segment in India. A couple of months after this incident my friend, Ishan Baisoya and I started Broomberg in a small basement in Malviya Nagar,” said co-founder Samrat Goyal.
The first task at hand was buying the cleaning supplies and tidy up their own office. Following this, staff members were hired and trained. They also use organic cleaning supplies because they “don’t want to compromise on the customer’s health”.