Get a load of FlyCleaners–the new service startup that manages to offer free pick up and delivery for laundry and dry cleaning while still being affordable. Photo: Daniel Broadhurst
Call it the Uber Effect, but now it’s possible to have pretty much anything delivered within the hour to almost anywhere in BK. We covered many of these startups this winter–Divvydown makes it easy to party, Makespace simplifies storage and Postmates is like a courier on steroids.
Now there is an on-demand laundry and dry cleaning service that’s affordable and lightening fast. Its founders David Salama and Seth Berkowitz discovered that the average person spends 100 hours a year on laundry and dry cleaning, so they started FlyCleaners, and for that we thank them.
For the past several weeks I’ve been testing out FlyCleaners, which offers free pick up and delivery through their smartphone app, and I have no plans to stop–and this is coming from a full-time freelancer for whom frugality is a forgone conclusion.
Here’s what I’ve determined to be true about this seems-too-good-to-be-true service: FlyCleaners charges $4.95 for five pounds of laundry, which is roughly what my local laundromat charges for drop-off (a little cheaper in fact), and its dry cleaning prices are competitive–$3.99 for a dress shirt, vest or tie; $9.99 for a dress, suit or sport jacket; $5.99 for a jacket, skirt or sweater.
The company allows you to either schedule a pick up or delivery window, anytime between 6am and midnight, seven days a week, or request the first available driver. The drivers that have turned up at my door did so within the agreed upon time frames. One time I even got my clean laundry 12 minutes after I requested it, which is less time than it takes me to walk to the laundromat. My washed clothes have so far been ready within 24 hours, and dry cleaning within 48. I was able to track my orders through the app, and have my laundry and dry cleaning delivered separately as it was finished, instead of all at once, for no extra charge.
After your first cleaning, which comes with a $10 discount, your clothes are returned to you in reusable blue laundry and dry cleaning bags, for you to use from there on out. You can also opt for green cleaning options or leave specific instructions regarding your laundering preferences in the app. Basically, it does everything it says it does and it smells good.
At the moment, FlyCleaners is operational in North Brooklyn, and offering one free cleaning on the house to a lucky BB reader (just email us to enter, we’ll notify the winner this Friday). Need some fodder to enjoy until FlyCleaners comes to your neighborhood? See what they discovered sifting through 10,000 pounds of Brooklyn’s dirty laundry.
