Participated · Seed · Jan 2014

Washio operates an on-demand laundry and dry-cleaning pickup and dropoff service accessed via a mobile app. The company launched in Los Angeles and has expanded service to San Francisco and Washington, D.C. It was founded a little more than a year ago and has grown quickly—revenues have increased 8x since last September. Washio currently employs about 20 full-time staff and uses roughly 120 drivers to serve its markets. The company plans to use new funding to expand into additional U.S. cities (including New York, Boston, Miami, Atlanta, Chicago, Austin, Denver and Seattle) and to hire more engineers and drivers. Its near-term focus is geographic expansion and scaling operations to support growing demand. Washio offers a mobile app that lets users schedule laundry pickup and delivery for wash-and-fold or dry cleaning with a 24-hour turnaround. The company contracts washing to third-party laundry facilities while it handles pickup, drop-off, fulfillment and in-app payments. Launched in Los Angeles and expanded to San Francisco, the two markets are nearly on par and the service briefly shifted to a 36-hour turnaround before returning to 24 hours due to high demand. Washio says it is preparing to enter a third city and is targeting expansion into five to ten new cities this year. It is also pushing an enterprise product that lets employers offer Washio credits as an employee perk and has signed a few pilot clients. Financially, Washio raised $2.25 million in a celebrity-filled seed round and had previously raised $550,000, bringing total disclosed funding to $2.8 million.