Cleaning is Only Just a Click Away

CleanNow, describing themselves as ‘expert cleaners in Edmonton, Sherwood Park and St Albert’, are a home cleaning startup based in Edmonton, Canada. Their aim is to unite households in the pursuit of cleanliness, without you having to do a thing. They boast of a network of over 5,000 cleaning entrepreneurs across Canada, supplying an on-demand service at the click of a button.

By Cara Bedford

CleanNow app launched in November 2018 on IOS and Android with a buzz in the local tech community. Therefore, I had to try it out. Before giving the app and the service a spin, I spoke to Angus Gastle, CEO and President of CleanNow. Angus opened with a pretty comprehensive pitch for his vision. “Our cleaners are experts in residential home cleaning, are fully insured, bonded and have completed our comprehensive CleanNow training program” he said. “We do in-person interviews and they are not released until they pass the training and comply with our standards. They have to learn how to use our products, and clean our way.”

In the traditional house cleaning world, I would post an ad, conduct interviews, call references, do a criminal background check, make sure their paperwork was in order, create a contract, agree on price per hour, estimate the time it would take to clean my house, buy supplies and then hire the cleaner.

In the CleanNow world I download the app, fill out some information, select my preferred time, see the cleaner’s ratings and get my house cleaned. Then, when they have completed the job, I leave a review.

“Basically, you have a regular, deep or move/in out clean. The booking system matches you to the cleaner in the closest proximity in your neighbourhood that is available with the highest rating” Gastle said, “they can be available now or later at your convenience.”

EXPANSION PLANS ARE IN THE WORKS

CleanNow currently operates in Edmonton, St. Alberta, and Sherwood park but are hoping to expand across Alberta in 2019, and then throughout Canada.
“We are using cleaning products that are not things you can just buy. They are made with all natural ingredients. We picked this group of cleaners specifically so they were safe for the inhabitants, but also for the contents of your home, so that we don’t hurt your countertops while we are cleaning.”

COMMERCIAL PARTNERS

The two lead investors planted the initial seed for this whole concept. Over conversations in 2017 they believed there was a gap in the market for on-demand cleaning services. They looked at their own network who were cleaning mostly at night, but the idea of cleaning during the day for residential properties was appealing, allowing their workforce to take advantage of the full 24 hour cycle.

According to Angus, the problems they faced haven’t been technological, but linguistic.
“The biggest hurdle we have encountered has been language barriers. We are rapidly working on building our app in multiple languages to serve all those who want to use our app, in their preferred language.”

Currently, CleanNow only offers residential cleaning through the app.

DATA AND TECH WILL PLAY A HUGE ROLE MOVING FORWARD

Social media has obviously been a large play for them. While they are in their early stages now, there are a number of other technologies they are looking at for tomorrow. They are looking to improve the ability to get accurate square footage measurements of each home and to predict the exact job type. They are also working on an accurate automated quoting system to improve fee rates, and incorporating machine learning into their pricing structure. “We are obviously very concerned with data governance and security, and we are using a Canadian database hosting center. We are encrypting everything to encryption standard, everything for payment data is going through stripe and doing penetration testing of our facilities.”

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