What Happened in the Last 9 Days

When I started this series I thought that committing to writing on a tight schedule, specifically once a week on Sundays, would suffice. But it didn’t and I realized it immediately.

For the purposes of this blog — public accountability, transparency, data, and story — once a week was not enough to cover everything that I wanted to cover. I began writing at whim, sometimes writing 2 or 3 articles a day and sometimes writing none for a few days at a time.

This schedule works great for me as long as I don’t wait too long between posts. How long is too long? 5 days.

The reason is the to do list. At the bottom of each post I paste my current to do list for a multitude of reasons. If I wait too long, some important things on my to do list will appear and disappear without ever being logged in this series.

I don’t want that to happen. If I did something important, I want to log it, not to boast but to have it on record for future reference.

It has been 5 days since my last post. But just now I realized that I forgot to paste my to do list at the bottom of that post so it has actually been 9 days since my last post with my to do list. That’s a major flub on my part.

So I want to mention some of the things I have done in these 9 days since this is a critical part of the development of my company.

• I revamped the entire budgeting system. I updated my budget to include multiple revenue and expense categories which give me a better overview of my company and make taxes easier. My budget is open to the public.

Feather 2016 Budget

• I created a database to keep private customer data.
• I signed a deal with Delivery.com.
• I committed to hanging 350 door hangers a week (avg. 50 per day), and I’ve hung over 400 of them already in 6 days.

• I decided not to outsource any of the actual laundry and do it all myself allowing for full quality control.
• I got customers! So far my business has 5 total customers in 20 days of being operational. My 5th customer had not done laundry in so long her order was 95 lbs! Not only that but some of the clothes were wet and had gotten the smell of mildew so they had to be washed 2 or 3 times, which made her 7 loads turn into 10 loads of laundry!

Speaking of which, here’s what I learned about laundry —

• Guys clothes are so much easier than girl’s clothes and bonus, they’re heavier too. Girls wear flimsy pieces of cloth that have to be washed and dried with caution.
• Folding girls clothes is much harder because of the variety of shapes. Sometimes sleeves, sometimes no sleeves. Sometimes the back is longer than the front or vice versa. Sometimes it’s hard to tell which side is the top or bottom, or which side is the outside or inside. Sometimes there’s a layer underneath a layer.
• I learned that I can put the dryer on delicate, then take the delicate stuff out and increase the heat midway through the cycle and fold the delicate stuff, then take out more dry stuff and increase the heat again. This allows me to fold continuously throughout the drying cycle.
• I learned that my capacity is about 6 loads of laundry in one day before I collapse from boredom or exhaustion!
• I learned how to package and seal folded clothes (Major Key). I use plastic drop cloth for packaging. I wipe it down with disinfectant, put the folded clothes making a square in the middle, and wrap it like a Christmas present. Seal it with a Feather sticker. Sorry I forgot to take a pic.
• I started to inspect each article of clothing individually. Does it smell like mildew? Rewash. Does it have lint? Lint roller. Is it still wet? Back in the dryer. Etc. Having this much quality control is very gratifying.
• I decided to switch to all organic plant based detergents once I run out of my current stock.
• I’m considering switching from dryer sheets (known to have harmful chemicals) to organic linen spray. Not sure how this will play with my customers but I’m going to test it.

As you can see there’s so much info. I need to write more often or important things about my business may get lost in the shuffle.

To Do List

1. Fix the website — re-order button, links to the order form.
2. Write the next blog.
3. Create more Instagram memes.
4. Write the Craigslist ad.
5. Design car decals.
6. Find local bulletin boards to attach flyers / business cards.
7. Reach out to Instagram influencers.
8. Create a pitch deck for b2b sales.

This story is part of a series documenting the journey of a 2016 Dallas startup called Feather. For your reference here is the Table of Contents for the series.

Previous Story: Feather Signs a Deal with Delivery.com

Next Story: Clarifying the Milestones

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Thanks for reading!