Tired of doing laundry? These startups want to help.

Summary

Doing laundry can be a chore. It takes time and is tedious. Few of us like to do it. So it’s no surprise that startups have emerged to take that load off your back — literally. And investors are lining up to fund new and older players alike. Eleven-month-old NoScrubs has just raised $2 million in a pre-seed round led by Initialized Capital for its on-demand laundry delivery service. And in late February, Rinse raised a $23 million Series D led by LG Electronics to continue growing its 12-year-old business, which includes dry cleaning services. While they have different business models, the two companies are the latest examples of laundry startups attracting venture capital. And they’re hoping to succeed in a space that has seen other startups wash up. Early Instacart employee Matt O’Connor, CEO of NoScrubs, and Sudhanshu Gautam, CTO, (pictured above) founded the startup nearly a year ago with the intent of building a faster, more affordable laundry service. The company claims it can return folded loads within a few hours from pickup. Customers can either pay on demand or sign up for a subscription. So far, NoScrubs is only available in its home base of Austin, where it’s approaching 1,000 unique customers, O’Connor tells TechCrunch exclusively. (I used the service briefly in 2024 when our home renovation resulted in a loss of access to our washer and dryer.) Rinse, which touts itself as the “Uber of laundry,” was founded by CEO Ajay Prakash, CTO Sam Cheng, and James Joun in 2013. It has raised over $70 million since inception. San Francisco-based Rinse currently operates in several major U.S. cities. It pledges to turn around laundry or dry cleaning within as little as 24 hours (for an extra fee) but has a standard three- to four-day turnaround. It prides itself on hiring its workers as employees rather than making them independent contractors. NoScrubs The idea for NoScrubs was born while O’Connor was head of geographic expansion at Instacart as one of its first 20...