Bootstrapping a Two-Sided Marketplace: Mort Fertel, CEO of SudShare (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: So, from 2017 to about 2020, that’s the phase when you crossed the million dollar milestone. Then COVID accelerated your situation. What happened?

Mort Fertel: On the customer side, I mentioned what happened there. It’s a hypothesis. I can’t prove it. I think that with life being so precious and that idea being so in the front of people’s minds, people have become more intentional about how they want to spend their time. Laundry is just this burdensome task that we just have to get done. If you can present them with an alternative like we have, they’d rather spend time with their kids and spouses.

The other thing that happened was that instead of people going to work in a suit and tie, people are working from home in sweats and pajamas. There’s more laundry. Not only is it a burdensome task, but there’s more laundry during COVID. On the sudster side, it’s really unbelievable timing. Everybody wants to work from home. It accelerated the sudster side of the platform because there was such a demand.

Sramana Mitra: Were you still doing Google advertising?

Mort Fertel: Yes.

Sramana Mitra: Did you get a lot of marketplace word-of-mouth impact on the buy side? 

Mort Fertel: Yes. When they get to the laundry bag, they’re like, “I’m never going to do laundry again.” They make these videos that they post. Their friends and family see it.  

Sramana Mitra: What is an example of virality features that you have in your app? This is one of the key things that’s helped any app reach inflection point of exponential scale.

Mort Fertel: We have a referral program. Customers can use a referral code to refer friends and family. Friends and family get a discount off their first order. The referrer gets credit towards their next order. That’s one. We also have a Be A Hero program. In the app, the customer is presented with the opportunity to be a hero for a particular friend or family. For the person of their choice, we will do their laundry for free for up to 20 pounds. The customer doesn’t get any credit. The family member gets their laundry done.

Sramana Mitra: At this point, has there been any other strategic nuance that you have introduced to the business that we have not discussed?

Mort Fertel: Not that I can think of. 

Sramana Mitra: How many people are you now?

Mort Fertel: Nachshon has a triplet brother who’s name is Moshe. We brought Moshe on full-time. He is responsible for social media marketing. He does the hiring and training of customer service staff. Moshe is really helping out. We also have a PR coordinator because we get a lot of people in the media. I mentioned that Nachshon had one developer that he works with. We now have two. And then we have about 10 customer service representatives that are responsible for customer service on both sides of the platform. 

Sramana Mitra: Are they all US-based?

Mort Fertel: Some are US-based and some are offshore.

Sramana Mitra: The total number of people would add up to what?

Mort Fertel: 17.

Sramana Mitra: It’s all still self-funded?

Mort Fertel: Yes. We’re in touch with some VCs and we’re thinking about doing a seed round, but we haven’t committed.

Sramana Mitra: Terrific. Thank you for your time.

This segment is part 5 in the series : Bootstrapping a Two-Sided Marketplace: Mort Fertel, CEO of SudShare
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