Wayfinder startup NeighborING is moving in … to Laguna Woods Village, that is.
The Orange County gated retirement community now uses NeighborING to help its residents with chores and other tasks.
NeighborING’s online platform connects people who have difficult tasks around the home or chores to college students who can help. A user posts a task on the NeighborING website and offers a price, either an hourly rate or a total sum. From there, students sign up for jobs, like furniture assembly, cleaning or moving. NeighborING then collects 30 percent, about seven dollars, of the client’s payment.
At Laguna Woods Village, NeighborING maintains a similar model, but residents can call the company number and a representative will complete the online request form for them. After a student has selected the task, NeighborING alerts the user.
With over 18,000 senior residents on 2,100 acres of land, Laguna Woods Village gives NeighborING ample opportunity for new clients, feedback and advertisements. It provides steady, stable income for the students and the startup company. Also, Laguna Woods Village makes up NeighborING’s central target demographic; one they had not considered when they began their company.
“This has always been one of our key target markets,” said Josh Mundell, founder and CEO of NeighborING. “But now our go-to-market strategy is based around the senior communities or very large communities.”
Beyond average tasks like gardening or IT assistance, through NeighborING, college students at Laguna Woods Village have transcribed a resident’s poetry onto a computer and helped residents recovering from surgery perform basic tasks like house cleaning or moving around their homes.
The partnership grew out of a personal connection between Mundell and Amazing Hearing, a hearing aid company that works with Laguna Woods Village. Amazing Hearing shared NeighborING brochures with the gated community and, as a result, NeighborING began a pilot program there. After a lengthy vetting process, Laguna Woods Village approved NeighborING for its sustainable business model in February. Now, the company averages about 15 to 20 customers per week from this neighborhood.
“They’re taking our materials and are handing them out to their friends because they’re so happy about the service,” said Mundell. “In startups, you talk a lot about your first users. I think we have truly hit that with Laguna Woods.”
NeighborING credits UCI Beall Applied Innovation resources, like the Innovation Advisor Network, and the Small Business Development Center at UCI Beall Applied Innovation with their company’s growth and development. The open workspace also resulted in a mutual business partnership with fellow Wayfinder team, Wing, a personal assistant app.
In the future, NeighborING plans to capitalize on the Laguna Woods Village partnership as well as connect with more senior communities. They encourage other startups to explore unexpected business routes and conduct market research.
“You need to have an open mind with whatever you are doing,” said Mundell. “Take your own passion that you have for building and creating something into your workplace.”
Learn more about NeighborING here.
Photos courtesy of NeighborING