Warm weather makes summer the most popular time of the year to move. But carrying large boxes and unloading trucks isn’t the way most people want to spend their time. That’s where Bellhops comes in – a rapidly growing start-up from Auburn University that is taking the Triangle by storm.
“Raleigh is our sixth strongest market in the entire country out of 90 markets,” said David Martin, the communications director at Bellhops. “Chapel Hill is our 34th best market in the entire country and Durham is our 29th. We’ve been able to get a lot of great traction in the Triangle.”
What began as a small campus business to move students in and out of their dorms, has since grown into a nationwide company that is filling a hole in the moving industry.
“We refer to ourselves as the option between booking a traditional moving company and begging your friends for help,” Martin said. “Until we started offering our services, there was a huge, unfilled niche in the moving industry.”
Bellhops is powered by smartphones and college labor. It uses the same business model as Uber, the popular ride share app, which means it invests in a “shared economy.” Bellhops hires college students who then accept moving jobs off an app on their phone.
“They can claim the jobs on a first come, first serve basis, just like an Uber or Lyft driver would do in their industry,” Martin said.
The company is in 90 cities from Florida to Washington State and employs over 6,500 college students. Bellhops came to Chapel Hill in July of 2013. Since then, business has been booming.
“Between 2014 and 2015 we grew by 250% in Chapel Hill,” Martin said. “And it looks like we’re going to be experiencing the same kind of growth in 2016.”
Over 100 college students in the Chapel Hill area are claiming jobs through Bellhops this summer. One of those jobs was helping local homeowner Josh Bevill move into his new house.
“They’re helping out a ton,” Bevill said about the two UNC students who carried his heaviest furniture into the house. “We’ve moved a lot of small stuff but we needed a little bit of muscle to bring in this heavy stuff.”
Each bellhop costs $40 an hour and specializes in small to medium size moves.
“It was really easy to book the bellhops,” Bevill said. “I wish I would have known about this years ago – it might have saved my back a bit.”
For more information, visit Bellhop’s official website here.
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