Busy consumers are hiring personal errand services to handle an increasing array of household chores

by Olivia Winslow
Staff Writer


IT'S THE END of a long workweek. You've put in your 40 hours and then some.

You've commuted an hour each way on the train or slogged your way through enough stalled traffic on the Long Island Expressway to try the patience of a saint. But it's your time now. Time to kick back and enjoy. You don't want to toil on household drudgery or run around all weekend on annoying little errands. Still, things need to get done. No problem. There's somebody out there who will do it for you-for a price, of course.

Want a well-balanced meal ready and waiting for you when you walk in the door? A personal chef will see to it.

Does the prospect of standing in line for a couple of hours at the Department of Motor Vehicles fill you with dread? There's a service out there that can do it for you.

Don't have the time to run to the mall? Or just hate to shop? There are errand services out there that will shop for gifts, wrap them and deliver them.

Need groceries, but hate cruising the aisles of the local supermarket? Try online grocery shopping or a shopping service.

If you're a pack rat who rarely throws things away, leave it to a professional organizer to take the reins and show you how to streamline.

And the list goes on.

It seems that the range of services is limited only by one's imagination.

The concept of personal delivery services is hardly new, said Hofstra University economics professor Irwin Kellner, pointing out that we have been able to get pizzas and Chinese food delivered for years. But what you can get delivered to your home or handled for you has become much more varied. Kellner, who also is chief economist for CBS MarketWatch.com, a financial news Web site, suggested the catalyst for such services is the two-income household that "needs help with normal household chores." "When I was a kid, my mother did everything, but she spent a whole day planning evening meals, going from store to store. There was no such thing as these services, unless the local grocery store might have a delivery boy drop off heavy bundles. Starting in the mid-'60s, when women began to work to a greater extent, obviously, that led the way for these services. This is nothing new.

"What is new," he said, are "companies chopping up the business in finer and finer pieces." And the rise of the Internet "has just accelerated the process." Gail Satler, a professor of sociology at Hofstra, added another element.

Despite technological advancements that many thought would make our lives easier, Satler said research has shown those advances haven't really reduced the drudgery factor all that much. And with more women working outside the home and still facing more work when they get home, Satler said it's not surprising many people are seeking relief.

"People are thinking about how to make the most of time and family," Satler said. "Even people not making a lot of money pay someone else to do it instead of fighting over who will do it. If you have a limited amount of time to spend, why spend it on housework when you could spend time with family?" Why, indeed.


Charol Shakeshaft turned to Pamela Fosella of Huntington, who operates a one-woman enterprise called Out-N-About Errand Service, because as a wife, mother and Hofstra University professor who also co-owns an educational consulting business with her husband, time is a luxury she doesn't like to waste. Shakeshaft said she loves to give Christmas presents to family, friends and co-workers - about a hundred people are on her list-but she hates shopping.

So she selects items from catalogs and has Fosella do the shopping.

Fosella "did online ordering or she went to the particular stores that I'd indicated [the items] would be at ...then she would order them. She made a Web site for me to show what had come in and what hadn't, where there had been a change," something Shakeshaft hadn't expected.

"It worked out beautifully." As Fosella shopped for white and red impatiens at a Huntington nursery for another client, with son Paul Jr., 1 1/2, in tow, she explained her motivation for going into the errand business. "I'm just trying to make people's lives easier." A former high school math teacher, Fosella said she stays at home with her son and decided to offer an errand service as a way to make some money and do what she loves.

"I love to shop. I'm going to be shopping whether it's my money or your money," Fosella said, laughing. But more seriously, she views her errand service as a way to provide a service for busy people and to take the "drudgery out of a task for a client, leaving the client to do what he or she enjoys, like planting the flowers without having to do the shopping for them. They magically appear in your yard." Having someone else do what Shakeshaft finds off-putting was worth the cost, she said. "I hate to go on errands and I don't like to go to stores," Shakeshaft said. She said she has used a variety of personal service contractors over the years, "partly to save time so I can use my time in other ways," particulary spending it with her family. "As a mother and a worker outside the home, it just offers me more time to do the things I want and less time spent on things I don't like to do."


Listen to Eleni O. Marudis, owner of the appropriately titled U Name It Organizers, based in Manhattan, which also serves Long Island clients: "We provide around 200 services," from going to the DMV to get a client's car registered to house cleaning to organizing. Fees start at $50 an hour and can run up to $250, depending on the service and whether a client is private or corporate. "We are so many things to different people," Marudis said, hence the title of her business. "As long as it's legal, we'll do it."

The demand for such help has enabled Liz Holt of Kings Park, owner of Let Lizzzzzz Do It, to make a living full-time on her errand service. "There were years when I had full- time jobs" and conducted the errand business on the side, Holt said. But for the past five or six years, Holt said she has been running errands-or arranging for other people to do the tasks her clients want done-full time. "I don't even advertise. I just go by word of mouth...I'm not well off, but I'm comfortable." Josephine Amplo found that she, too, could make a business out of grocery shopping for others. Since 1994, she has operated Josephine's Shopping Service out of her Selden home. It doesn't hurt that King Kullen supermarkets has recommended her service to busy customers who'd rather have someone else shop for them. It has grown into a company that she said now has about 1,000 clients, 90 to 95 of whom she and her workers shop for on a weekly basis. "When I started, I had three customers." Audrey Lavine, president of the New York chapter of the National Association of Professional Organizers, which includes businesses that provide everything from concierge or errand services to space organizing, time management and clutter-control services, said time constraints are the key factor that has triggered a growth in these kinds of businesses. "Everything is so sped up and we're also inundated with so much more information. Things come into our home uninvited. More and more information has to be processed. You come home from work, another pile of stuff is waiting in the mailbox." Things pile up and soon, Lavine said, some people find they've lost control and are overwhelmed.

It's Easy, a Manhattan-based company, has made a business out of standing in line for people. The company has clients from the metropolitan New York area as well as out of state. It's Easy employees will go to the DMV to get clients' cars registered or obtain license plates, or tackle City Hall to obtain a birth certificate, or other agencies to obtain passports and visas. "Everyone can do any of these transactions themselves," said Leslie Shapiro, president of It's Easy. But "often, you go down there unprepared. So you wait in line three hours, and when you get your turn, you find you don't have the right documentation." So, many turn to It's Easy to take care of it for them, for a cost that ranges from $15 to $175, depending on what is needed.

"Everyone is too busy," said Jody Berman, explaining why her business, So Organized! Ltd., based out of her Roslyn Heights home, is thriving. "Everyone's got the same 24 hours and trying to make the most of it. They feel technology will save time, but ultimately it doesn't necessarily save time. It could take you weeks or years just to learn how to use that technology. Ultimately, you could be doing something else." If Berman does it for you, the cost ranges from $60 to $100 an hour, depending on the task and whether the client is corporate or residential.

Berman's work varies, from helping a business maximize employee productivity to making order out of chaos in a client's home. "I help people organize their paperwork in the residence," Berman said, giving one example of how she helps people "declutter their lives." "Many times, people don't know what to do after the mail comes in. Many people are amazed we can make a business out of it and many people are amazed there are people like them who need this help," she said.

Technology has become an increasing presence in the field of personal services, with many entrepreneurs using the Internet to tap into a consumer base.

Take, for instance, mylackey.com, an online errand service that started in January in Seattle. In May, the service took its business to Portland, Ore., and plans to branch out later this year to San Francisco, Washington, D.C., New York, Boston, Los Angeles, San Diego and Irvine, Calif.

Mylackey's services include washing and detailing a client's car, house cleaning, laundry, shopping, pet care and arranging a massage. "We're solely on the Web," said Mylackey spokeswoman Andrea Britt, with clients ordering what they want through their computers and Mylackey personnel making the deliveries or performing a particular service.

Manhattan residents can log onto kozmo.com or ur banfetch.com to have a smorgasbord of items delivered to their doors, from foods and compact discs to books and movies.

Ross Stevens, CEO and president of Urbanfetch, says his company's promise to make deliveries in under an hour -as does kozmo.com-is a direct result of the Internet. "It simply would not have been possible without the Internet," which enables the fast transmission and processing of a customer's order. But the company does take phone orders as well. While the company owns the domain name sub urbanfetch.com and is always looking for new markets, the current focus is on urban areas, Stevens said. He said suburban residents commuting into the city by train can use the service by picking up their Urbanfetch order at the company's kiosk in Penn Station.

Whether you're getting something delivered to your home, having something picked up or cleaned or organized for you, it's all about convenience and what you're willing -and able -to pay.

Marudis of U Name It, who said she once toiled in the health care field, recalled how she would often hire someone to do her laundry "even on my limited salary." "I was too busy," she said. "I was on a 24-hour-a- day beeper...I said, 'If I can afford this on my salary, I bet there's a whole world out there waiting for somebody to do things for them.'" She found that world 14 years ago, when she started her business, and hasn't looked back.

Online Services Kozmo.com: online shopping and delivery service based in New York.

Advertises making deliveries in less than an hour. Serves New York City, Boston, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Chicago, Atlanta, Washington, D.C., and Portland, Ore., with more cities to follow. Phone orders also accepted at 877-GO-KOZMO.

Urbanfetch.com: online shopping and delivery service. Advertises making deliveries in less than an hour. Serves New York City, with plans to open in London next month. Future plans include branching out to other U.S. cities.

Suburban residents who commute into the city can pick up orders at an Urbanfetch kiosk in Penn Station (near Amtrak trains). Phone orders are accepted at 212-981-3500.

Mylackey.com: online errand service currently in Seattle and Portland, Ore., with plans to branch out to several cities, including New York, later this year.

HOME COOKING FOR HIRE IF THE PROSPECT OF COMING HOME to an aroma of something delectable emanating from your kitchen is a fantasy for you, dream no more. A personal chef can make it a reality.

"Most people are busy. They come home, they don't want to hassle with having to make dinner," said personal chef Scott Pierce, owner of the Huntington Cooking Studio.

"When they get home, the house is smelling nice because of the fragrance of the food that's been cooked," Pierce said. And all the customer has to do is warm up the meal that's been prepared by the chef.

The popularity of personal chefs is growing, and not only among the very rich.

Pierce cites, for example, middle-income and upper-middle-income busy "two-career couples" who make up a large share of his clientele.

Andrew Palazzotto, owner and chef of Once Upon a Table Personal Chef Service based in Oakdale, has a similar customer base, adding, "I think they're calling me because they're real busy. They really don't have the time to do the planning of the meal, shopping for the meal, the preparation. Most people get home after 7 p.m. The last thing they want to think of is the meal. That's where I come in. I do all the work in their home. I'm using 99 percent of my own utensils. I clean up. Most often people don't know that I've been there except for the smell in the house or the food in the fridge or they realize the kitchen is really clean." Palazzotto said personal chefs are becoming a "huge" trend that he believes will "stick around." Alicia Mandel-Hickey agreed. "People are loving it," said Mandel-Hickey, who handles sales marketing for Bryanna's Table Personal Chefs and Catering, which serves New York City, Queens and Nassau County. (Her husband, Patrick, is the chef). She thought they'd get a higher-income clientele but has discovered their services are sought out by hard-working, dual-career couples, many with no children.

A personal chef who not only cooks the meal customized to meet the client's preferences, but also does the shopping-taking care to buy only the best ingredients, freshest produce and best meats available-is the sort of thing that appeals to busy people, Mandel-Hickey said, at a cost many find affordable.

The prices of meals by personal chefs vary, ranging anywhere from $150 for three meals a week to $300 to $400 for 10- and 20-meal packages.

Personal chefs serving Long Island include: Bryanna's Table Personal Chefs and Catering, 212- 929-3543.

The Huntington Cooking Studio, 631-271-2554.

Once Upon a Table Personal Chef Service, 631-419- 0011.

Time to Dine, 516-295-4039.

Dinners to Please Inc., 631-563-1450.

Heavenly Cuisine, 718-746-7090.

The U.S. Personal Chef Association, 800-995-2138; and the American Personal Chef Association, 800-644- 8389, can give referrals for personal chefs in your area, or go to the American association's Web site: www.personalchef.com and click on the "Find A Personal Chef" icon.

Out-N-About Errand Service, 631-697-2959, Web address: http://out-n-about.net

Out-N-About Errand Service
phone:631-697-2959
E-MAIL: out.n.about@juno.com
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