Whether it's a shoe shine at the airport or a trip to the nearest cobbler, shoe care and repair looks basically the same today as it did decades ago--that is, if you can find those services at all. But even as the shoe repair industry continues to struggle (there are an estimated 4,300 shoe repair shops today compared to 100,000 in the 1930s), one startup thinks it has an easy and accessible way to get people fixing their shoes agin.
Shoe Drop, a Chicago startup that launched in beta five months ago, has created a system for people in high-rise buildings and large offices to conveniently get shoe shines, repairs, weatherproofing, and other services. And it's about to launch an app to make the process even more seamless.
The startup works like this: Users leave their shoes at a Shoe Drop partner location, which consists of office building, residential high-rises, and select dry cleaners. Users note the specific service they need, and the shoes are returned in three days or less. Shoe Drop co-founder Brandon Labrum called the beta a "low tech" launch intended to get the service inside as many buildings as possible as the app is built. Once the Shoe Drop app hits the app store (within a week, Labrum says) customers will be able to select their service, track progress, and pay all within the app.
Shoe Drop, started by Labrum and his co-founder Duncan Davis, is in roughly 40 Chicago locations, including the Groupon, LinkedIn, and Salesforce offices, as well as a handful of law offices and real estate companies, Labrum said. The majority of locations are dry cleaning businesses, which have a Shoe Drop sticker in the window if they are partners.
"Shoe repair service has just become really inconvenient. It's really inaccessible, and it also really lacks for innovation," Labrum said. "We set out to create a solution that would completely revolutionize the industry. Something that is accessible, modern, and tech enabled."
The company charges $8 for a shoe shine, $35 for a restorative cleaning and weatherproofing, and up to $90 for sole replacement, with prices in between for a variety of other services. Shoe Drop says it isn't just collecting shoes and taking them to repair shops; the company hires its own show repair workers.
"The business is tech enabled, not tech driven," Davis said. "We employ the people who fix the shoes. We’re not just managing the logistics."
Shoe Drop isn't just a mailbox or a bin to leave your shoes in either. At offices, the secretary takes the Shoe Drop bag from a user. At an apartment building, it's the doorman. Shoe Drop then collects the bags and returns when the service is complete.
Labrum said he expects the company to have more than 150 drop off locations in Chicago by the end of the summer, and he is eyeing San Francisco and New York as potential new markets.
"Having a shoes shine guy in your lobby is becoming less and less frequent. Cobblers are going the way of the dinosaurs," Labrum said. "Shoe repair has never been offered in a way that feels more like an amenity."
