Lightspeed backs Indian home services startup Snabbit as the next big consumer trend | TechCrunch

Home services in India — whether it is cleaning, dishwashing, or laundry — have traditionally been offline and informally run. This has often resulted in delays and uncertainties for consumers, as well as inconsistent pay and job insecurity for workers. Recently, however, startups have begun viewing this area as ripe for transformation, leveraging technology to bring predictability, scalability, and structure to the space.

Snabbit, founded last year, is one of the early movers in this arena, enabling customers to book high-frequency home services, including cleaning, dishwashing, laundry, and kitchen preparation, through its app, with delivery as fast as 10 minutes. The startup has now raised $19 million in a Series B round led by Lightspeed, with participation from its existing investors Elevation Capital and Nexus Venture Partners, at a post-money valuation of $80 million to expand its presence.

The 15-month-old startup launched its quick-service platform in the western Indian city of Mumbai, the country’s financial capital, after founder and CEO Aayush Agarwal personally experienced the challenges of finding reliable home services. At one point, Agarwal told TechCrunch, the situation became so difficult that his mother had to fly in from the eastern Indian city of Kolkata to help him find a new domestic worker.

“What stayed with me was that in a world of convenience where you can press a button, and you’ll get a cab, or you’ll get food or groceries, you can even get someone to go out on a date with, but finding someone for a simple service at home was excruciatingly difficult,” he said in an interview.

The startup ran experiments early last year and remained in one micro market in Mumbai for the first 12 months before expanding to seven markets in the city and one in Bengaluru.

Snabbit took a “full-stack approach” to sourcing, screening, training, onboarding, and managing workers, who the startup calls “experts.” Once Snabbit signs them, it has the workers move close to the startup’s demand centers so they can fulfill the company’s promise to provide service in 10 minutes.

Snabbit is not alone in this race, as incumbent Urban Company (backed by storied investors, including Accel, Prosus, and Tiger Global) started a similar experience on its app earlier this year. However, the company faced criticism due to the initial message it conveyed and the name Insta Maids, which it later corrected and renamed to Insta Help. This did not help convince many, including gig worker unions, though.

Similarly, newer entrants, including Broomees and Pronto, have also joined the arena recently. The latter even recently attracted Bain Capital Ventures for its seed funding.

“We know that the market is heating up,” he said. “The category is getting exciting, new players are coming in and getting funded. And I think all of it is great for us as long as we keep executing relentlessly.”

The startup charges customers between ₹169 (about $2) and ₹499 (nearly $6) to avail services of up to 240 minutes. The pricing is higher than that of Urban Company’s Insta Help, which starts at ₹49 (50 cents). However, Agarwal said the startup continued to grow and scale even after Urban Company’s foray into the market.

Agarwal hopes to compete with a consistent customer experience using its in-house tech stack that includes an internal CRM tool, a sourcing and screening pipeline, and an eKYC process to better comply with local regulations.

Snabbit currently has over 600 workers on its platform, and each of them covers a median walking distance of 300 meters between two jobs. It has also partnered with the mobility startup Yulu to train and provide ebikes to its women workers, covering a larger median distance of 800 meters between their jobs. Moreover, Agarwal told TechCrunch that the startup will reduce the median distance for its workers as it scales.

The average ticket size on Snabbit’s platform is between ₹250-₹270 (about $3), while its workers completing a 12-hour shift earn “upward” of ₹40,000 ($470) a month. For completing 4 hours a day on the platform, the workers get over ₹10,000 ($120) a month, Agarwal said, adding that workers are also eligible for bonuses.

Agarwal contends that workers can earn more than the roughly ₹9,000 ($100) that domestic helpers in urban locations are typically paid in the country, per the International Domestic Workers Federation (PDF).

Better treatment for domestic workers

Snabbit also provides personal life insurance, health insurance, and accidental insurance to all its workers, as well as family insurance to those who have been with the startup for some time.

Workplace abuse has also been quite prevalent for domestic workers in India, as the country predominantly lacks protective laws. For such cases, the startup provides an SOS feature on its app that workers can use to call a field operations team, which reaches the location within “five to seven minutes” to help workers in edge situations, the founder said.

Over the last four months, Agarwal stated the startup grew 5x and is currently growing around 20% week-over-week. It plans to expand to over 200 micro markets across metro cities in India within the next nine months by utilizing the fresh capital and hire more employees in its workforce that has nearly 100 people.

That said, several hyperlocal consumer apps have been tried and failed repeatedly. For instance, food deliveries imploded globally in 2023 after the pandemic-led lockdowns eased, but they started facing challenges in the last few months. Even in India, instant food delivery models introduced by quick commerce platforms including Zepto and Zomato have struggled. The former paused its 10-minute cafe services due to supply constraints, while the latter halted its 15-minute food delivery service just four months after launch, citing “no incrementality in demand.”

The cost of acquiring customers and providing suppliers in their location is expensive and often hard to pay over time. In Snabbit’s case, TechCrunch has learned that the customer acquisition cost is ₹700 ($8), while its average ticket size is about $3.

The startup has onboarded over 25,000 customers so far, and an average customer transacts on the platform at least three times a month, per Agarwal.

“Our retention rates are as good as any consumer internet company, say, a Zepto or Swiggy, would be having,” the executive said.

Nevertheless, it remains to be seen how the startup can retain its customers over time and beat the competition while continuing to scale and expand its market in India.

“Snabbit is transforming home services in India by bringing speed, structure, and trust to a sector that has largely operated informally until now,” said Rahul Taneja, a partner at Lightspeed, in a prepared statement. “We are excited to join them on this journey and support their mission to transform and scale what was once considered a luxury into a day-to-day necessity.”