Students launch cleaning company

Hearing her friend complain about their messy apartment, Mila Vipond, who loves cleaning, jokingly told her, “I’ll do it for you.” But what started out as an offhand comment said in passing grew into a full-fledged cleaning operation for student living spaces with 15 clients, a mix of one-timers and regulars. From piles of overflowing dishes in the sink to rust-stained bathtubs lined with moldy bath mats to mountains of laundry mountains, Vipond and Kaitlin Schachter, her business partner and co-founder of Tidy Trojans, have seen it all. 

In line with their mission statement, Vipond, a sophomore majoring in business administration, and Schachter, a sophomore majoring in psychology, said they started their company to reduce the time their peers spend on cleaning so they can “free up their time and make the most of their college experience.”

“I feel like a lot of times in college, there’s so much going on, especially with the academic portion and balancing that with the social life, but there’s a lot to do,” Schachter said. “The last thing you want to do is spend that little bit of free time that you might have in your busy schedule cleaning up your apartment, so through our company, we do that for you, so you can have more time to live your life and go do the things that you want to be doing.”

Tidy Trojans was founded last November, closed for winter break and reopened in late January. Vipond is in charge of the cleaning, while Schachter runs the company’s social media accounts. 

After the visit to their friend’s apartment, Vipond said Tidy Trojans began on a “whim.” 

“Literally that same night … I started drawing a logo for us,” Vipond said. “It took me like until 2 a.m. or 3 a.m. where we’re just talking about it … The following day, I got up at 9:30 a.m. and within a span of four hours, I had put together a website, created social media pages and basically put us on the map.”

The very next day, Tidy Trojans had its first appointment. 

Minjoo Koo, a junior majoring in business administration and art history, and her housemates decided to hire Tidy Trojans to clean their apartment, who she said transformed their “disorganized” space. In only a span of an hour, Koo said the entire place became “really clean.” 

“I would totally recommend it to other people,” Koo said. “Especially to people who don’t really clean their apartment.”

Tidy Trojans charges $30 for the first hour and $20 for every subsequent hour. Students can book an appointment through Tidy Trojans’ website or Instagram page. 

Jeneva Lindsey, a graduate student studying social work, discovered Tidy Trojans from a flyer hanging in her apartment building. As someone who has a hard time keeping her space clean when she’s stressed, Lindsey said using Tidy Trojans’ services freed up her time to focus on other things.

“I definitely needed the help,” Lindsey said. “I was literally in class while she did the laundry … I could definitely feel a responsibility being lifted off of me.”

Vipond said that an important part of her work is helping people stay stress-free. On her first job, she remembers feeling initially overwhelmed by the mess she’d have to clean but, by the end, felt satisfied with her work. 

“There were pots and pans in the sink that had been in there so long, they rusted and started to rust through the sink,” Vipond said. “They had never used the dishwasher; there was still Styrofoam in it from when it was initially put in. They had never cleaned their bathrooms and toilets.”

After the two and a half hours Vipond spent cleaning, she said the place was “spotless.” Vipond said she noticed every time she returned, the owners were able to maintain it better and better.  

As Vipond transports all her own supplies riding her scooter, Tidy Trojans serve a two-mile radius outside of USC’s campus. When the University lifts the no-guest rule for campus housing Mar. 1 as communicated in a Feb. 18 email to USC Housing residents, Vipond said Tidy Trojans will also be available to those who live on campus. 

Through her work at Tidy Trojans, Vipond said she’s realized how challenging it is for students to keep their living spaces clean. 

“I”ve learned that most people want to live in a clean space, but many were never taught the proper ways to clean or know what products to use,” she said. 

Vipond said that the greatest challenge of staying on top of cleaning is not letting chores, like laundry or dishes, pile up as the more there is, the more daunting it is to clean it. 

“Just as a starting point for everyone is to take five minutes a day and just say, ‘Okay, I’m going to take this five minutes and tidy up my room,’” she said. “At least twice a week, I’m going to do laundry instead of once every two weeks.”