News

Actions

The 'Uber for moving': Bellhops booming in Kansas City's exploding market

Posted at 4:38 PM, Jun 07, 2016
and last updated 2016-06-07 23:26:11-04

A company that has expanded to Kansas City is giving hundreds of college students summer work and may be changing an industry while doing so.

Bellhops exclusively hires college students who take jobs helping customers move through orders on their mobile app or website.

The new company says they’ve experienced “mushrooming demand” in Kansas City, and have therefore created at least 100 new jobs this summer alone.

“Last year Bellhops' business grew by 150 percent in Kansas City. We’re planning to do more of the same in 2016, and we’ll need to add a slew of Bellhops to support that growth,” said Bellhops COO Matt Patterson.

Referred to as the “Uber for moving,” Bellhops pays their workers between $13 and $15 an hour and currently has students from Johnson County Community College, Park University, Rockhurst University, UMKC and William Jewell College.

"We provide the labor and the labor is a lot cheaper than those big moving companies,” said Bellhops employee and Rockhurst student Alex Hagan.

For students like Hagan, the job is perfect. It pays well, it's flexible and as long as he’s available, he can grab new work within a matter of hours.

"I had someone book a job last week, and I was there in an hour and a half,” said Rockhurst student Nat Cole.

Stuart McCaskill and his wife used Bellhops for the first time for help moving to a new house in the Northland and both were happy with the service.

“I wanted to find a moving company that did that [hire college students] because it's hard for these kids to find just three months of employment,” said McCaskill.

So far the young company doesn’t have too many complaints online, only a small handful of reviews complaining about the functionality of the app.

Charles Wilson, a local realtor, believes that companies like Bellhops will continue to thrive as long as the Kansas City market stays active.

"In most respects it's crazy. It's what I call a hyper-market where things sell in hours,” he said.

Bellhops is currently in 90 cities nationwide, employing roughly 6,000 college students. 

------

 

Josh Helmuth can be reached at josh.helmuth@kshb.com

Follow him on Twitter:

Follow @Jhelmuth

Connect on Facebook: