Angelika After years of persuading Michael, I finally got a new bed a year and a half ago (Rundbrief 12/2016), and I thought to myself, that worked out well, now we also need a new sofa. After all, we've had our old one for almost 20 years, and it was getting a bit worn out, and I didn't like the shape as much anymore. So we tried out various sofas in furniture stores and eventually found the right model again at the Canadian furniture store EQ3. The waiting time for the good piece was a solid 6-8 weeks, as the sofa was built for us in Winnipeg, Canada, and upholstered with the fine leather we had chosen. When the delivery company informed us that our sofa was ready for its grand debut in our living room, we started to scramble a bit, wondering where to put the old one.

Anyone who has ever tried to give away an old sofa knows what I'm talking about. Our sofa was indeed older, but still in good condition. The fabric was a bit faded on one side and not as vibrant red as when it was new, but the sofa was neither sagging nor broken, so it was far too good for the junkyard. We thought, let's just donate the sofa to Goodwill (Rundbrief 03/2003) for a good cause, but it wasn't as easy as we thought. Goodwill is a large non-profit organization that accepts all kinds of donations, and they even want sofas. The company supposedly works with a third-party provider that picks up the sofas, but they never answered the phone or checked their voicemail when we called. By the time they finally called us back after weeks, we had already gotten rid of the old sofa. The organization "Salvation Army" also accepts sofas and even picks them up. However, the next available pickup date was four weeks later, and we didn't want to have two sofas sitting around in the apartment for four weeks.

Michael also made an effort on "Nextdoor" (Rundbrief 09/2014), the neighborhood portal, to get someone to take the sofa. An older couple was also interested and came by to try it out, but then realized that our sofa was too big for their apartment. We had, of course, provided the measurements, but they had apparently overlooked that. So Michael posted a classified ad on craigslist.org and lo and behold, a couple who had just moved to San Francisco from Singapore showed interest. But they lived on the other side of town, so how were they supposed to get the sofa from our apartment in Noe Valley to their place? Sure, you can rent a small truck from U-Haul, but the downside is that you have to carry the sofa to the truck yourself and drive the truck through the city on your own.

But in the age of the internet, someone has naturally already come up with the brilliant idea of offering the appropriate service for it. The company is called "lugg.com". "Lugg" apparently refers to lugging furniture, and it has been around since 2015, now in several cities in the US. The idea is that if someone wants to quickly transport a few pieces of furniture within city limits from point A to point B, but doesn't need a whole moving truck or doesn't want to become a mover themselves, they install the app on their phone and enter the details of the transport.

In the next step, the customer chooses whether they need a pickup truck with one "Lugger" (i.e., furniture mover) or two, or a slightly larger van. The cheapest option for just one piece of furniture with only one mover costs $33 base price plus $0.85 per working minute across the city. For two "Luggers," the price increases to $45 plus $1.45 per working minute. Similar to the ride services "Uber" or "Lyft" (Rundbrief 03/2013), the "Luggers" use their own vehicle. The brilliant thing is that the whole process is quick. You can have the moving truck at your door within half an hour, but of course, you can also book further in advance. So, the next big Ikea purchase that doesn't fit in your car is saved, because Ikea's own transport service usually takes much longer.

The idea for "lugg.com" came from Jordan Brown, who worked for a small healthcare startup in Salt Lake City and often encountered the furniture transportation dilemma. Brown developed the app and then moved to San Francisco to launch "lugg.com." The service is now available in San Francisco, Sacramento, Seattle, San Diego, Los Angeles, Silicon Valley, and Orange County.

Everything went well for us. The "movers" did drag our sofa a bit across the floor, which made me quite anxious, and of course, they didn't have a dolly with them (this seems to be a common phenomenon even among professional movers), but Michael is well-equipped in this regard. The new owners were able to track the sofa on its way to their apartment via the app, and after half an hour, it arrived safely. Our red sofa now has a new home.

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• More topics you might be interested in:

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