Lulu, leaving behind the anonymity and isolation

Notre Dame de Paris

July 20, 2017 -- A couple years ago, a fellow named Vincent decided to start up a new service in the 4^th arrondissement, in the St. Paul neighborhood.  That service is now spreading throughout Paris, and it is about something more than providing services.  It is about making human connections.

The service is called “Lulu Dans ma Rue,” meaning “Lulu in my street.”  It puts people who need services rendered together with people who can render those services.  What services?   Examples are delivering groceries, delivering warm croissants and the newspaper on Sunday, making minor repairs around the home, assembling that new bookcase from Ikea, walking the dog, watering the plants while you’re on vacation, carrying heavy boxes down to the basement, getting a troublesome computer to work, etc.

Graffiti art along the Seine

Those who need to place an order for help can do so by going to a nearby kiosque that is staffed by volunteers, or placing the order online at www.luludansmarue.org.

Yes, it is a sort of “job creation” project; but Lulu Dans ma Rue is also about a conviction, clearly stated on its web site.  Let me translate:

Lulu dans ma rue, is also the conviction that our society will be better if we put humanity back in our daily lives.  We’re in a society where services are driven by marketing and excessive productivity that depersonalizes the benefits rendered;  it is time to recreate a place with authentic human relations and with confidence in my neighborhood.  That’s a way of reaching out to the folks in my neighborhood that I know and that I appreciate, to help me in my daily life.  The promise of Lulu dans ma rue is then to construct the neighborhood life that I love and that I desire, where the service rendered consciously permits the re-creation of ties, leaving behind anonymity and isolation.

Ah, so Parisian!

In 2015, I think the going rate for a Lulu’s help was 15 euros per hour, and that seems to have been adjusted now to 20 euros per hour.  The Lulu service collects a 15 percent fee for connecting Lulus with customers.

Using the Lulu service, housecleaning costs 20 euros per hour.  A helping hand simple tasks is 10 euros for 30 minutes.  Help with heavier tasks is 15 euros for 30 minutes.  Babysitting is 20 euros per hour, and gardening is 15 euros for 30 minutes.  Feeding a cat or walking a dog is 10 euros per visit.  You get the idea.

The concept is that you’re doing business with others in your neighborhood; hopefully, you will get to know them.  You will care about them, and they’ll care about you.

Art along the Seine

I do not know if there is any vetting of the Lulus, or of the customers, for that matter.  I don’t know if local businesses have complained that this is unfair competition for them.  And I don’t know of any problems that have resulted from Lulu interactions gone wrong.

I do know that I really like the concept.  I wonder if this would work back home in Florida?

Here in the 15^th arrondissement, a Lulu kiosque has been set up at the Place du Commerce, a couple blocks down the street from us.  A temporary kiosque is also set up at the Grenelle outdoor market, which operates on Wednesday and Sunday mornings. 

According to the 15^th’s mayor, Philippe Goujon, about a hundred residents stop by the kiosque at the Place du Commerce every day!