Colette Monaghan

Twenty Years Of Small Business, Right Here In Portland

Colette Monaghan - Founder

Bin There, Tote That! isn't my first company, and the ones before it are why this one works the way it does.

In 2002 I started Real Solutions Marketing by myself. Realtors and mortgage brokers needed a way to stay in front of their clients, so I designed, printed and mailed it for them: flyers, postcards, newsletters, the whole thing. I learned the business one customer at a time. Within three years we were at $250,000 in sales. Within five, more than 700 clients across the country and four full time employees who kept it all moving.

I loved that work. Not the growth chart, but the calls. Hundreds of people trusted me with the thing their livelihood depended on, and I got to be genuinely useful to them.

These days I also manage operations at Monaghan's Landscaping. That means all of it: the financials, the scheduling, the hiring, and the systems that let a company grow without falling apart. In season we run a crew of up to thirteen. It's small and family owned, and our Google and Yelp ratings are high because our customers are happy. In this business you can't fake that. People talk.

So Why Totes? Why Rent Plastic Moving Boxes?

Because I keep living the problem. This year I moved again, into a new house in Milwaukie, and the cardboard chapter is still the worst part of it. The running to the store multiple times. The taping. The box that gives out halfway up the stairs. Then a mountain of flattened cardboard in the driveway that you now have to deal with on top of everything else. No one's ever finished a move and thought, the boxes were the good part.

There's no reason it has to work that way. Sturdy totes already exist. Somebody just has to show up with them, take them away afterward, and charge a price you can understand before you book. That's not a technology problem. It's an operations problem, and running crews and schedules is the thing I already know how to do.

So, I built it here, for here. Portland and Vancouver, both sides of the river, with our own people doing the deliveries. Not a franchise, not a booking portal. When you rent from us, the bins show up when we say they will, the price is the price, and if something goes sideways you talk to me.

That's the whole idea. A local company, a local reputation, and a name I'm not willing to spend carelessly.

And honestly, I love this part. Moving day is a big one. New house, new street, new coffee place to figure out. I get to show up at the front end of that with a stack of clean totes and take one thing off your list.

Whenever you're ready, it would be my honor to help you move.