There's a specific kind of business I keep thinking about: the one-person salon, the barber booking 40 heads a week, the cleaner handling 15 jobs. Not underserved because they can't afford software — underserved because the software keeps assuming they have a spare hour to configure a booking portal and remind customers it exists.
The actual problem is simpler. Their customers text a phone number. Not a form, not an app — the number on the window or the Instagram bio. When that text comes in at 8pm asking about Saturday availability, there's nobody home to answer it. The appointment goes to whoever texts back first.
I got interested in this because the gap felt oddly specific. SMS is already the channel. The customers are already using it. The missing piece is purely presence — someone available at 9pm on a Tuesday.
What I built
Remi is an AI receptionist that mans a dedicated SMS line for a local service business and handles the full customer lifecycle: answering questions about hours, pricing, and services; collecting name, preferred service, and time in natural conversation; confirming the booking; sending automated reminders 24 hours and 1 hour before each visit; following up afterward to ask for a review.
