The price of the order and what it costs to hire 'a Marie Kondo' for home

Chaos can prevail over harmony in closets, living rooms or studios, which is why more and more professional organizers dedicate themselves, from about 30 euros an hour, to reconfiguring spaces

Wind and water. It is, literally, what feng shui means, a very popular Chinese technique that deals with how to occupy a space so that a specific energy flows in it. Profitable. Ancient art for some and bullshit for others, the truth is that psychology has found links between order and happiness. For this reason, more and more professionals are dedicated to creating order within chaos. They are not exactly Taliban of organization and shelving in a closet, but practitioners of a method and a system. Balance, clarity, harmony. Functional optimization. Hiring a Marie Kondo costs about 30 euros per hour, at least.

They help their clients to make their dressing room stop being a lion's den. They reduce stress, but they also provide routines, plans and tricks. There is an organizational effort, with a good splash of pedagogy (so that the change is lasting and after four days it is not all sleeve by shoulder) and a few brushstrokes of coaching. Even philosophy. The doses vary according to each expert or expert.

Professional organizers: what it costs to have a Marie Kondo at home

María Gallay immersed herself in the world of order in 2003. "The profession has changed completely since then," she tells Global Consumer. When it started, it was a wasteland. Now there is even an association (Aope) that watches over the interests of these workers. And spread it. "I got all the training and courses by researching the North Americans, buying their books and training myself, there was no other way," says Gallay. Later, she says, it was necessary to explain to the people what this was about. “Evangelize,” she says between laughs. She turned out fine. Organization of Order, her professional Instagram profile, now has nearly 21,000 followers.

Of the existing methods of getting paid, she chose the hourly rate. "I established to charge twice as much as an assistant and half as much as a psychologist," she specifies. Something different, more transcendental than cleaning a floor, but not as powerful as psychological help. But that's where the shots went. Gallay was charging 25 euros an hour for many years. After decades of experience, collaborations with brands and recognition, now it's 45 euros an hour. “Clients are paying by time. Time that is later for them: to enjoy, to find things, to save a few minutes every morning with well-done routines, ”she clarifies.

The profile of clients who contract order

On her website, Esther Torras defines herself as an orderologist. His rate is 30 euros per hour plus VAT, although he also has packs: for 126 euros he carries out more complex and comprehensive projects such as "a change of wardrobe, to turn the order in your kitchen, your living room or the room of your son or for those who want to make their workspace an organized place”. These are not prices for everyone. For this reason, regarding the client's profile, he says that at first he thought they would be people with a “relatively high, upper-middle class, because for a person who does not have a lot of money it may seem like an expensive service. But in my case it is not like that. There are a lot of middle or lower-middle class clients”.

According to Torras, the person who hires her "invests in something that she believes can bring her solutions." Thus, it is about “normal people” who want to “reconvert their spaces”. As she specifies, her work goes beyond letting people know where she has a t-shirt: "You can have papers scattered around that are bills you haven't paid." The order is a whole, it is not a concrete situation. Among her benefits, Ella Torras alludes to mental stability: “Knowing that your environment is orderly is one less problem you have in your life. If you can find everything easily, on a mental level you are more relaxed because you know that your environment is working for you.”

Btw, if I unfollowed you during my purge and you asked why. I really don't know how to respond to that. Most peopl… https://t.co/4X8r5dJjAt

— Raine Yi 💦【Slime EN/KR VTuber】 Mon May 24 11:41:58 +0000 2021

“The house should be a refuge”

María Gallay thinks along the same lines. According to her, the most difficult thing has to do with the inability to leave things behind. Material things with which people establish an emotional bond. For example, the expert says that, when a father or a mother dies, there are relatives who, due to the pain of grief, take all the objects from the house to theirs. That leads to accumulation. “An accompaniment is needed to see why what happens in your house happens.” As Gallay specifies, a motto that guides her work is that things are just things. "There are people who are slaves to their home, and it should be a refuge," she considers.

Letting go of things is hard. Minimalism is fine on an aesthetic level, but it does not square with the values ​​of Spanish society, accustomed both to piling up objects and to inheriting and preserving what their parents had. Which, until not long ago, used to be little. Some clothes, a few jewels, linens, some furniture and the usual crockery. How to get rid of things in which memories live? How to leave behind the props of a lifetime?

The Netflix Phenomenon

Torras, asked about the Marie Kondo phenomenon, the Japanese samurai of order who became famous with her organizational method (which Netflix gave a good push), points out that "she made visible a problem that existed and to which people did not put a name : there was a problem of accumulation and it was not known”. However, not everything that Marie Kondo contributed was good, says Cloti Marínez. She acknowledges that she had a positive part because she "made herself known to us as a professional figure", but also counterproductive: there were people who were not prepared who tried to jump on the bandwagon. "She is Japanese, the Mediterranean lifestyle is much more chaotic, so the issue of order can be misunderstood," she relates.

Cloti is the author of the book Reorganize yourself: The art of ordering your house and filling your life with happiness. “I realized that people not only had a problem of what to wear, but how to distribute what to wear to be able to wear everything. Thanks to my natural ability, I found my passion in order, I realized that I was capable of organizing a space to get more out of it, to make it more practical, more functional and more beautiful and harmonious”, he writes in the introduction to the same. Among the most common phrases of her clients, she says, is “I didn't remember that I had bought that”. Therefore, the challenge is also to use what you have. On the best occasions, when the change is deep, it can lead to a realization.

The luxury of order

The tendency to accumulate, she says, is more pronounced in the wealthy classes, who can afford to keep more and more things. But that doesn't mean only the rich hire her. “There are people who prioritize having an order over buying another mobile, for example. There are also different rates. Obviously, if you lack the money it can be expensive, but the organization provides you with a form of luxury: a feeling of joy, of tranquility, of peace…”. Along the same lines, María Gallay points out that her work is not limited to “making a few moves and that's it”, but to trying to generate lasting changes. “Create a system that works for the client,” she specifies.

Until when does it work? Does the client learn, or then go back to the old ways and, therefore, to require these services? The experts agree that there is everything. However, the most lasting changes are those that happen in the head, not in the closet. Cloti Martínez considers that having a house full of junk everywhere does not lead to more than problems and discussions with the cohabitants. In this way, she relates, "in the end it consists of paying to be happier."