‘Unfair it’s always women’: twin brothers in China start all-male domestic cleaning agency to challenge rampant gender bias
- Shao Qiang and Shao Gang, aged 32, started a home cleaning service business a year ago and hired men with an average age of 25
- Domestic work remains a job that many in China see as ‘indecent and low’, but the pair say hiring young males will change occupational stereotypes
Twin brothers in China have set up an all-male domestic worker agency to challenge widespread gender bias about housework in a country where household chores are still largely seen as a woman’s responsibility.
Believing that men should be encouraged to participate more in domestic work, Shao Qiang and Shao Gang, aged 32, started a home cleaning service business in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, eastern China, a year ago and hired a group of men with an average age of 25.
Aiming to change an industry that’s long been dominated by women, mostly middle-aged or older, Shao Qiang said his team focuses on deep cleaning for new homes and second-hand homes before the owner moves in, which is more physically demanding.
“It’s unfair that it’s always a woman’s job to clean the house. I think it’s a task that both genders should shoulder together,” he told the South China Morning Post.
Charging prices between 25 yuan (US$3.70) and 45 yuan per square metre, more than double the price charged by traditional house cleaners, Shao Qiang said his company, named Shenshi Domestic Help, hired young men because it was a physically demanding job with high standards.
Promising to: “clean everything from dust on the lights to stubborn toilet stains and leave no dirty corner in the house”, Shao Qiang said it normally takes three men nine hours to clean a 100-square metre home.
The most expensive order they have received so far was a 2,500-square metre villa that took a dozen people three days to clean, he said. The owner paid 90,000 yuan (US$13,300) for the work.