I received a manicure from a robotic in San Francisco. Is that this the longer term?

As I slide my finger into the handle, a rubber ring clamps around my ankle to hold it in place. It’s a gentle reminder to move as little as possible, although I’ve also been warned not to be too rigid.

“Done,” I announce. The flash machine takes a photo of my finger and records exactly where my frayed cuticle borders my nail and the length of the nail itself. The familiar whir of an inkjet printer begins and lowers a small, rectangular capsule with a pointed tip, almost like the tip of a colored pencil down to my index fingernail, but not without stopping, to a quick dab of the maroon paint on a pad toward the back of the machine. Just like your local manicure ensures that the Goldilocks amount of nail polish is on the bottle’s brush when it starts to paint – not too much, not too little – so does the robotic arm.

I get a manicure from a robot in the marina and yeah, it’s maybe one of the most stereotypical, tech-savvy things I have ever done in San Francisco. But as I watch the tiny brush head draw a near-perfect outline of my nail before I fill it with paint in a mesmerizing loop, I reluctantly admit to myself that this is almost certainly the future.

Or at least part of the future, much like how Ubers is more ubiquitous today than taxis and Soylent is part of the food system. They are options that will remain, whether we like it or not.

For starters, having a robot painting your nails is quick and cheap. Shellac a deep red chestnut cost me $ 8 and was done in 10 minutes. Plus, you don’t need cash to tip a robot.

Exactly for this reason, founder Renuka Apte came up with her company Clockwork. “I used to feel really guilty about the time I spent on beauty routines, and that wasn’t something my mostly male coworkers had to do,” she said. “They said, ‘Oh, don’t do it,’ but they didn’t understand. It was an ongoing thing in the back of my mind. “

She and a colleague, James Rasmussen, had talked for a while about starting a business together, and after doing a few focus groups with women, Apte convinced him that this was their big opportunity.

Two and a half years later, Apte estimates that Clockwork may be the fastest robotics company making sales.

It took about eight months to get an initial prototype and the machine has been improved ever since. The biggest learning curve was finding out that they couldn’t use traditional nail polish bottles; they had to invent their own cartridge. Today they buy paints from well-known brands like OPI and CND and use them to make proprietary cartridges.

Then there was the handle, something that seemed easy, said Apte, but in the end it was anything but. She had to find the best way to keep people relaxed, comfortable, and calm while also being suitable for different hand sizes.

When some nail polish dripped on the skin of my little finger, Apte said the machine is still learning – the more nails it sees, the better the AI ​​gets. It’s also just a coat of polish (although it feels thicker than a coat you would do at home) but I was told to add a top coat at home if I wanted the manicure to last longer.

Clockwork founder Renuka Apte supports a customer.

clockwork

Without the recommended topcoat, my index fingernail lost a corner of the nail polish and was chipped the next morning, and by the fourth day I considered removing it entirely. Still, as someone who doesn’t get their nails done regularly in a salon (this was my first manicure since January 2020), my first question to Apte was when she plans to debut her robots in airports, where might someone? Opt for a quick, temporary fix without having to put in a manicure before traveling. I know that if my flight is delayed and I already have my pre-flight beer limit, that’s exactly what I want to do before vacation.

Apte said the company doesn’t have any airport infiltration plans yet, but she sees the machines as I do. Maybe they won’t replace the gel manicure you need for your sister’s wedding, but it could certainly replace the weekly manicure you get just to look professional for an evening. She envisions the machines in the lobbies of luxury apartments or commercial buildings or even in retail stores, ideally no more than a 10-minute walk from you.

The Clockwork location in the marina I visited is designed more as a showroom and demo room and currently only accepts appointments from Friday to Sunday. While the demand is certainly to have more days open each week, Apte said they need to focus on other aspects of the business. She hopes you won’t need a clockwork appointment in the future. You just go to your app and go to the next machine. “We want to make this as easy as a cup of coffee and as affordable,” she said. “… We want to be the fast-casual restaurant of beauty.”