Prepaid2Cash is a mobile application company that provides a quick and easy way for consumers to turn their prepaid card and gift card funds into cash in their bank. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Prepaid2Cash chief product officer Jerome Myers to learn more about the company.
Jerome Myers’ Background
Myers’ first exposure to stored value products was in 1995, when stored value cards consisted primarily of prepaid phone cards.
“At that time, I traveled the country, speaking to audiences about building a prepaid phone card distribution business. It was a time before wireless phone proliferation. With more than 2 million payphones in service, the prepaid phone card industry was booming and would surpass $2 billion in revenue,” Myers said. “I went on to manage BellSouth’s prepaid phone card product and became a member of the board of directors for the International Prepaid Communications Association. That was the beginning of a 20+ year career in product development, with most of that time spent in the financial services sector with companies such as First Data and WorldPay.”
“I currently have the privilege of serving as Chief Product Officer for a fantastic company called Prepaid2Cash. Our CEO, Peter Vogt, founded the company in 2015 after searching unsuccessfully for a way to exchange a prepaid card for cash. As it turns out, Peter was among many interested in exchanging prepaid and gift cards for cash. When I came on board in early 2022, Prepaid2Cash was a thriving and profitable startup. My role is determining what’s next by identifying more problems we can solve for our users and finding adjacent opportunities to expand our capabilities. I am excited to say that we are in the process of building a new app, which is 85% complete. The new app will support our current business and add revolutionary capability while expanding our reach in the stored value and financial services market.”
Favorite Memory
What has been Myers’ favorite memory working for the company so far? Myers shared:
“So far, my favorite part has been the people. When it comes to a business or a career, the people you associate with every day make a difference, positively or negatively. Starting with the CEO, every person in the company is an absolute delight to work with. We have a team of very smart, motivated, selfless people. This highly functioning team atmosphere provides the confidence that Prepaid2Cash will continue to be successful and build something truly remarkable.”
Core Products
What are the company’s core products and features? Myers explained:
“Prepaid2Cash is exactly what it sounds like. We provide an app that allows users to exchange prepaid cards and gift cards for cash and distribute the funds to their bank account, PayPal, or Venmo. This is the core of our business today, which sounds simple. However, on the backend, we have built an extremely robust platform and validation process that enables us to know our customers (KYC), protect against money laundering, and protect against fraud.”
“There is nothing simple about that, and the robustness of the backend allows us to succeed on the front end of our business. The solid foundation we have built is allowing us to add significant features and functionality, which we will launch in Q2-Q3 of 2024. Although I will not give all the details here, our new app will revolutionize the digital gift card giving and receiving experience and continue to serve customers with our core redemption services.”
Challenges Faced
Has Myers faced any specific bottlenecks in your sector of work recently? Myers acknowledged:
“It is an interesting time as fintech meets banking as a service (BaaS). Regulators need help determining how much or how little regulation needs to be in place for Neo-Banks, FinTech, Bitcoin/crypto, and other financial services. Banks are uneasy as regulatory pressure mounts. Given the environment, it can be frustrating for startups to navigate the compliance and regulatory red tape necessary to secure the relationships needed to provide key products and services. Fortunately, Prepaid2Cash has been very proactive on the compliance and regulatory front to ensure we have solid guard rails in place that serve to protect ourselves, our partners, and our customers.”
Evolution Of Prepaid2Cash’s Technology
How has the company’s technology evolved since launching? Myers noted:
“On the backend, we continue getting smarter and enabling systems and processes to improve our business and protect against threats. In the financial services space, nobody is independently successful. Integrating with key partners is critical. Prepaid2Cash has successfully identified important partners, including Fortune 500 companies, and we have integrated with them to build our business further. As we move forward, we continue to evaluate many technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), to determine how we might leverage these new technologies in our existing business and new products and services.”
“An example of this might be the gift-giving experience. Most everyone struggles with what gift to buy for friends and family. AI can assist with this process today in that someone could engage with ChatGPT, describing their friend or family member and soliciting recommendations for a gift. However, having an application be smartly suggestive without engaging in long typing exercises would take it to an entirely different level. We are only at the beginning of what may be possible.”
Significant Milestones
What have been some of the company’s most significant milestones? Myers cited:
“The most significant milestone to date is doing what no one had ever done before: providing the technology that would allow a holder of a prepaid card to truly use the value of that asset their way. Ultimately, that is what Prepaid2Cash is about. We are freeing users to be able to use their money their way. As we launch our new app, we are empowering users to think in terms of, ‘I’m able.’”
“I’m able to control my financial assets; I’m able to connect with friends and family; I’m able to make someone’s day with a personalized digital gift card; I’m able to store all my gift cards, whether digital or plastic, all in one place; I’m able to easily budget by creating my fun-money account; I’m able to move money where and when I need it quickly. And, most importantly, I’m able to trust Prepaid2Cash to do all this without exploiting or betraying my trust. Prepaid2Cash’s new app will enable all these things. For our customers, we want to assist them in living by the mantra, ‘I’m able.’
Customer Success Stories
After asking Myers about customer success stories, Myers highlighted:
“Because we are very single-threaded today, all our success stories are similar. The gratitude of our customers for freeing up their assets to be used their way is the success stories we thrive on. It may be overstated to say that Prepaid2Cash can be lifesaving, but receiving comments like the following makes me feel good about what we do. We give our users greater control over their assets; every transaction is a success story of its own.”
Prepaid2Cash customer: “I’ve been looking for an app like this for a while now! My union is on strike and work is nonexistent, so to subsidize my income I participate in focus groups/studies and am mostly compensated with prepaid cards.’”
Prepaid2Cash customer: “Saved me! Emptied out my wallet of old unused gift cards and got a lot of money for them and the deposit to my PayPal was within hours. Definitely saved me financially this month. I’m so grateful!’”
Total Addressable Market
What total addressable market (TAM) size is the company pursuing? Myers assessed:
“A Credit Summit report indicated over $21 billion in unused gift cards and prepaid cards are at least a year old. That is a staggering number and represents the total addressable market for our core business today. When we look at the new app, which will launch in 2024, this expands our purview to the entire gift card/prepaid card giving market, which totals well over $200 billion annually. Digital gift card giving is a significant portion of that, and our aim is to become the primary source of digital gift card purchasing and sending in the U.S.”
Differentiation From The Competition
What differentiates the company from its competition? Myers affirmed:
“Today, we are the only source available for redeeming open-loop prepaid cards. This is a very significant differentiator. Additionally, we look at ourselves as a financial services company and have built-in regulatory compliance as a major component of our offering. So, even in closed-loop gift card redemption, we still apply regulatory procedures as part of the normal process. In the future, we will be further differentiated as providing even more prepaid and gift card solutions that are not offered anyway else.”
Future Company Goals
What are some of the company’s future company goals? Myers concluded:
“We aim for Prepaid2Cash to become the premiere and the only end-to-end consumer gift card management platform for digital gift cards and prepaid cards.”
“Steve Harvey (comedian and host of Family Feud) has commented, on multiple occasions, that couples need four accounts: an account for all bills and necessities, a savings account, and each their own guilt-free spending account. We intend to serve the latter purpose for our users with Prepaid2Cash’s new app launching in 2024. The future is very exciting for Prepaid2Cash and its customers!”
