Cheddar is an instant peer to peer payments and cashback rewards platform. It lets you send money or request money from anyone irrespective of who they bank with. Cheddar also helps you save money through cashbacks when you spend at any of our partner retailers.
Cheddar brings the benefits of Open Banking to consumers, making it easy to spend and get paid at the same time. Requesting money with Cheddar is just as easy as writing a message.
How did you come up with the idea for the company?
The company initially set out to develop a frictionless solution to splitting group expenses like restaurants checks, hotels and travel bills, etc, however, it quickly became apparent that the real problem wasn鈥檛 splitting the bill but getting paid back for it.
We then shifted our focus to building that payment solution. We needed a catchy name too. One that rolled off the tongue and wasn鈥檛 being used in the banking/fintech space. We settled on Cheddar – an English slang word for money that we hope to turn into a verb one day i.e., 鈥榗heddar.me鈥� in other words, pay me!
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How has the company evolved over the last couple of years?
During the first lockdown, we started working on and researching the business case. We identified open banking as a technology that could power our payments platform and went on to develop an initial prototype as proof of concept.
We initially applied for our FCA licence in December 2020 and waited in what felt like a lifetime to receive our FCA approval in July 2021. During that time, we started recruiting and building a team remotely, and now have employees across the Netherlands, UK, Spain and Canada.
As Cheddar evolved, we went on to realise that with open banking, we can help consumers navigate economic uncertainty and inflation. Our new Cashback feature allows users to earn up to 50% when making purchases at their favourite retailers 鈥� making their money go further and saving with little change to their existing spending habits.
What can we hope to see from Cheddar in the future?
Cheddar鈥檚 short-term goal is to successfully launch our cashback proposition. The medium-term goals are to continue scaling up and growing out the business as well as expanding into European markets. Longer-term Cheddar wants to be the de facto way people pay each other across Europe and continue to evolve the benefits we provide to customers through Open Banking.
We want to build an ecosystem that directly adds value to consumers. I think we can achieve that in five years.
