Assertion Supported
Payday lenders lose 15% of all lent capital to defaults
“Payday loans are really expensive because of three reasons. One brick and mortar. So, so just being storefront. To old school administrative practices, they have just like terrible ways of collecting data, terrible ways of processing that data. And then third,…”
Assertion Contradicted
ZayZoon was the first to offer wage access via payroll integration
“Zayzun was first to do this with an actual payroll company using that payroll integration as a way to extend those funds.”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Payroll companies will bring earned wage access in-house within 5-7 years
“And what you're saying is probably going to be the re reality in, in five, seven years.”
Disclosure
Hackert issued $250K in uncollateralized peer-to-peer loans by age 23
“Half the time or more than half the time, I didn't even take collateral. And so a lot of it was just like pure trust. And I did over a quarter million dollars of these loans for an age of Call it 16, 17 to about 23.”
Insight
Delayed pay cycles are effectively interest-free loans to employers
“So actually that employee is effectively giving an interest-free Loan to their employer in, in a really funny roundabout way.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Multiple major payroll companies failed at building in-house wage access
“We know of very large payroll companies, multiple very large payroll companies that have tried to do this themselves have, you know, failed miserably with it.”
Assertion Contradicted
Only 10% to 15% of employees actively check payroll self-service portals
“Well, in reality, like how many employees actually use a self-service portal to look at their pay stub? It's about 10, 15%.”
Insight
Go-to-market success comes from stacking marginal 1% to 2% tactic gains
“I think like the unlock that people look for is like, what's the one thing that's going to give me like this crazy amount of conversion or this crazy amount of, you know inbound interest. When in reality for us, it was like, we just needed to be really, we nee…”
Disclosure
ZayZoon's revenue plummeted 70% overnight during the 2020 COVID lockdowns
“COVID hits our re our revenues plummet at 70% overnight because everyone's, like, shelter in place. Like, no one's working. If people aren't working, we have no one to advance pay early to. And so, twenty-twenty was a crazy year where we basically had, like, a…”
Disclosure
Hackert confirms ZayZoon's annual revenue is closer to $100M than $10M
“We can say that. Yes, we can say that. I don't want to get too specific on, on numbers.”
Assertion Partly supported
Independent mom-and-pop providers process 50% of the US payroll market
“In the US, 50% of payroll is paid by the big guys, ADP, Paychecks, Paycom, these big players, right? 50% though is, is effectively mom and pop independently owned payroll companies.”
Insight
Founders must assess if their product is just an incumbent's loss leader
“Sometimes economics don't make sense. Like sometimes people have a beachhead of a business and what you're creating isn't a product. It's actually a feature. And I think you need to really really be honest with yourself and, you know, ask yourself those questi…”
Insight
Being a student is a cheat code for getting meetings
“Using the university badge, which by the way, for anyone listening, that's a university student. It's like the one time in your life where you can use that card and you can get a meeting with almost anyone, right? Like I'm a curious, hungry university student.…”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
ZayZoon raised its first $18M from Calgary angels, avoiding early VC
“Our first eighteen million dollars of capital was 99% Calgary based high net worth angel investors and family office. So we didn't actually take VC capital until our series series A. And then, or series, series B. Sorry, we didn't take, take venture capital in…”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
ZayZoon did not truly reach product-market fit until late 2019
“In reality, I think when we look at all the personas of our business, the payroll company, the employer, the employee you know, we probably didn't experience product market fit truly until the end of 2019.”
Disclosure
ZayZoon charges employees between $0 and $5 for early wage access
“Like now, now we charge anywhere from zero dollars to five dollars.”
Assertion Contradicted
ADP and Ceridian control 80% of Canada's payroll market
“In Canada is much different. We don't need to get into that, but you know, it's like ADP and Ceridian are the 80% and then 20% is, is everything else.”
