healthy financial habits
As inflation continues to grow persistently higher, millions of Americans are struggling financially.
With that struggle comes a whole lot of financial stress. Fruitful is a startup that wants to provide access to financial planning to the masses at a cost that won’t eat up whatever savings — if any — they might have.
Fruitful is emerging from stealth today, announcing a total of $33 million in equity funding raised across a seed and Series A round over the past 18 months. Emigrant Bank led the company’s $8 million seed round while 8VC led its $25 million Series A. Neither financing was previously announced. The company also raised $4 million in a convertible note, which represented an oversubscription of the Series A.
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Other backers include Lux Capital, Founders Fund, Elad Gil, Hero Health founder and CEO Kal Vepuri, along with founders of Brex, Gemini, Tagomi and others.
In a nutshell, when it launches this fall, Fruitful will provide members with a certified financial planner — many of whom have worked as a “guide” in the financial industry for companies such as Fidelity. The role of that guide is to give a member ongoing personalized advice for $98 a month on a variety of financial matters, from budgeting to establishing savings and investments to 401(k)s, buying a home, putting away funds for kids’ college and paying taxes.
It is currently in a live beta.
A member will be able to access Fruitful’s service via its mobile app, where the company says members “can live chat anytime,” or book video calls with their “guide.” The startup says it also offers “exclusive” content on relevant financial topics.
Fruitful’s investors are naturally bullish on what the company is doing.
“Fruitful is building from first principles to create a financial home for their members that is enabled by technology and informed by deep human expertise,” said 8VC’s Kimmy Scotti in a written statement. “Their service-first approach is highly differentiated in a world full of subpar automated experiences and frustrating user experience failures.”
healthy financial habits
