The ultimate goal of the Branche platform, is of course to provide a new and highly accessible option to those individuals who want basic financial services. The opportunity for Lenders and the potential of our “one-to-many” interactions is also hugely significant, and beneficially disruptive to all involved.

The foundation of the system however, and the key to understanding its power, is the humble Branche Vendor!

The Branche Vendor system eliminates the high costs and low efficiencies of traditional “brick and mortar” financial service providers like banks, credit unions and payday loan stores. It also empowers and bolsters the relationships and responsibility between service providers and community members.

By decentralizing the financial network, and working only with digital payment providers instead of cash, an individual, business or community organization can leverage the resources and infrastructure they already have to provide the identity verification and positive relationships needed to offer safe and accessible financial service options to the general public.

Put another way, Branche lets people add a new income stream to their lives without adding any new costs, and as a result provides new financial service options to the consumer base.

All the Vendor needs to provide is an internet connection (and we can help them out with that). They even have the choice between using their own mobile device or an official Branche tablet. Branche provides the network, the technology, the financial services, access to the Lender liquidity pools, even marketing materials, so that the Vendor has as little to worry about as possible. They have some customization and control over service options and fees (of which they get the lion’s share), as well the final choice about who they will serve. Our goal is to create an opportunity for the Vendor to provide a high quality service, limited only by their creativity and the needs of their community.

Here are just a couple of examples of theoretical Vendors:

A convenience store puts a small tablet on a stand at the end of their counter and a sign in their front window. They choose only to provide cheque cashing to a prepaid visa card, but it increases foot traffic, therefore providing both a direct and indirect increase in profits.

A university student sits in the corner the school cafeteria and sets up a small cardboard sign that she keeps in her book-bag. She sits there and studies between classes, using her phone to offer services to her fellow students. Even though she’s only there for a couple hours a day, she makes some extra money that helps pay for textbooks and a trip home at Christmas.

An industrious night owl loses his minimum wage job, but with a bit of careful planning he finds a 24 hour diner that lets him set up all night with a little sign, as long he keeps buying coffee and tips well. Since there’s no other financial service open past 9pm in the area, he sets his rates to the max, but offers to buy a coffee for every customer. Pretty soon he’s making more than he was before, but he doesn’t need to get up before noon.

A ride-hailing driver who is already out every Friday and Saturday night to make some extra money, gets so many requests to be driven to the local payday loan store, that they decide to just offer the service themselves. Almost immediately there’s enough money coming in on Friday nights alone, that the driver can take Saturday night off to spend with their family.

One of the great strengths of the Branche platform is that we’re creating potential. The examples listed above don’t even include amazing opportunities we will be creating for community charities and organizations that deal with at-risk members of the public.

By making it easy, safe and responsible to provide basic financial services, Branche in turn makes those services affordable, flexible and accessible.

As always, we will be releasing more information over the coming weeks and we are always happy to answer any questions you may have.

You can contact us at: info@branche.io

Learn more about us here: http://www.branche.io/aboutus

And you can signup for regular news and updates here: http://www.digitalescrowservices.com/branche/signup