Interview with Avinash Rajan, Founder and CEO at Social Saving Platform: Offspring

Offspring is a free and secure social saving platform that helps family and friends save together for important occasions. It has over 1000 users with over £1.6 million value in savings goals. It is a clever social saving tool and can be used for any shared goal, this could be friends and family contributing to a birthday gift, wedding presents, house deposit, Christmas celebration or even a leaving collection.

Using Offspring you can set-up a contribution page and link it to a bank or building society account in less than three minutes. The link can then be easily shared with family and friends so they can contribute to help you reach your saving goal. Contributors can also leave messages of encouragement and you can track progress towards achieving your goals.

How did you come up with the idea for the company?

Talking to fellow parents I repeatedly heard common aspirations and pain points in relation to their children’s future. They said, repeatedly, how they want to give their children opportunities to learn, access diverse experiences and to save for the big moments in their lives. I have also seen parents, grandparents, godparents and wider family gift money to their children, often without thinking about the long term consequences on their own financial position. As parents, we all want to do the best for the children in our family and help them accomplish their life’s goals. Yet, we see so many young people start their adult life with debt!

That’s where the idea of Offspring germinated.

We created Offspring as a social saving tool that allows family and friends save for, and gift to, important occasions. It could be for a birthday present, that first car, a wedding, university costs or that first deposit.

And by doing this we can help them start adult life positively, with a little less debt and by encouraging a savings mindset.

Goals on Offspring can be shared easily, and friends and family can leave messages of encouragement, you can thank them for their gifts and can keep track of progress towards reaching goals. It makes the process of social saving and gifting much more fun!

We also built Offspring in a way that banks, building societies and investment managers can use it to offer their customers, who are families, the ability to save together. By working with these organisations we can help build a culture of saving – which is a key life skill in my view.

What advice would you give to other aspiring entrepreneurs?

In my entrepreneurial journey I have held onto six pieces of advice I have received. They have helped me keep perspective:

• The journey is not linear – it is messy and squiggly and sometimes like groundhog day. Just accept it!
• As Mike Tyson said “Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth”. Stuff happens and, often, it’s not what you planned. Get used to it and live that advice with your team!
• Surround yourself with family / friends support. You will need it!
• You may be an entrepreneur/founder with great passion for your business but you don’t have the monopoly on the best ideas for it to grow. Surround yourself with people who have the skills to make it grow and let them help you!
• “Feedback is a gift!” Accept it with both hands from customers, advisors, investors, colleagues…..
• Cash flow is king. Distribution and product are king makers

What can we hope to see from Offspring Savings in the future?

A key benefit of using Offspring is that you don’t have to open yet another savings, current or investment account. We operate as a social saving layer above savings and current accounts you already have. Our view is that banks, building societies and investment managers do a good job of offering those accounts. They just need more savings directed into them! Currently, you can link the Offspring social saving tool to any bank or building society account that takes money electronically.

In the near future, we will roll out features that allow social saving into investment products, followed by features that help manage inheritance tax and features that help families engage in money discussions between generations.

Over time we will use our understanding of goals our customers have set to offer the best advice and options to achieve those goals.

Offspring is working with the biggest financial institutions to help improve financial outcomes for the next generation.