Embedded banking boosts retention 6x for Wethos

Throughout the pandemic, Americans have quit their jobs in record numbers, preferring to work for themselves. But for these newly independent contractors, managing a business is often more complex than they had anticipated. The time and effort of things like creating proposals, sending invoices, and preparing tax returns can quickly become overwhelming. 

Enter Wethos. The New York-based startup makes it easy for independents to team up and transform their one-person shops into full-service studios. Founded in 2016, Wethos started as an agency and quickly learned first-hand the pain of managing cash-flow and finances. In 2021, they decided to launch their platform to power hundreds of thousands of others to start and scale their own small businesses. 

“When it comes to managing your finances, independent contractors have been left behind,” explains Claire Humphreys, Co-Founder and COO at Wethos. “The high account minimums and hefty fees of legacy payment processors squeeze these businesses, and the need to juggle various banking and payment platforms is cumbersome.” 

Wethos saw an opportunity to go the extra mile for their users by embedding business banking services into their platform. But they knew they couldn’t do it the old way: until recently, integrating with a bank meant years of development work, not to mention hiring a compliance team and a dozen partner vendors.

With tens of thousands of Wethos users looking for a better cash flow solution, the company needed a banking-as-a-service solution that could launch quickly and scale with demand. That’s why they turned to Unit + Plaid.