Over the course of a month you probably tip dozens of people who've brought you food, drove you home, or poured you a beer. But why not tip yourself when you've done something worthy of a little financial recognition?
That's the mindset behind Tip Yourself, a new Chicago startup that wants to get people to reward themselves for accomplishing a goal, and change the way people save their money. Tip Yourself, which was founded in February and has been in beta for the past four weeks, has created an iOS app that allows you to transfer funds from your checking account into a virtual "tip jar" with the tap of the app.
"We tip so many other people. We tip bar tenders, servers, Uber drivers, but we don’t tip ourselves," said CEO Mike Lenz. "Tip Yourself is about taking a moment to recognize yourself. Hit a button, save some money."
Inside the Tip Yourself app users can tip themselves between $1 and $250, which gets transferred from their bank account into a secure Tip Jar account held with WinTrust Bank. You then describe why you tipped yourself ("ran an extra mile today," "finished my to-do list," etc.) and the Tip Yourself community can like and comment to send encouragement. You can also track data around your tip frequency and tip averages, and withdraw money from the tip jar whenever you want. Lenz added that there's no fee to use the app, Tip Yourself doesn't store any user banking information, and all US banks are supported on the platform.
Lenz, a Loyola grad who founded the company with former classmate Sam Rodriguez, said the goal of Tip Yourself is to change people's mindset around saving money, and reward positive behaviors. Tip Yourself has seen over 100 users tip themselves more than $1,500 in the 1-month beta, and people have tipped themselves for everything from making it to the gym to quitting smoking, he said.
"It comes down to building real behavioral change," Lenz said. "The real way to change behavior is to not focus on perfection, but to focus on incremental improvements ... tiny habits that you can achieve and you can build success on. That success momentum will cause drastic change in your life."
The psychology around paying yourself for positive behaviors is why Tip Yourself believes its app is more than simply moving money from your left pocket to your right pocket; you could just as easily transfer money from your checking account to your savings account using your bank's app. But the startup thinks that by creating a virtual piggy bank, it could encourage people to save more and set more obtainable goals.
Lenz said so far people have used the virtual tip jar as a rainy day fund, or to save up for a big purchase like a new pair of shoes or a summer vacation. The startup plans to continue monitoring how its users interact with the app before launching it publicly later this year.
While the app currently just lets users tip themselves, Lenz said the company is not ruling out the ability to tip others (a la Venmo) or tip a charity or other organization.
Lenz added that the company is currently focused on improving its product and gaining users, but one potential revenue stream could be allowing people to tip themselves into an investment account, where the startup would take a management fee.
"Tip Yourself is a concept and a product that can scale," he said. "Where those users lead us is what's most exciting ... We want to help people change their relationship with money in an easy, fun and positive way."
Images via Tip Yourself
