Houston-based PickleJar launched its live entertainment and cashless payment platform for artists and musicians last year. Now, the company aims to expand into other key markets.
Jeff James, CEO of PickleJar, previously worked as a radio DJ before working with Atlantic Records for a number of years. Out listening to live music in Nashville's honky-tonk district, James saw a young woman carrying a tip bucket around the bar, asking for requests. He paid using Square because he didn't have cash at the time.
The interaction yielded a number of questions for James: Where does that money ultimately go? Does it all go to the artist performing on stage? Would the young woman even remember his song requests to begin with?
Payment services like Venmo, Square and Cash App already exist, but they're not built with artists and content creators in mind. There had to be a better way, James said.
"We literally got a stack of napkins there at the Second Fiddle on Broadway in Nashville, Tennessee, and sketched out what ultimately became Project PickleJar," James said.
PickleJar was created around three tenets, James said. One, artists get to keep 100% of every dollar that was tipped by a fan. Second, artists have 100% reach to their audience on PickleJar, unlike social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter with algorithms that can throttle an artist's exposure, James said. Third, PickleJar wanted to give artists the opportunity to use their talents to give back to nonprofits or other philanthropic causes.
The app brings together artists, their fans, venues and nonprofit organizations in a single payment platform. Fans tip artists using PickleJar and receive digital currency — Pick Coins — to use for buying tickets, nabbing merchandise and other features. In addition to getting paid through the app, artists can thumb through a setlist, fan requests and even connect directly with their audience using PickleJar. The platform also has offerings for live streaming, which became a lot more popular for artists during the Covid-19 pandemic.
PickleJar utilizes a number of different models of revenue generation, including selling sponsorships, passing transaction and handling fees on merchandise sales to buyers, and offering hyper-regional targeted advertising for clients.
"We reverse those transaction, shipping and handling fees back to the fan and in return, they still get Pick Coins," James said.
Since PickleJar officially launched in May 2021, the platform has onboarded over 1,000 artists, musicians and content creators and more than 300 venues. After starting at locations in Houston, Nashville and Chicago, the company aims to expand its footprint into other growth markets.
PickleJar plans to hire 20 new employees in cities including Houston, Austin, Dallas, Fort Worth, San Antonio, Nashville, Memphis, Atlanta, New Orleans and Los Angeles. The company also plans to expand into Canada and the U.K. with partnerships during the first quarter of 2022. PickleJar aims to hire venue sales managers, customer service representatives and dispute/fraud operations directors as the company expands its on-premise technology with more venues.
"Now, we're going into venues. We have a QR code technology called Tip Topper that allows for fans in the venue to engage with the people that are on stage, but also the live streaming aspect of an event for patrons who may not want to come because of Covid," James said.
PickleJar finalized a $2.3 million seed round in December, James said.
