#150 Remynt

Hey founder friends, this is your last chance to apply to pitch on the next season of our show. Applications will close November 13th. So if you’re raising capital for your startup. You should apply. 3-minutes is all it takes! pitch.show/apply

And with that I’m Josh Muccio, and you’re listening to The Pitch, where startup founders raise millions and listeners can invest. The pitch for Remynt is coming up right after this.

Josh: I wrote a new thing on the clapboard so it’s great [clap]

Gwyneth Borden has a vendetta. This season has been all about tearing down broken systems. And she wants to take on one of the biggest systems of them all. Debt collection.

This historically sleazy industry needs a makeover. And Gwyneth is starting her own debt collection company to do just that, by offering hope and redemption instead of guilt and shame.

But how do you pitch hope and redemption to a roomful of VCs when you haven’t yet collected a dime?

Today, Gwyneth is pitching Cyan Banister

Cyan: Hi. Cyan. Nice to meet you. 

Mac Conwell

Gwyneth: Mac. We've met before. 

Mac: Yes. Good to see you.

Gwyneth: Good to see you again. 

Ben Taft

Ben: Hi, I'm Ben.

Gwyneth: Ben. Gwyneth. 

Ben: Good to meet you. Gwyneth. 

And Elizabeth Yin

Elizabeth: Hi, Gwyneth. Elizabeth. 

Gwyneth: I'm a huge fan of the Hustle Fund and your newsletters. 

Elizabeth: Thank you. Thank you.

Cyan: I love that dress. 

Gwyneth: Thank you. Hi. My name is Gwyneth Borden and I'm the founder and CEO of Remynt. Remynt empowers consumers to rebuild credit while resolving delinquent debt. Something I know a bit about from personal experience. I experienced something called charge off debt. This is a point in which your credit card accounts are closed and sold to third party debt buyers. I started fully repaying my debt, and I realized that doing so was not rebuilding my credit. 27 percent of Americans and the 100 largest US metros currently have severely delinquent debt. In fact, credit card charge offs almost doubled from 2022 to 2023 from 22 billion to 42 billion. Who's in this demographic? Overwhelmingly, Gen Z, low income and people of color. They've seen their credit scores drop as much as 200 points. They now have debt collectors calling them incessantly with payment plans and options they can't afford, and they need to resolve their debt. But I found a better way. And that is Remynt. We buy charged off consumer debt, and we offer those consumers the opportunity to build and earn new credit, a savings account, personal finance tools, a community, and rewards repayment. What's novel, by opting in to paying 75 to 100 percent of their debt, we open a credit tradeline so they can start rebuilding their credit from their first payment. They're ultimately working towards a charge card that becomes available to them once they fully satisfy their debt obligation. How do we make money? We buy debt very cheaply. So we can buy high quality debt for two and a half cents on the dollar, so that means that if I get your debt that's a thousand dollars, I've paid $25 for it. Any amount over $25 is profit to me. If you want my credit rebuilding product, that means you have to pay 75 to a hundred percent of your debt. So my profit margins in thousands of percent. We are currently looking to close our $1 million round at the end of this month, so that we can spend up to $250,000 on buying about $10 million of debt value, and we anticipate recovering about 30 percent of that, so that would be a 10x return on our spend. So I hope you'll join us on our mission to get millions of Americans Remynted to a better financial future, and I'm here for your questions. 

Elizabeth: Thank you. 

Mac: So, just so I have this clear, you're going to buy a bunch of debt really cheaply. You're then going to reach out to these people and say, Hey, I now hold your debt. Please start paying it off. Once you've paid this off to a certain percentage, we then will bring you into a program where we will help you start to build credit for all the good work that you've done so far. Is that correct?

Gwyneth: No, so you opt in immediately. So you choose up front. So we make it really easy for someone who really does want to start handling this obligation. And what we do is we don't offer any preset repayment plans. We leverage marketing automation tactics, no call centers to drive people in line to resolve debt on their own terms. So people can start with as little as $10 a month. And that's one of the problems in traditional debt collection, usually you have to call and go back and forth with a collector, and we've completely eliminated that. Because there's a lot of fear and shame in this industry, and we're really focused on hope and redemption.

Elizabeth: Mhm

Ben: So firstly, this is a really important company that you're building. So congratulations. 

Gwyneth: Thank you. 

Ben: You're taking a very frightening cycle and you're breaking it for people and you're giving it the chance to be positive sum. That's really important. So just seriously, congratulations. Would you mind just telling us a bit more of your personal story and kind of what led you to the company and the background and from the origin?

Gwyneth: Yeah. So as I mentioned, I personally experienced this myself and it's a horrible experience, right? You like you have these incessant phone calls, there are payment plans that are irrational, people saying, well, can't you just borrow money from your mother? Can't you just do this? It's like, no, I can't. That feeling of helplessness and being like, no, I really want to pay you, but I can't do it at the cadence that you need. And I felt that pressure in spades. And so when I realized I actually had this experience where one of my creditors, American Express, offered me the opportunity to fully repay my debt and issued a card like 90 days after the fact. And all of a sudden when I got my American Express card, my credit score started to soar. And I was like, this is the missing piece. 

Cyan: Yeah, I was issued a credit card when I was 18 and I was very irresponsible with it. And I had to go through this. And I also got put on check systems. 

Gwyneth: Mm-Hmm.

Cyan: Which, you know -

Gwyneth: Oh no, you couldn't get a checking account?

Cyan: Nope. Couldn't get a checking account. So I identify strongly with this product and I agree this is a very important thing to work on.

Gwyneth: Thank you. In our country, I don't think we do a good enough job, when people fall behind, helping them. We know how to punish people. But we don't know how to provide resiliency. And that's what this product is really about. The problem is when you're on the rebuild cycle, those products that you're being offered only help perpetuate you to be worse off. And for people who are like smart and like highly educated, yeah, they'll get it together for the most part and figure it out. But for everyone else, lower income individuals, they won't figure it out. They'll be stuck in that kind of purgatory. And when you talk about a lot of people that are unbanked, some of them fell out of the credit system. And so that's what we're really like, it's really about helping people not fall out of the system that might otherwise do so without our intervention. 

Elizabeth: Let's just say, hypothetically, you're buying $1,000 of debt for $25.

Gwyneth: Right. 

Elizabeth: Are you buying, basically, any and all debt? Are you trying to pick and choose? Are you assessing who these people are? How do you think about that?

Gwyneth: Yeah, a couple different things. First, we're only buying credit card debt up to $5,000 maximum for an account, under three years in age. Ideally, we're the first outside collector from what they've had with the original creditor. So prior to purchase, we assess the value of the portfolio. We're working with TransUnion. They have a portfolio assessment product. 

Cyan: What part of the process of the business so far have you beta tested? Like, have you taken anyone through sort of the beginning to increase in credit or like - just if you could walk us through that. 

Gwyneth: Well, I mean, it's hard to do that because you have to have a credit product to build with people. In interviews that we've done with potential consumers, overwhelmingly the, the two issues that they've said that they've encountered, well the three issues were like payment plans and types, right, not being affordable to them. Not knowing where to start. And then finally that sense of like someone who cares that's looking out for them because they felt really abandoned by their creditors, who were willing to extend credit to them and keep extending credit to them until they had a problem. 

Mac: So what is your long term vision? Is your long term vision to be the best debt recovery program on the planet or is it to be something else? 

Gwyneth: So it is a much bigger vision, right? When you buy debt, you get 50 to 150 pieces of information on that consumer. So you have a lot of data. So we want to perfect the way that we buy debt. And then we also want to offer additional products and services that better serve our consumer base. So while we see debt collection is our entré point, we actually see our business growing much bigger on another side. Once we better understand more about that population, then we can really expand our credit box and our credit underwriting and really do that in a really responsible way to grow that company, to be responsive for people who are even just starting out. Because I've had a lot of people who've been immigrants who've said, I needed your product, not because I messed up my credit, but because I couldn't get any. 

Elizabeth: I think um, I think from a mission perspective, I love what you're doing. I really think that things need to change in the system. I've also gotten those nasty notices. You forget a payment here or there and then all of a sudden everybody and their mother's calling you. uh I think in fintech, one of the things that I'm often very concerned about is the unit economics of it. I completely agree with you that for debt collection, like if you're paying $25 for $1,000 of debt, you can make a lot of money, you can probably do it more efficiently than a lot of the existing debt collectors with technology and automation. I think once you get beyond that, then you're starting to enter some of the neobank space and your margins just drop a whole lot, right? Like if you have a credit card, you're just making small percentage points. It's an interesting customer acquisition wedge that you've got like, Oh, this high margin product to get into that space. But then once you're in that space, you're in that battle for that small margin with everybody else. And the other thing, the interesting thing about FinTech that I often hear entrepreneurs say is, Oh, we want to expand our SKUs to increase the lifetime value of our customers. But when you actually look at the data, even like Chase, a big behemoth. Most people don't have a bank and a credit card and a mortgage and all the other products with Chase. Most people have maybe one thing with Chase and then other things with other banks. Right? So it is actually very hard, even for the big companies to quote "own" the consumer on many products. So this is going to take a lot of capital, the margins are going to be thin, and I think for us in our small fund, it's probably not the best fit. But I really am rooting for you and hope that you knock this outta the park. 

Gwyneth: Thank you. 

Mac: I disagree with Elizabeth here. I've also gone through these issues with credit card debt. My time as a young founder who had golden handcuffs, I quit my job and say, Hey, I'm gonna do the Silicon Valley thing and lost everything and spent like years of getting like, I got really good at ignoring my phone. And so I can imagine if I'm working with a program that helps me build my credit, there is going to be some brand loyalty. For me, I like you a lot, and I love what you're building because what you're building is important. But I got one hang up. 

Mac’s hangup, after this.

Mac: I like you a lot, and I love what you're building because what you're building is important. But I got one hang up. You have a wedge where, because of the product you're building, you get all these customers' information up front. You still have to figure out how to engage them. And I know you have a full plan around it. But you don't know what part of that plan is going to work just yet. You have to test all that stuff out. You're going to get this million dollar close. We're going to speak that into existence. But I know, the decent portion is going to go to buying debt.

Gwyneth: I'm only up to 10% we’re gonna spend. 

Mac: Well, 10 percent is going to buying debt. That means you got 900,000 to figure out how to engage these customers. And really probably like half of that, because I'm just talking time wise. Cause once you get through half of that, you start to feel the crunch. If the numbers aren't kicking in, then you start looking around the team, how we shrink things down? How do I figure this stuff out? Then that gets you into a cycle of, you got to figure out this customer acquisition thing really quick. And if you don't within that amount of money, that's it. 

Gwyneth: But I have a full marketing stack. Braze, Amplitude, Hot Jar, Mix Panel. We're like, we're in it to win it. But again, like in basic debt collection, people pay their debt without any marketing automation tactics. So I want to remind you that the front end is that the other alternative for this consumer is not responding and being referred to a debt collector that sues them. 

Mac: Well, just to close it up, I'm really interested. I can't get over that hump just yet. 

Gwyneth: Okay. 

Ben: I have a question actually. Pitch hat off for a second and like you and I strategizing on this thing together for a second. Let's say for one moment that we just put aside this potential million dollars you raise. Like, it's not going to get raised. What's the, like the just the minimum viable proof point to be like this business works and how can we get that? 

Gwyneth: Yeah. So what we're doing actually, it's a phased in approach. So we are launching with spending a small amount, up to $25,000, and we're only doing debt collection, no credit building. In August, we layer in a credit builder line, right? Where we open a credit line for each payment to report to the credit bureaus. Then we will launch in October the actual charge card. But the thing is, we need to close this raise just to do the first step, to get in and buy very little bit of debt. We're in the process of closing our bank partnership, but they want to see us have a balance sheet of at least $750,000. So the reason I have to have the money is without it, I can't get into the market because we're partnering with the bank. 

Ben: These three phases. Which of the three phases requires a bank's participation?

Gwyneth: The second phase for the credit building. 

Ben: The second phase. Okay.

Gwyneth: So any credit building component requires a bank because I can't issue credit. 

Ben: Okay, but so that for the first phase to just get a little bit of debt and prove that you can collect it and so forth and understand the unit, unit economics, it sounds like you can do that independently of a bank, right?

Gwyneth: Yes.

Ben: Okay. Where I stand and where we stand as a fund is, it would go a long way for us if you were past that first milestone, because that's the furthest you can get on your own to prove that this business will work. And now you're at the obstacle where you need the money to move on to the next phase, but you've already derisked the business up to this point. And so if we were talking two months from now, I think I could get really behind this, but I would want to see you get to that point first personally. So that's why I'm going to sit out for now. 

Gwyneth: Okay.

Cyan: Has anyone priced this round yet? 

Gwyneth: So at the end of this month, we're closing at a $5 million valuation cap. After this month, it's going up. We're less than $200,000 away from our goal. So our goal here today was to try to close out because then we can close our round and actually get into the market and make things happen. 

Cyan: Well, I'm in

Gwyneth: Oh, thank you. I appreciate that.

Cyan: I'm in for 50k personally. 

Gwyneth: Thank you. 

Cyan: And then I would like for my fund, Long Journey Ventures, to take a look for the rest.

Gwyneth: That would be great. 

Cyan: And, I really, really want you to succeed. This is a problem that's near and dear to me. My life was wrecked for about ten years. I had to keep money in literally a sock drawer. 

Gwyneth: I'm so sorry.

Cyan: So, so I get this, you know. It was really painful and it is filled with stigma, you know, and my friends were out using credit cards. I couldn't use one, you know, I couldn't explain it. Couldn't get hotel rooms.

Gwyneth: Yep.

Cyan: You know, like it was embarrassing. So I'm rooting for you and I want to be by your side and I want to help you with this. 

Gwyneth: Thank you so much. That's so meaningful. I think the hardest thing about pitching a lot of VCs is they didn't have this, these kinds of issues, like people, like, like I said, like a debt collector, literally it's like, can't you borrow money from your mother or whomever, right. And so they can't understand it. And there's really a feeling like, Oh, people are deadbeats. They don't pay their debt. I'm like $70 billion of liquid charged off debt gets repaid every year, right? Our financial system wouldn't work if most people didn't repay their debt. So, going back to kind of the risk that you're concerned about, it's like I'm not concerned because people who call on the phone make a profit margin off of debt collection. I know I can beat that, right? But I feel like the concern about the acquisition is I don't think is as founded as you might all assume, just because there are 6,300 companies that do debt collection that are regulated by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, because it's such a profitable space. They wouldn't spend their time regulating this industry if there wasn't so much profit in it.

Mac: So just a piece of advice, you're 100 percent correct, but that's the wrong way to approach investors. 

Another hangup from Mac, after this.

Mac: So just a piece of advice, you're 100 percent correct, but that's the wrong way to approach investors. You have at least three people up who've lived this, right? So we know that it's going to happen. So yes, we know that if you buy some debt, people are going to pay it off. The question is, what's the percentage of people and how many people can you get to do that over a long period of time? Because we're starting today; you're on the ground floor. Our goal is whatever companies we invest in, have to get to a billion dollar valuation, right? That's a minimum hundred million in revenue. That's a long journey. And so you're right that you inherently have something where people are already engaged. And so for you, you're like the customer acquisition is not the most important piece. It's all the other stuff.

Gwyneth: Correct.

Mac: But you still have to speak to the customer acquisition piece as if it is. Show up with a plan of like, this is how we get our customers. These are the things we do. And we already know this works because we know that phone calls get 15 percent return. If we do letters, they get five. We know with our chat bot, we're going to get another two. And if you cobbled all together. You know, the industry standard is X, we think we can get to Y through these means, and that's why we're going to do better. That's a better answer than just saying, this isn't a problem. You're focusing on the wrong thing. 

Elizabeth: A hundred percent. Because especially in FinTech, a lot of VCs have gotten burned by customer acquisition. So, in many ways, you have to address problems that are unrelated to your business that have been created by other fintech companies. 

Gwyneth: Fair point. I, I accept that.

Mac: It's just, it's just the way of, of framing it when you tell the story, Put it in a frame of like, how every other SAAS founder talks about things. 

Gwyneth: Helpful. 

Cyan: And sometimes it's better to just say you don't know things. That you're gonna go use this money just to prove it out, which I believe is what you're gonna do. And I know that the confidence comes from you are just so well versed in your business, and you know what you're talking about, and I would take a bet on someone like you all day long. But let's derisk it so that we can get everybody else in. 

Gwyneth: Yeah.

Mac: Hey, we got an investment. Woo.

[applause]

Gwyneth: Thank you, Cyan.

Mac: Congratulations. 

Gwyneth: It means a lot. Thank you. Yeah. 

Cyan: I'm excited about this. 

Gwyneth: You guys are all going to regret it. I'm telling you. 

Mac: I hope so. 

Gwyneth: No, I mean, the thing is - listen. Like this is like, for me, Like this is, this is like - taking care of my mother who has Alzheimer's. This is taking care of my sister who's bipolar. This is my everything. This is not like I'm 22 years old and I'm doing this. This is my moonshot. And I am 100 percent confident that we are going to crush it and be a billion dollar company and be the third publicly traded debt buyer collector. I have no doubt in my mind. If you know me, like when I decide I want to do something, there's no stopping me. So I'm just telling you guys, in the later part of the journey, when you're thinking about it -

Cyan: They'll just pay more later. 

Gwyneth: They'll pay more later.

[laughter]

Gwyneth: But I thank you all for your time and your feedback. It's always very helpful. And like, thank you, Cyan, because with your help, we'll be able to close out and actually prove to you all what I'm saying. Thank you.

Ben: You're resilient and you're mission driven and you will win.

Gwyneth: Yeah.

Mac: The passion is there. We all see it. 

Cyan: The passion is definitely there. 

Gwyneth: Thank you guys so much for your time. 

Josh: Hey, Gwyneth. The Pitch Fund would also like to invest. 

Gwyneth: Yay! That's awesome.

Mac: Whenever we do, they do. 

Josh: If you can hold 50k for us, that'd be awesome. 

Gwyneth: That's amazing. Thank you guys so much. 

Cyan: Nice. 

Mac: 100k in a day.

Cyan: Yeah.

Gwyneth: You just did it. You closed my round. Bye guys.

Cyan: I love her. This is a napkin idea really, like at this point, like.

Mac: Yeah. I will say I've seen, I've seen a lot in the debt -

Elizabeth: It's pretty crowded.

Mac: - recovery and remittance space, especially from underrepresented founders. Now, granted, she has a different spin on it. I really like it. 

Elizabeth: She's got a big vision. I love that. 

Cyan: Yeah. 

Mac: Yeah. I just, I need to know that you know how you're going to get your customers. She has a lot of thoughts around it, but I feel like there are things she could have tried at this point to start building some of that.

Elizabeth: Yeah. 

Ben: Once she develops the business vision to be as strong as the mission vision, and those two things are congruent, unstoppable.

Mac: Me and you were saying the exact same thing. 

Ben: I'm such like a business, you know, systems thinker. So, yeah.

Mac: But she was - she herself, incredible. Her confidence, like she is going to do everything she can and she will put every ounce of effort into that company. Probably to a detriment of herself to try and - 

Cyan: That's the one thing I would watch out for is just like - 

Mac: To be successful - 

Cyan: Her health.

Elizabeth: Yeah. I was worried when she started talking about like -

Cyan: Yeah.

Josh: What do you mean by that? Like, you're worried about health? 

Cyan: Oh, just burnout. You know, just, that's a lot of weight to carry. 

Josh: Sure. 

Mac: She's putting it on herself. 

Cyan: I, yeah, I find that - so interestingly, a lot of founders at her stage wing it more. If she came in and was just like, I'm raising this money. And she led with like, I've already got 700k of it or whatever. And I'm almost there. But this is what I'm going to use the money for. I'm going to prove it out. Here's a lot of things I don't know. 

Elizabeth: In many ways, I think that would have been stronger.

Cyan: Yeah. And for whatever reason -

Mac: Yeah. 100 percent. 

Ben: Yeah. Agreed. 

Cyan: That's what most people do. Now, I found that when people are getting a lot of no's, they overprepare. And so she's spending a lot of time to be really, really, really ready. But I guarantee you that her peers, are not. 

Mac: Yeah. 

Cyan: And so the little bit of that sort of winging it, I know that sounds crazy, actually goes a long ways And it's also honest, which is just like, Hey, there's a lot I don't know, but here's, here's what I'm going to use the money for, and I'm going to prove all this stuff out. 

Elizabeth: I don't think it's so much winging it. I think the way that I think about it is like when I was a first time founder back in 2008. You know, you come in with all this confidence. You're like, this is the plan, and this is going to work, and that was sort of the vibe I got. But then as you go along, it's like, actually, no, that doesn't work, and maybe she'll figure it out, right? But it will look more like this, like zigzagging. And that's what I would expect. uh

Josh: You want someone who will acknowledge that path? 

Elizabeth: Yeah, who will acknowledge that, like, Hey, these are the things we know, these are the things we don't know, but we're going to figure it out. As opposed to, I know this is going to work 100 percent confidently.

Josh: Well, you would see something like this approach, Gwyneth's approach, in a first time founder who maybe doesn't realize how much might change in the next six months.

Mac: I mean, it started to give me even more pause cause it seemed like she wasn't readily able to say like, Oh, I don't know, or that could happen, but this is why we think it won't. She's like, this is going to happen. This is going to happen. You're coming off as not being coachable at this point, cause you're not listening to what I'm saying. Like, that's what we hope is going to happen, but that may not be. So if that doesn't, then what? No, that's going to happen. I know for a fact that what you think is going to happen is not going to happen. 

Elizabeth: Not everything goes a hundred percent to plan. 

Ben: Sizzle versus steak. We're selling sizzle at the pre-seed, right? And as soon as it's like steak, it's, you know, there's something to measure, then you can start to scrutinize the business. And if you start to insinuate that there's maybe more steak than there is, then we'll start to scrutinize it and it's really just sizzle, right? And that's okay. 

Cyan: For me. It's just - I just really like her.

Ben: That was fun. 

Josh: That's pitch one. 

Cyan: Awesome. 

Mac: Can we take a break? 

Elizabeth: Are we over time now? 

Mac: We've been over time. Elizabeth was doing her best to get us out here early.

A fiery pitch with some fiery feedback from our VCs - but to give Gwyneth credit, she handled it well.

Gwyneth collected a $50k commitment from Cyan and 50k from The Pitch Fund. But as foretold by the VCs … not everything goes according to plan

Gwyneth: It's just been an adventure this summer, working on getting into the market. And always there's so many fits and starts and things that like obstacles that are thrown your way that you have to like step over. like our payment processer dropping us because it turns out debt collection is treated like cannabis and gambling and those kinds of controversial industries.

Josh: Of course, of course it is. 

Gwyneth: And so there are a lot of payment processors that won't work with us. So my next company might be creating a payment processor for debt collection.

Lisa: Oh my gosh.

Josh: That's your pivot.

Will Gwyneth finally be able to buy some debt and get those “proof points” investors are looking for? Find out on our season finale on December 11th at 7pm. You can register for the virtual watch party at pitch.show/party. We'll be giving away some free merch from our store, including my personal favorite, the valuation cap.

No offer to invest in Remynt is being made to the listening audience on today’s show, but LPs in The Pitch Fund do have access. You can learn more and invest in our debut fund at thepitch.fund

We just crossed $4M under management in fund I and we’re open to new investors now through December 15th! After that, you’ll have to wait for fund II in 2026.

Next week on The Pitch … 

Chinar: We help AI teams to turn end user feedback, into actionable insights. It's called feedback intelligence. 

Mac: Can you talk to me a little bit about your business model?

Chinar: on average we’re we charge them 90k annual contract. 

Mac: Did you raise any money for the company you were doing before? 

Chinar: Yeah. One million. 

Mac: And so, Is this new company, is this a completely new company or is this a pivot -

Chinar: Pivot. But still we are using that money for this. 

Elizabeth: I would like to invest, but not at the valuation you're looking for. 

Chinar: We can negotiate.

Mac: I’m sure!

That’s next week! Subscribe to The Pitch right now, and turn on notifications so you don’t miss it. 

One last time, for the people in the back. Founder applications for season 13 will close next Wednesday, November 13th. This is your last chance to apply! We’re taping January 14th-16th in Miami, FL. Submit your application at pitch.show/apply

This episode was made by me, Josh Muccio, Lisa Muccio, Anna Ladd, Enoch Kim, and Jackie Papanier. With deal sourcing by Peter Liu and John Alvarez.

Music in this episode is by The Muse Maker, Breakmaster Cylinder, FYRSTYX, Memory Palace, and Onders.

The Pitch is made in partnership with the Vox Media Podcast Network.