Where Are They Now? ft. Hoppier
With the uncertain and changing times we are encountering this year, many companies have begun allocating stipends to their employees to cover the costs of working at home, as well as to act as an allowance for employees to use on mental health, wellness, and other beneficial services. Managing all of the employee stipends and ensuring that every dollar is being used accordingly can get tough, which is where the company Hoppier comes in.
Hoppier is a platform that makes it easy for companies to manage their stipends, among other things by offering a modern way to manage employee benefits. “We believe that the future of benefits and total compensation is not just your salary, health and dental benefits. It’s greater than that — it’s the wellness, fitness, and learning programs your company provides, and much more,” says Cassy Aite, co-founder and CEO of Hoppier.
Cassy Aite and his brother Emil Aite conceptualized the idea when Emil was an employee at Shopify in October 2016. He saw what the company was doing in their food program, and used the concept as an opportunity to help companies manage the way that they spend money on employee food-related spending. This evolved from food-related stipend management to all stipends provided by companies to their employers.
When Hoppier was a part of the Entrepreneurship Hub’s Startup Garage program, they benefited immensely, says Cassy. “we definitely benefited a lot at the time. We really didn’t have much and just being a part of the program gave us the confidence to succeed at a very early stage. It was incredibly helpful and it was a great program for us.” Since then, Hoppier has found significant success — in their second year of business, they hit 100 customers, as well as achieved a million dollars in annual revenue. As of 2019, Hoppier has expanded to the United States, including but not limited to San Francisco, Houston, New York, Miami, Wisconsin, and Chicago. Cassy estimates that Hoppier is currently working with “a couple hundred companies” in Canada and the United States.
As we take the ride to remote work, more and more companies are incentivized to work with Hoppier in order to better provide for their workers — “We’re seeing companies creating stipends for their employees to work from home,” describes Cassy. Companies like Shopify are providing thousand dollar stipends in work from home benefits, all made more efficient through Hoppier. “[Our] software helps companies manage and distribute stipend and manage payroll and tax complaints. Effectively, it’s up to you as an employer to decide how your company manages their stipends, and creativity is the limit.”
“Hoppier has a framework we use internally — our cultural code, you could say. We create a culture deck every year, with stories employees tell that cover our mission and our values,” says Cassy. “We have an acronym that we use that Arnold Schwarzenegger would always use — WEIGHTS.” In this acronym, the W stands for Wow Moments, or moments that deserve recognition, the E stands for Empathy, the I stand for Infinitely curious, the G stands for Genuine, H is for High achievers, T for Transparency, and S stands for Scrappy.
As Hoppier grows, so do their goals. Their biggest goal is to support as many employers and employees as possible. “We work with a lot of happy organizations and happy people, and our mission is to continue to support them. We want to work with thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of organizations, and millions of people,” says Cassy. “Our mission is to make work happier.”
*This feature was published as a part of the Where Are They Now? Series, 2020.
