Michael Hershfield founded Accrue Savings to let shoppers save toward purchases instead of borrowing against them, and raised a $25 million Series A from Tiger Global to do it.
Worth knowing
He sells savings to retailers as a payment option, which means he has negotiated partnerships on the merchant side and built the consumer product behind them, after years running enterprise and inside sales at scale. He also writes angel cheques into early software companies. Founders working on consumer fintech, retail distribution or a first real sales motion should get in touch.
Story
Michael spent more than a decade in the Toronto and New York startup scene, co-founding LiveStub and later running operations at Kitchensurfing, the in-home chef marketplace, and at Nucleus Intercom. He led monetization and business development at Sailthru, and did deals and legal affairs at Howcast Media. In 2018 he joined WeWork, where he ran inside sales globally, led product, and finished as SVP of Sales for the medium and large business segment. He left in 2021 to build Accrue Savings, giving retail customers an FDIC-insured wallet and rewards for saving up rather than taking on buy-now-pay-later debt. He studied at the University of British Columbia and named his consulting practice, YVR, after the airport he flew out of.
Highlights
- Founder & CEO, Accrue Savings; $25M Series A led by Tiger Global (2022)
- Raised $4.7M seed from Box Group, Twelve Below, Hanaco and others
- SVP of Sales, WeWork (2018-2021)
- Charter member, C100
- Angel investor in Clay.run, BrightHire and Teal; advisor to Voyat
Know someone who belongs here?
Constellation is the directory of Canadians and friends of Canada around the world, written by the people in it. Send them this page, or add your own.
Add Yourself