This app allows you to help charity without donating money and in 30 seconds

It has raised $500K funding.

Do you want to help but no time to volunteer? Do you love giving to charity but don't have a lot of cash? Fret no more. A mobile app called ‘Happi’ helps time-poor and financially stretched people support causes they care about without spending money and in 30 seconds.

The Happi app promises to provide consumers with a quick, easy and free way to drive donations towards causes, charities, schools and interest groups they care about, while also being rewarded with tailored promotions, special deals and chances to win anything they select on the Happi e-commerce platform. The currency Happi uses is a ‘Smile’. ‘Smiles’ can be obtained free of charge by answering 5 question surveys.

How does it work?
Happi enables its members to win prizes and get tailored promotions, all while supporting the cause they select. In just 30 seconds and without spending a single cent, members simply log in, select items or deals they want to win/buy by ‘Smiling’ at them, and then take a five-question survey.That 30-second survey drives a $0.10 donation to their Partner of choice, downloads the promotional coupon for the respective deal/ item to their phone, and finally, enters them in a lucky draw to win that deal/item.

Every Friday, Happi also conducts ‘Random Act of Happiness’a giveaway where they randomly select members who have ‘Smiled’ at items/deals at least ten times that calendar month and simply give that member one of those things.

Happi currently provides over 45 teams, clubs, charities, student groups and community groups with funding. Specifically, $1 per consumer signup, $0.10 per “smile”, $10,000 for each 50,000 smiles, and $5 for every purchase the partner’s supporters make. Happi estimates that for every 1,000 actively engaged users, doing one 30- second, five- question survey per day, Happi will be able to give $144,000 annually to each partner organisation.

Happi currently enables over 70 merchants to distribute targeted deals and promotions to a large and well-defined audience free-of-charge. The only charge to the merchant is a redemption reward for each coupon used to make a purchase. Happi then donates this money to the customer’s charity, so the customer has one more reason to buy that item from the Happi merchant rather than another.

Greg Lipper, Happi's Founder and Chief Happiness Officer, sums his motivation to developing the application as follows, “Happi is a platform for people helping people where each participant’s small acts lead to big impacts for any cause they’re passionate about. We are especially excited to launch in Singapore, where people are so busy that they find it challenging to support the causes and groups they care about. Happi now gives people a fast, easy, free, and rewarding way to give support to the group they care about. This is a great example of how social enterprises can create huge social benefit while also being sustainable without taking money from consumers or support from public funds.

Happi was incorporated on June 23, 2015. The launch was on February 12th, 2016. They raised over S$500,000 in pre-series A funding.

The founder
For New York- born Greg, transforming an idea into a business venture has always been a part of his DNA. His first taste of entrepreneurship was at age 12 selling skateboarding gear to his fellow classmates. Immediately after graduating in 1987 with a major in Entrepreneurial Studies and Communications at Babson College near Boston, Greg moved to Osaka to study Japanese. It was in Japan that Greg’s colorful career in Asia commenced with Mitsubishi Corporation and led him through consulting, startups, and his final role in Japan as President of Peregrine Systems KK.

In 2001, Greg’s work led him to Singapore, where he has resided since. Greg has worked with large enterprises like HP and Mercer, many clients as a consultant, and four ventures of his own, but all of his work has focused on using technology to advance new business models. The idea for Happi came to Greg as a synthesis of existing models. Charitable donations, discount coupons, sweepstakes, and surveys have all existed separately for eons, but Greg thought of a way to bring them all together with a single tap on a mobile app. This would enable charities to receive effortlessly, enable people to give in 30 seconds with no cost, enable merchants to acquire new customers efficiently, and finally, would enable sponsors to understand and engage with consumers quickly, efficiently, precisely, and at massive scale.

From May 2015 onwards, Greg started developing the Happi platform. The Happi website and mobile apps were subsequently launched nine months later, in February 2016. Greg’s core focus for Happi is to empower its members to support a cause they care about with just 30 seconds a day and without spending money. If enough people do that, those small acts will have a huge impact for every community group Happi’s members support.

As an entrepreneur, Greg is completely consumed by his business, but when he isn’t working to drive Happi forward in one way or another, he enjoys backgammon, poker, golf, and promises himself to one day get back inside of a gym.

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