The new start-up from Olaf Scholz's nephews offers investments in ETF portfolios for everyone. Fabian Scholz, co-founder and CEO of rubarb, explains how this works and why they named their start-up after the rhubarb plant.

Your app was launched in November 2020, can you tell us a bit more about it? Why did you found your startup, what problem are you addressing and how are you solving it?

With rubarb, we want to completely rethink the topic of "savings books". It is still only a fraction of the population that is willing to invest their money in financial market products. The majority still relies on traditional savings products, even though these hardly yield any profits in the face of low interest rates and inflation. We therefore asked ourselves the question: Do saving and investing have to be mutually exclusive? We think: no! If the hurdles for investment beginners are lowered, many more people may be willing to try out the capital market.

And this is exactly where we came in and developed rubarb, an app that allows users to invest without much effort. The principle behind it is called 'rounding up'. This means that every user can link either their checking account, credit card or Paypal account to the app. Every amount of money spent is then rounded up to the next full euro; the differences collected in this way are then invested once a week in one of a total of three globally diversified ETF portfolios.

As you say, your target group is the general public. You want to make finance and investments accessible to everyone. What special features does that entail, and what do you have to watch out for?

Exactly - our app is aimed at the 85 percent of the population who have not yet used any financial market products at all. They either don't trust themselves to invest or are afraid of doing something wrong and ending up losing their money altogether. We want to alleviate these worries by making our app as easy to understand and clear as possible, by making the processes behind it transparent, and above all by enabling users to access their invested money at any time. With our app, there is no minimum term or minimum investment amount; instead, we create the lowest possible threshold for accessing the investment market.

Home screen of the app. Photo: rubarb GmbH

What were the biggest challenges you had to overcome in the beginning?

We founded rubarb in the midst of one of the biggest economic crises in history - and took a full risk. In retrospect, there certainly would have been a more relaxed time for the founding. At the same time, however, we see the crisis as an opportunity. After all, it shows us every day how important the idea behind our business model is: if you want to be secure in times of crisis, you'd be well advised to put money aside early on. At the moment, of course, that seems to be difficult for many people. This is where our app comes in and fills a glaring gap in the market.

What was the most valuable piece of advice someone gave you during the startup phase?

"Hire experienced people for the most important core functions and expect that the majority will not share your enthusiasm for the idea at first" - both pieces of advice come from good friends and both have proven true. Especially in the beginning, we looked at different ways to find the balance of experience, speed of implementation and cost. While freelancers, agencies and others often have a super pitch and make big promises. Ultimately, however, the personal commitment of each individual when a team is sworn in and building a product without distraction is simply unique. In the short term, of course, the experienced colleague is a bit more expensive. Twelve months after the start-up, however, it pays back many times over to have built an extremely stable and high-quality product that can be scaled and for which the necessary knowledge is available within the company.

And on the second point: In Germany, everyone is doubly critical at first anyway - it's simply in the genes of many people here. But you also have to have a lot of composure when taking on risk chapters, especially at the beginning. In the end, if it were so obvious and simple, someone would have done it already. So every new idea is always one that many people don't understand at first. Fortunately, it has since become very clear that we have launched an incredibly useful product.

Your app is called rubarb (German: Rhabarber); at first glance, one would assume a food startup. But what does rhubarb have to do with finance and how did you come up with the name?

That's an exciting question. Initially, we took a very analytical approach to finding a name and didn't make it easy for ourselves. We wanted a name with which we could also operate internationally, i.e. which would not have a negative connotation in other languages. Ultimately, we see a parallel to the topic of saving in the English term rhubarb: Money is like rhubarb - no one really dares to eat raw vegetables, but everyone loves what you make out of them.

Save money automatically every time you spend with rubarb. Photo: rubarb GmbH

One of your product promises is "financial wellness," how do you create that for your customers?

For us, it's about helping our users create a solid financial foundation so they can look to the future without worry. To do this, they need to put money aside regularly over a longer period of time - just like with savings accounts or overnight money. The rounding up of purchases involves small sums that are not really missing from the account at the end of the month. But all in all, they add up to an amount that is worth investing. Our experience so far has shown that the average user saves about 30 euros per month. Depending on the risk affinity, the money is then invested in one of our three ETF portfolios and yields a corresponding return. The associated effort for our users is extremely low, but the effect is still great! By the way, we also offer a savings plan on a daily, weekly or monthly basis - and of course one-time deposits are possible at any time!

You're offering rubarb free of charge for the time being, so let's be honest: How do you earn your bread (or rather your rhubarb) with it?

The app is completely free to use; anything else would contradict our conviction that we really want to offer investments to everyone. In the medium to long term, however, we want to further expand our offering. For example, we plan to offer some premium functions in the app soon, which our users can add for a fee if they are interested. The idea is to gradually expand rubarb into a personal finance app that helps our customers identify potential savings in their spending habits. At the moment, of course, we're most interested in what our users actually want. That's why we regularly gather feedback, engage in dialogue and develop new ideas from it.

Where do you see your startup in three years?

We want to establish rubarb as a trustworthy partner for the vast majority of the population when it comes to investing. We also plan to make our business model known beyond the country's borders. This year, for example, we want to launch the rubarb app in at least one more EU country - after three years, we then aim to have a substantial six-figure user base in several EU member states. We are very much looking forward to this journey ahead of us.

rubarb founder Fabian Scholz, photo: rubarb GmbH

Do you have a role model and if so, who is it?

For me personally, it's actually many of my friends and people from my extended circle of acquaintances. My brother Jakob, however, has a clear favorite: Jeff Bezos. On the one hand, of course, because of his rigorous product focus, which Jakob also exemplifies every day and which has made Amazon what it is today. But more importantly, because without him, he probably never would have founded it.

I have a few more years of experience in the startup scene and have also talked Jakob down a lot. But in the end, he saw an interview with Jeff Bezos, how he made the decision to leave his well-paid hedge fund job and found Amazon. He asked himself the question: When I'm 80 and look back on my life, will I regret not taking the step? For him, the decision was then clear - he could live with the doubt of failing. But he couldn't live with not having tried. That's when the penny finally dropped for Jacob, too: In the end, everyone boils with water after all. The question is, what motivates you, what stories do you want to be able to tell the next generations later? We think we're on the right track here.


Like it? Please spread the word:

FYI: English edition available

Hello my friend, have you been stranded on the German edition of Startbase? At least your browser tells us, that you do not speak German - so maybe you would like to switch to the English edition instead?

Go to English edition

FYI: Deutsche Edition verfügbar

Hallo mein Freund, du befindest dich auf der Englischen Edition der Startbase und laut deinem Browser sprichst du eigentlich auch Deutsch. Magst du die Sprache wechseln?

Deutsche Edition öffnen

Related companies

Similar posts