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Forge - an easy way to accept payments online, powered by Balanced (YC W11)

24 points by jareau 14y ago

dylangs1030 14y ago
A few points: Why is this different (in a worthwhile way) from existing payment options? Like Stripe? What else can you cite that Paypal does wrongly that you can implement correctly? I don't mean to be critical, just asking hard questions. "Taking on" big companies like Paypal has been a de facto way to bring attention to projects since the early 2000s, but it's hard to actually achieve that level of eminence and market share. Being good isn't enough.
- kevinholesh 14y ago
  Designer at Forge here. Those are both great questions. We're aiming Forge at people who cannot write their own backend payment processor to use Stripe, and only know basic HTML. If you have the skills and the time to code and maintain payment processing and a checkout form, then Forge isn't for you. We're aiming it at non-techies who want to sell something online. PayPal certainly has its advantages, but we're trying to solve two main problems: the checkout experience and the withdrawing of funds. The checkout experience on PayPal has 5 or 6 steps and redirects you away from the merchant's site to complete a payment. Ours is on one page and is embedded directly in the merchant's site. Click "buy product", checkout form pops down, fill out 6 or so fields and click "buy now." Done. Also, we automatically deposit your profits into your bank account every Friday. Our goal is to get this down to the next-day. You sell something Tuesday morning, ship it Tuesday afternoon, and the money is in your bank account on Wednesday morning.
  - dylangs1030 14y ago
    Thanks for the quick reply Kevin. Will you also be implementing a hardware system for the iPhone/iPod like Square? Or are you going entirely online? Paypal has a card reader as well. Just a thought.
    - kevinholesh 14y ago
      We don't have any plans to make a hardware system for taking payments. Only online. Square is not a business I want to be up against right now :-)
tvladeck 14y ago
At the bottom they lay out the charges. All of us can do the arithmetic, but their example works out to 6.4% of a $20 sale! And of course once you back out the overhead and direct costs of selling, the amount of your potential profit that eats up is some multiple of that. They charge 2.9% + $0.30, and then 2%. Stripe charges 2.9% + $0.30. So they are approximately 65-70% (2/2.9 = 0.69) more expensive, depending on your average charge.
- kevinholesh 14y ago
  You are correct. We are more expensive than Stripe if you're just looking at money. But we look at it from a time and capital perspective. With Stripe, you have to code and maintain your own payment solution on the backend and your own checkout form. You also have to worry about a million other things like emailing your customers when they place an order, and handling refunds. If you don't have the coding skills to build that yourself, you have to hire an expensive developer to build and maintain that for you. If that extra 2% cost savings is worth it to endure the hassle above, then Forge isn't for you. We're aiming at people who don't want to deal with all that and would rather concentrate on growing their business doing things like launching a new product and marketing their current ones.
  - flexie 14y ago
    The extra 2 percent - that is 'only' 2 percent of revenue but for a webshop it is easily 20 percent of profits.
    - kevinholesh 14y ago
      Absolutely. If you're doing enough business, that 2% really adds up. At that point, it is financially worth it for you to build your own backend payment solution using Stripe or Balanced to save money. But when you're first starting out selling something, it's a huge capital investment to build that payment processing code on top of Stripe/Balanced, likely $5,000+ if you do it right. We're trying to make it as easy as possible to get started.
jbrooksuk 14y ago
Yet another Payment processor which doesn't work outside of USA/Canada. I hate being in Europe.
- kevinholesh 14y ago
  Believe me. We're bummed about that too. We're working as hard as we can to get into other countries, but we had to start somewhere.
runaway 14y ago
The word "forge" seems to me an odd choice for a company that deals in finance. Three of us here independently saw negative connotations when it comes to money, security, trust, etc. but nobody else has brought it up yet so perhaps it's just us. Best of luck to them.
- kevinholesh 14y ago
  That's certainly a valid point. We're trying to convey that you're forging a lasting online business and doing the hard work to be independent from a corporate job. If the name turns out to be losing us business, then we'll have to address it.
sabalaba 14y ago
Stripe is going to be a tough organization to compete with. I wish you the best of luck.
- kevinholesh 14y ago
  I don't see us competing with Stripe. If you're a developer and have the time to write and maintain a payment solution around Stripe, then Forge definitely isn't for you. We're going after the people who don't want to code all of that themselves and just want to sell something and get money deposited into their bank account.
- dylangs1030 14y ago
  Forge and Stripe are technically not applicable to the same audience. Developers are attracted to Stripe for extensibility and customization through coding. Non-technical users will like Forge because it's non-technical and quick to start up, in a "just works" sort of way.
  - kevinholesh 14y ago
    Couldn't have said it better myself.
- jusben1369 14y ago
  Gumroad might be a better analogy (I think built on top of Stripe) They're 5% and 25 cents.
trungonnews 14y ago
Are you guys doing the exact same thing as Stripe Checkout? https://stripe.com/docs/checkout https://stripe.com/docs/checkout
- jordanmessina 14y ago
  Stripe checkout button only sends a charge token to a backend that you have to write. A backend that needs to trigger the actual charge and everything that goes along with that, like generating emails and receipts. Forge takes care of all of that so you don't have to worry about it.
  - trungonnews 14y ago
    Ah. Thanks.

24 points by jareau 14y ago

A few points: Why is this different (in a worthwhile way) from existing payment options? Like Stripe? What else can you cite that Paypal does wrongly that you can implement correctly? I don't mean to be critical, just asking hard questions. "Taking on" big companies like Paypal has been a de facto way to bring attention to projects since the early 2000s, but it's hard to actually achieve that level of eminence and market share. Being good isn't enough.

kevinholesh 14y ago
Designer at Forge here. Those are both great questions. We're aiming Forge at people who cannot write their own backend payment processor to use Stripe, and only know basic HTML. If you have the skills and the time to code and maintain payment processing and a checkout form, then Forge isn't for you. We're aiming it at non-techies who want to sell something online. PayPal certainly has its advantages, but we're trying to solve two main problems: the checkout experience and the withdrawing of funds. The checkout experience on PayPal has 5 or 6 steps and redirects you away from the merchant's site to complete a payment. Ours is on one page and is embedded directly in the merchant's site. Click "buy product", checkout form pops down, fill out 6 or so fields and click "buy now." Done. Also, we automatically deposit your profits into your bank account every Friday. Our goal is to get this down to the next-day. You sell something Tuesday morning, ship it Tuesday afternoon, and the money is in your bank account on Wednesday morning.
- dylangs1030 14y ago
  Thanks for the quick reply Kevin. Will you also be implementing a hardware system for the iPhone/iPod like Square? Or are you going entirely online? Paypal has a card reader as well. Just a thought.
  - kevinholesh 14y ago
    We don't have any plans to make a hardware system for taking payments. Only online. Square is not a business I want to be up against right now :-)

tvladeck 14y ago

At the bottom they lay out the charges. All of us can do the arithmetic, but their example works out to 6.4% of a $20 sale! And of course once you back out the overhead and direct costs of selling, the amount of your potential profit that eats up is some multiple of that. They charge 2.9% + $0.30, and then 2%. Stripe charges 2.9% + $0.30. So they are approximately 65-70% (2/2.9 = 0.69) more expensive, depending on your average charge.

kevinholesh 14y ago
You are correct. We are more expensive than Stripe if you're just looking at money. But we look at it from a time and capital perspective. With Stripe, you have to code and maintain your own payment solution on the backend and your own checkout form. You also have to worry about a million other things like emailing your customers when they place an order, and handling refunds. If you don't have the coding skills to build that yourself, you have to hire an expensive developer to build and maintain that for you. If that extra 2% cost savings is worth it to endure the hassle above, then Forge isn't for you. We're aiming at people who don't want to deal with all that and would rather concentrate on growing their business doing things like launching a new product and marketing their current ones.
- flexie 14y ago
  The extra 2 percent - that is 'only' 2 percent of revenue but for a webshop it is easily 20 percent of profits.
  - kevinholesh 14y ago
    Absolutely. If you're doing enough business, that 2% really adds up. At that point, it is financially worth it for you to build your own backend payment solution using Stripe or Balanced to save money. But when you're first starting out selling something, it's a huge capital investment to build that payment processing code on top of Stripe/Balanced, likely $5,000+ if you do it right. We're trying to make it as easy as possible to get started.

jbrooksuk 14y ago

Yet another Payment processor which doesn't work outside of USA/Canada. I hate being in Europe.

kevinholesh 14y ago
Believe me. We're bummed about that too. We're working as hard as we can to get into other countries, but we had to start somewhere.

runaway 14y ago

The word "forge" seems to me an odd choice for a company that deals in finance. Three of us here independently saw negative connotations when it comes to money, security, trust, etc. but nobody else has brought it up yet so perhaps it's just us. Best of luck to them.

kevinholesh 14y ago
That's certainly a valid point. We're trying to convey that you're forging a lasting online business and doing the hard work to be independent from a corporate job. If the name turns out to be losing us business, then we'll have to address it.

sabalaba 14y ago

Stripe is going to be a tough organization to compete with. I wish you the best of luck.

kevinholesh 14y ago
I don't see us competing with Stripe. If you're a developer and have the time to write and maintain a payment solution around Stripe, then Forge definitely isn't for you. We're going after the people who don't want to code all of that themselves and just want to sell something and get money deposited into their bank account.
dylangs1030 14y ago
Forge and Stripe are technically not applicable to the same audience. Developers are attracted to Stripe for extensibility and customization through coding. Non-technical users will like Forge because it's non-technical and quick to start up, in a "just works" sort of way.
- kevinholesh 14y ago
  Couldn't have said it better myself.
jusben1369 14y ago
Gumroad might be a better analogy (I think built on top of Stripe) They're 5% and 25 cents.

trungonnews 14y ago

Are you guys doing the exact same thing as Stripe Checkout? https://stripe.com/docs/checkout https://stripe.com/docs/checkout

jordanmessina 14y ago
Stripe checkout button only sends a charge token to a backend that you have to write. A backend that needs to trigger the actual charge and everything that goes along with that, like generating emails and receipts. Forge takes care of all of that so you don't have to worry about it.
- trungonnews 14y ago
  Ah. Thanks.