What seemed like just another bureaucratic HR task turned into the creation of one of the most relevant startups in the corporate benefits market in Brazil. When trying to offer meal vouchers and food vouchers to his own agency’s employees, Pedro Lane found a system full of distortions, low efficiency and little innovation. From there, the idea that would give rise to Flash was born.
“When you are in a laboratory, which is your own company, the pains are there on a daily basis, you end up seeing enormous opportunities pass in front of you. One of them was precisely the benefits market”, reveals Lane.
The turning point began when he decided to understand how employees used the benefit. The response exposed an unexpected reality. “You cross the avenue and talk to the ticket agent. You stick your card in there. At the time we paid 500 reais a month for meal vouchers and he gives you 400 back.”
In practice, workers agreed to lose part of the value to transform the benefit into cash and be able to buy food where they really needed it. For Lane, this showed that there was something deeply wrong with the model.
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“I was inculcated with this. If the product is not broken, with this maxim, something is happening. The worker is happier with a score of 80 than a score of 100”, says Pedro Lane, co-founder of Flash, in an interview with From Zero to Top.
A giant, frozen market
When investigating the sector, the entrepreneur saw a concentrated market, with a few companies dominating almost the entire operation and without clear incentives to innovate. According to him, this environment explained the bad experience for both companies and employees and establishments.
“So there was a typical money arbitrage of an outdated product on the market, frozen in time. They had 95% market share at the time, there was no incentive for innovation. There really was some opportunity. Some link in that chain was broken.”
From then on, Flash’s proposal was to redesign the corporate benefit experience. Instead of multiple cards and low acceptance, the company invested in technology and a wide network of use.
“At Flash, you are the one who chooses where you will eat and how you will eat. We always believed that we would win the game with the best product and the best service”, says the founder.
The startup began construction at the end of 2018 and was officially launched in July 2019, already with customers. The initial focus was on small and medium-sized companies, a segment that, according to Lane, was neglected by the big players in the sector.
From the beginning, the company’s thesis was to win by delivering. Without competing for financial incentives for HR, Flash sought differentiation in product and service.
“When everyone is competing for large employers, a huge share of this market has never been a priority,” says Lane.
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The strategy helped the company grow month after month. For a company, corporate benefits should not only be a legal obligation, but a real valuable tool for companies and employees. Today, the company operates in thousands of Brazilian municipalities and has transformed an operational problem into a nationwide business.
“If it benefits someone, it should benefit before any other of the two clients, the worker”, concludes Pedro.
To find out more details about Flash’s creation and strategy, see the full episode on . The program is available in its podcast version on the main streaming platforms such as , , , and
About From Zero to Top
The Do Zero ao Topo podcast is a production of InfoMoney and brings, every week, the stories of prominent women and men in the Brazilian market to tell their story, sharing the biggest challenges faced along the way and the main strategies used in building the business.
