Like all successful entrepreneurs, Bronner has almost boundless faith in his dreams. But even in his most optimistic projections, Bronner knew that Upromise wouldn't come close to covering four years of tuition, which runs about $100,000 for two children at a public university and about $225,000 or more for private college. So he followed his imagination to a more immediate objective, one that has the slightly subversive quality of a fertile marketing mind. The real goal of Upromise isn't to fund college education. It's to act as a catalyst for action -- to get more people saving sooner.
"I want to put people in motion, because the biggest problem in the college-savings crisis is inertia," Bronner says. "Americans are not culturally ingrained to save. But to get something for nothing, to seek a deal, to be scared as hell that 'I'm missing out' -- that behavior is culturally ingrained in us. With Upromise, all I've got to do to begin taking advantage is open a college-savings account, and if I don't, I'm stupid because I'm missing this money."
Bronner had worked this seam before. He helped launch American Express's Membership Rewards program, which allowed card holders to convert points for their purchases into airline tickets, a first when it was introduced in the 1980s. Later, he advised AT&T on its Winback campaign, the opening salvo in the battle for long-distance customers that used cash rebates as ammunition. Tunneling around in the psyche of the American consumer had given him a profound regard for the power of such programs. "Think about this," says Bronner. "About 40 million people have an American Airlines AAdvantage frequent-flier account, and the numbers for United, Delta, and US Airways are all pretty close. But how many have a college-savings account? A little more than 1 million. What does that tell you? It tells you that this country gets the idea of something for nothing."
It also tells you -- haven't we heard this before? -- that Americans are a nation of short-term thinkers. And yet, with the right incentives, even the home of the brave can demonstrate a bit of foresight. Bronner appreciated how the clarity of a well-defined objective made 401(k) plans accessible and popular, and gave people a way to begin thinking ahead. He recognized how the same deal-seeking impulse was pushing people to save money for retirement. "401(k) plans really took off because employers say, 'We're gonna match savings' and people say, 'Whoa, that's real money, and I'm missing out if I don't take it.' "
There was something else about 401(k) plans that appealed to Bronner -- how easy it was to contribute to them. People sign up through their workplace and never handle the money that flows into their accounts through automatic payroll deductions. Ease of use, Bronner believed, was the key that would unlock a mass market of millions of consumers, and he made simplicity the number-one design principle of Upromise.
Three years ago, Bronner could not have built a network secure enough or reliable enough to support Upromise. But the Web, and more important, the infrastructure of loyalty-purchasing programs, gave Upromise the tools to knit together a complex savings network that's nearly transparent to consumers. Members log onto Upromise's secure Web site, and register their credit cards and phone numbers. When they buy something at a participating business, Upromise automatically tracks the amount, calculates the contribution, and sweeps it into their college-savings accounts. Starting in September, big grocery chains like A&P and Shaw's will link their checkout scanners to the Upromise network, so members can begin collecting contributions ranging from 3% to 5% on 700 different items.
Simplicity meant more than a clean user interface that doesn't require members to change their buying habits. The offer itself, the value proposition of Upromise, had to be simple enough that consumers could grasp it immediately. "And it's got to be fair," Bronner says, "because if there's a catch, people will sniff it out." Bronner negotiated -- and renegotiated, in some cases -- to ensure that Upromise members would not be slotted into AT&T's full-price long-distance plans, for example, or get charged a $25 annual fee for Citibank's credit card. "We don't want anyone to question, 'Are they getting the better of me?' "
Upromise wouldn't contain nearly as much potential -- as a business, as a college-savings scheme -- if the list of companies willing to contribute were limited to one or two marquee names and a bunch of nonentities. The power of Upromise lies in the idea, but Bronner understood that to be taken seriously by consumers and their families, he had to have an all-star team of committed backers from America's corporate elite. What's more, his team had to be in uniform before Upromise announced that it was ready to play. If the big names stayed on the sidelines, waiting to see if Bronner could build momentum before signing on, consumers would dismiss Upromise as bush league, and the company would founder before it even took the field.
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