Kasasa Ltd. is a wholesale financial services company headquartered in Austin, Texas. Kasasa sells branded, community-powered products designed to drive profit and growth for community financial institutions. Kasasa also supports community banks and credit unions by providing them with marketing, consulting, and web-based solutions in order to market their products more effectively.
History
Kasasa was founded in 2003 in Taylor, Texas under the name BancVue. BancVue’s first product was a checking account called REWARDChecking, which was sold to community financial institutions in Central Texas. Kasasa has since expanded to provide full marketing-agency services to those financial institutions. Kasasa’s first financial institution, City National Bank of Taylor, in Taylor, TX is still a client. Timeline: 2005: BancVue, Ltd is formed to help develop, market, and consult on software products for community financial institutions. 2006: FirstROI, LLC is formed, with BancVue as majority partner, to create and host websites for community financial institutions. 2010: FirstROI, LLC changes name to BancVue Interactive, LLC 2011: BVi merges into BancVue, Ltd. to form one company. 2016: Riverside Partners LLC aka The Riverside Company makes a majority investment in Kasasa, Ltd 2016: BancVue, Ltd officially changes its name to Kasasa, Ltd.
Market
Kasasa products are exclusively for use by institutions classified as small financial institutions. Community financial institutions are the primary source of lending for small businesses and farms, and their boards are made up of local citizens who look to forward the interests of those in the community. They make up the largest share of Kasasa clients.
Impact
Financial institutions that offer Kasasa accounts are given training in the latest digital marketing techniques in categories like social media, search engine optimization, and how to run short- and long-term promotional campaigns as part of their contract with the company. Kasasa-branded accounts are managed and marketed by the partnering community financial institution and marketing team located at the company’s home base in Austin, TX. In exchange for these services and the right to use Kasasa accounts, partner institutions pay a series of fees.
Kasasa Products
Kasasa offers a variety of reward checking accounts and one savings account, only offered by community banks and credit unions. Accounts include: Kasasa Cash is a checking account that rewards account holders with nationwide ATM refunds, no monthly service fees, and high interest on their checking account balance. Kasasa Cash Back is a checking account that rewards account holders with a high interest percentage back on all of their debit card purchases, along with nationwide ATM refunds and no monthly service fees. Kasasa Tunes is a checking account that refunds account holders’ iTunes®, Google PlayTM, and Amazon® purchases. Kasasa Saver is a savings account that is paired with either the Kasasa Cash or Kasasa Cash Back accounts. The monthly rewards from these checking accounts are automatically deposited into the Kasasa Saver account.
