Founders Everywhere: Reto Bolliger
Reto Bolliger is the co-founder and CEO of Chaiz, the first online marketplace for extended car warranties.
Welcome to Founders Everywhere, where we highlight the incredible people behind the companies we’ve backed at Everywhere Ventures, a global pre-seed fund supported by a community of 500 founders and operators.
Owning a car is costly, and most Americans don’t have the savings to pay for unexpected repairs. Traditional avenues for purchasing extended car warranties often lack transparency and affordability, leaving consumers frustrated and vulnerable to overpriced and inadequate warranty plans. Chaiz is the first online marketplace for vehicle protection - empowering consumers to research, compare, and purchase protection online with just a few clicks. By leveraging technology, Chaiz is redefining the way car warranties are bought and sold. Their user-friendly online platform offers comprehensive comparison options and significant cost savings.
Co-founder and CEO Reto Bolliger is a serial entrepreneur who is addicted to learning new things and is always looking for the steepest learning curve possible. He studied biology, chemistry, classical music, and finance. He worked for Goldman Sachs on a trading floor for six years before starting companies in the music and travel industries. Chaiz is his third venture and he teamed up with Ryan Hartman and Philippe Koenig to aggregate the offerings of the best third-party car warranty providers in the industry and provide transparency in pricing and coverage.
Chaiz is driving peace of mind!
Why Chaiz and why now?
One of my best friends is a serial entrepreneur who owns car dealerships and part of his business is selling car warranties. I was looking for a new venture to combine my finance and marketplace experience, so I did six months of research speaking with all the stakeholders of the sector and found a very broken, antiquated industry, with no customer friendly solutions. My friend became the first investor and I put together the founding team.
What is Chaiz’ North Star?
Our mission is to digitize the extended car warranty industry and make it easily accessible for everyone with an online platform. In the process, we would love to help get rid of those pesky car warranty robo calls that have become infamous in the US.
Why is Chaiz going to win?
Currently, around 98% of transactions in the extended car warranty industry are still conducted offline, so Chaiz is addressing a huge need. Our digital platform allows for direct comparison, transparency, choice, and a cost savings of up to 40% for consumers.
Tell us about a milestone Chaiz recently crushed.
We signed our first tier-one provider to the marketplace, Zurich North America. We had been in conversation with them for over a year, so it’s exciting and we hope to share more soon.
Do you have any advice for other founders?
Based on my past experiences building companies with others and as a solo founder, I realized the importance of assembling the right founding team. I wouldn’t be a solo founder again, and it may take time to find the right people with good chemistry, but it makes the whole experience way more fun, exciting, and enjoyable.
Fun fact: I grew up in Switzerland and when I was a teenager I was the frontman of a punk band.
Read more about Chaiz’ $3.7M Seed round.
Check out Jennifer Mason with Anthony Dedousis on the Venture Everywhere podcast: Riding the Title Wave, Listen now on Apple and Spotify and check out all our past episodes here!
Watch the founder interview with Colin Horsford on YouTube.