EBay’s PayPal, Groupon’s Breadcrumb POS, and Square are vying to reimagine the cash register for Main Street merchants. Boston-based startup Punchey is launching a new payments system today to join the competition.
Founded in 2011 by Nathaniel Stevens, who previously founded local online marketing company Yodle, the 20-employee company has been testing Punchey with 500 businesses for the better part of the year. Like some of its competitors, the system is built around a credit-card reader that plugs into merchants’ smartphones. Stevens says Punchey, which was seeded in part with $1.7 million from his venture capital firm, stands out in two main ways: It charges users less and it helps them with their marketing.
