Bold Xchange

Bold Xchange, Inc. operates a B2B platform designed to streamline corporate gifting for sales and marketing teams. The company provides a service where businesses can send eGift cards for local establishments to nurture prospects, appreciate clients, and recognize partners. This model allows recipients to choose their own gift, while the corporate client gains access to analytics on campaign performance, including open, click, and redemption rates. Revenue is generated through a tiered, per-seat subscription model, with plans for individuals, teams, and enterprises, in addition to the cost of the gift cards themselves.

The company's origin stems from a personal mission of its co-founders, Danielle Deavens and Doug Spencer, who are college sweethearts from Elon University. In 2016, Deavens, then a writer for Food Network magazine, found it challenging to shop exclusively from Black-owned businesses for Christmas gifts. This experience highlighted a market gap. Concurrently, Spencer had withdrawn from Columbia Law School, seeking a more fulfilling path and noting the lack of diversity among the entrepreneurs he met. Unsatisfied with their corporate jobs, the duo left their careers to launch Bold Xchange in the summer of 2018, initially as a marketplace for Black-owned apparel and accessories.

Pivoting from its initial e-commerce marketplace model, which curated and shipped products from Black-owned businesses, the company now focuses on a software-based gifting solution. This shift leverages technology to help clients break through oversaturated inboxes by offering thoughtful, local gifts instead of generic ones. The platform is designed for ease of use, enabling users to manage recipients, curate local gift options, and track the return on investment of their gifting campaigns. Bold Xchange has secured $510K in funding over three rounds, with its latest seed round in August 2023. The company is a recipient of a 2020 Arch Grant and counts organizations like Centene, CarMax, and Capital One among its customers.

Keywords: corporate gifting, B2B sales engagement, client appreciation, prospect nurturing, local business gift cards, partner recognition, sales pipeline, lead generation, customer relationship management, eGift platform, Black-owned business support, sales automation, marketing campaigns, employee recognition, business development, St. Louis startup, Arch Grants, Danielle Deavens, Doug Spencer