Why we launched Plum business

A note from Aditya Bagarka, Head of Strategy and Innovation at Plum.

We started Plum to positively impact the health and wellbeing of every Indian, and we did it by helping some of the country’s fastest growing startups craft a culture of care with comprehensive benefits.

Over three years, we’ve grown to partner and work with over 3000 companies and pioneered the importance of employee well-being among small businesses. 

But as we delved deeper into conversations with leaders, we realized that health was just one part of a bigger picture. 

Employee wellbeing is also about how safe and secure employees feel in the workplace. And it's connected to your business’ wellbeing in more ways than you’d think.

Let’s talk risk

As a startup, if you’re not challenging the status quo in an established vertical, you’re out there building your own. 

We know. 

I’ve spoken to hundreds of founders and been overwhelmed by their energy, ambition, and optimism. Risk is par for the course.

But with a decade spent in commercial insurance, I also notice risk in the finer details. It’s an occupational hazard, fraught with opportunity for founders, who often fail to secure the value they create. 

We’ve seen this unravel in day-to-day operations despite the company's best efforts. All avoidable errors compounding to costly consequences, as you may have read in the news these days. 

The thing about risk is that nobody sees it coming. It happens when there aren’t failsafes. Things go south in ways you never expected them to. Here are some wild instances from my conversations:

• Flooding during heavy rains ruined a swanky office
• A CEO’s ghostwritten LinkedIn post went viral for the wrong reasons close to a fundraise
• A co-founder decided to retire and give up all worldly pleasures after a mental breakdown

One of the above is false, but you get the gist! It doesn’t matter how well-oiled your machine is, with it’s million turning parts, one error is all that it takes to wreck it.

Caution helps.

Yet, businesses, while aware of their risks, don’t protect themselves adequately.

The state of business insurance 

Being in the business of dealing with risk, I spoke to founders (including our own) about the potential risks, and asked them why they don’t invest in a comprehensive business insurance solution. 

The issue wasn’t capital, or a lack of interest. It was the industry itself. Why? 

The policy is complicated. If a founder wanted to understand their policy, they’d have to spend hours poring through tedious jargon for simple details. 

The product is not accessible. While insurance companies serve large organizations with more than 1000 employees, there’s a void to serve startups and small businesses. 

The process is broken. When you aren’t spending weeks negotiating quotes, you’re on loop with a local broker. Today, business insurance has a one size-fits all approach. Nobody is making an effort to learn about your unique requirement. 

It’s a hairy problem… and a hairy problem is an opportunity for plumbing. So, we decided to take this head on.

Let’s talk Business

Introducing Plum Business, a curated suite of business insurance products designed for founders playing the long game.

We believe in solutions, not silos. Our team is designing risk solutions for organizations based on their growth journey and risk appetite, something that influences the risk one faces in the business landscape.

As a startup ourselves, we know that every company's risk differs. We'll work with you to understand your needs and offer custom solutions – just like we’ve done for your health benefits. 

As a first step, we’ve built the Plum policy recommendation engine, post analyzing business insurance policies for companies across sizes, sectors, and geographies. In four steps, you get customized recommendations that you can purchase in a single click, no questions asked. 

Evaluation… to purchase in minutes. Check it out here. 

We understand that this can be intimidating. If it helps, you can book an exclusive Business Risk Analysis session with our team. Our experts will look at your business, compare your risk score with the industry benchmark, and suggest solutions that are customized for you. 

Book your Business Risk Session here. 

At Plum, we want to help every business evaluate and mitigate risk with a 360 degree lens. 

With Business Insurance being our third product line after Employee Insurance and Health Benefits, we see this as the natural evolution in our journey to craft true cultures of care, one that extends to your business as well as your employees. 

We can’t wait to see where this takes us!

P.S. Plum Business is as personal to me as it is professional. As a child, our family business suffered a fire accident. But insurance saved my family a great deal of money as we rebuilt what we lost. As I work with other startups to mitigate their risk, it feels like life has come full circle.