Retailers try all kinds of things to attract new customers to their stores and e-commerce portals, including designing new store layouts, holding giveaways and contests, launching targeted digital advertising and social media campaigns, and offering next-day delivery options. Yet none of these tactics will resonate with the more than 60 million unbanked and under-banked Americans who do not have access to traditional financing or a trusted digital ecosystem to shop for the items they want.1 

In other words, a potential customer base that’s about the same size as Generation X (65 million) remains untapped because merchants overestimate the risks or can’t overcome the technical challenges of accepting payment alternatives to cash, credit and plastic. 

The Acima lease-to-own (LTO) ecosystem provides greater access and choice for banked and unbanked consumers to lease must-have items. For merchants, this means creating opportunities to meet new customers, increase sales volumes and customer satisfaction levels all while eliminating transaction risk. Approved customers select eligible products from merchants, Acima purchases the products from the merchants and leases them to the customer under a flexible LTO transaction.

At Acima, later this month we’re launching new solutions that will demolish the walls that have long separated merchants and unbanked/underbanked consumers once and for all: 

• Acima Digital: Our new proprietary mobile application will deliver an end-to-end LTO customer experience allowing customers to seamlessly move between in-store, mobile, and ecommerce shopping opportunities. Customers can now use that shopping power to select and lease eligible items throughout the entire Acima ecosystem. They can use the app to return to their favorite retailer, to find another store location, or access the digital MarketPlace directly.

• Acima Marketplace: Our new digital MarketPlace, based on our proprietary technology, will connect our retail partners and consumers together with access to our flexible lease-to-own transactions. The MarketPlace will be accessible on both desktop and mobile devices and includes a browser extension allowing customers to carry Acima’s LTO capability with them as they visit other retailer websites.

We want to debunk the myths that cash and credit constrained consumers, or ones without bank accounts or credit cards, only shop at discount stores or are unable to pay for goods and services. Most unbanked and underbanked consumers are locked out of the types of transactions that many of us take for granted — walking up to the cash register to present a bank-issued credit or debit card or entering their account numbers into an online checkout portal.

Reaching out to the generation-sized market of underbanked and unbanked consumers doesn’t require merchants to assume more risk. In fact, just the opposite is true. By thinking more inclusively and leveraging technologies like Acima’s virtual LTO solutions, business owners can convert those consumers into customers and grow their bottom lines.