Salt Labs, a rewards platform for hourly workers, today emerged from stealth with $10 million in pre-seed funding led by Fin Capital with participation from Anthem Venture Partners and others. Co-founder and CEO Jason Lee tells TechCrunch that the money is being used to build out Salt Labs\u2019 initial team, product development and go-to-market strategy and execution.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe mission of Salt Labs is to enable hourly workers to own the long-term value of their work,\u201d Lee said via email. \u201cSalt Labs believes that by modernizing the total rewards structure for frontline workers, companies can better align their long-term interests with those of their workers.\u201d<\/p>\n

At a high level, Salt \u2014 which will launch sometime in early spring, available to any worker \u2014 attempts to gamify work by allowing frontline workers to earn rewards for every hour worked. Lee compares it to a frequent flier program, only instead of earning miles for flying, workers earn a virtual currency called Salt for working.<\/p>\n

Salt can redeemed for goods and experiences, similar to how other rewards programs work \u2014 or transferred to family and friends. But Lee and Rob Law, Salt\u2019s other co-founder, have broader ambitions for the platform. They expect to add a \u201cvesting\u201d feature to Salt that\u2019ll allow workers to earn additional rewards by working at a given job for some period of time.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe believe there are a ton of companies outside of tech who are struggling to hire workers,\u201d Lee said. \u201cIn order to do so, they\u2019re having to raise wages multiple times to attract workers in an environment where most companies are looking to reduce expenses. We think this is the ideal time to rethink employee loyalty and better align enterprises\u2019 long-term interests with those of their workers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Workers might rightly bristle at the suggestion that virtual currency is the answer to companies\u2019 retention problems, not higher pay.<\/p>\n