What a year 2021 was for Yoello, here's to 2022!

Happy 2022! We can’t quite believe that 2021 has already come to a close but we’re excited to be entering the New Year with many exciting things planned ahead.

Although the hospitality sector has already faced challenges over the festive period, we’re feeling optimistic about the year ahead and wanted to reflect on Yoello’s achievements in 2021. We’re grateful to be supporting businesses with game-changing technology during an ongoing pandemic.

Here’s what happened for Yoello in 2021, and where we’re heading in 2022.

1. Yoello won funding from Hodge Bank

One of the biggest things that happened for us as a business in 2021 is that Hodge Bank decided to invest. They’re passionate about innovation, and have invested to accelerate the growth of our mobile payments and banking platform.

It’s been a win for both parties, and for the consumers of our products too. We’re welcoming better products and a more technologically advanced service in 2022.

2. We hired some clever people

We welcomed Anton Manley as Chief Commercial Officer and Chris Hares as our Chief Technology Officer, who have already helped us make incredible changes.

Chris has a background in software product development, and Anton has held leadership roles in operations. We’re delighted to be growing our C-Suite and welcoming more inspiring individuals to the team.

3. We won lots of awards

We don’t like to show off, but we did win a lot of awards! There were the Wales Start-Up Awards, Tech Nation, Barclays Entrepreneur Awards, Fintech Awards Wales 2021, British Data Awards and plenty more! You can read more about the titles we won in our recent article.

Across an array of awards ceremonies, we took home:

- Fintech Awards Wales 2021, New Product Of The Year, Winner

- Fintech Awards Wales 2021, FinTech Scale-up Of The Year, Winner

- Wales Start Up Awards 2021, Wales Startup of the Year, Winner

- Wales Start Up Awards 2021, Cardiff Startup of the Year, Winner

- Wales Start Up Awards 2021, Fintech Startup of the Year, Winner

- Wales Start Up Awards 2021, Young Entrepreneur of the Year (Sina Yamani), Winner

- UK Tech Nation Rising Stars 2021, Regional Winner & UK Fintech Winner

- British Data Awards 2021, Start Up of the Year

- SME Leaders 20 - 2021

4. Lots of amazing merchant events took place

Although 2021 has been a challenging year in some respects, there were also plenty of successes. We watched our clients host amazing events like the street food cinema in Leicester, Winter Wonderland in various cities across the UK and Wales’ first large music event post-COVID.

We’re so proud to have helped these events run smoothly and safely, and hope to keep powering large events in 2022.

5. We released new tech

Festivals, large events and outdoor dining experiences all needed a little something extra in 2021, and that was a quick pick up offering.

By giving punters the chance to order their food and pick it up at a collection point later, we helped minimise the spread of COVID and cut down queues, making us wonder why we’d never thought of it before!

6. ITV news asked us to chat to them

Our founder, Sina, had a live interview with ITV News Wales at 6 O’Clock (nerve wracking or what?). He spoke about how the Welsh tech industry is booming and how Yoello has contributed towards that.

We love featuring on the news, and you might recall that in 2020 we also appeared in a news article on ITV because a customer had left a £100 tip via Yoello, which made one local barman quite emotional. We're hoping for the call up from ITV in 2022, too.

7. Expos helped us reach more people

We ventured out to London Excel and Birmingham NEC to meet lots of friendly faces and spread the word about Yoello.

8. As a company, we grew together

We hired more amazing team members this year, and as a company we made sure that remote working didn’t dampen the Yoello spirit. We introduced our 'Make It Happen Awards', to highlight the great work of our team.

Some of the standout winners were:

• I made it happen: Nic Biffen
• High flyer: Jack Lewis
• Master of the Moment: Phil Birtles
• Game Changer: Kate Hodge
• Brilliant Beginner: Kieran Green
• Leading by Example: Justin Curtis-Jones
• Happiness Hero: Yasmine Serfi

9. We welcomed more merchants into our community

It was a great year all in all, but we couldn’t have done it without our growing community of vendors. We’re always so grateful that merchants welcome us into their spaces, and use our technology as a central part of their payment system.

We can’t wait to grow our offering in the new year, and keep delivering the great service you’ve come to expect from Yoello.

Here’s to 2022! If you want to join the growing community of Yoello merchants, sign up now.