‘Money personality’ begins to form by the age of five. Should you care?

• Good Good Piggy and Mellow Watch are teaching young kids to understand finance basics early.
• Money personality starts forming by the age of five.
• Millennial parents are open to teaching their children finance basics through innovative ways.

It is a universally acknowledged fact that what we experience in childhood forms a core part of our personality. The same is true for your ‘money personality.’ Will you grow up to be a miser or a spendthrift? Are you scared of money or good at handling it? It goes back to your childhood. Companies like Good Good Piggy, and Meta Watch aim to teach kids the basics of finance starting at the age of five.

Behavioral scientists David Whitebread and Sue Bingham from the University of Cambridge declared in a study that our financial management skills, attitude towards money, and value of money are set by age seven.

“Parents of the current generation are usually millennials who are social media savvy. They do not want to rely on the old curriculum of teaching finance to kids. They themselves are debt driven and money starved due to the easy availability of credit. They now want their kids to not suffer that way”, said Purva Aggarwal, founder of Indian ed-tech startup Good Good Piggy.

The company allows 4-14-year-old children to form money management habits through interactive quizzes on the currently developing application. These also include receiving “digital blessings” from the child’s relatives. Parents give these young children missions to manage their money. In return, kids are rewarded on the app.

“A Cambridge study indicates we form our core money personality from the age of 7. India has the world’s youngest population, and we aim to target 11 crore kids who come under the child and pre-teen category. These are the Generation Alpha (born 2010 onwards) and Generation Beta (born 2025 onwards) will learn everything digitally. Teaching money management to your kids is a virgin space in India.” added Purva.

A Hong Kong based company Mellow has recently announced ‘Mellow Watch,’ a mini-smartwatch that tracks your kid’s spending habits by linking a parent’s debit card. If your child goes overboard with spending, notifications start popping up. Parental control is established within the app.

Even though it is a debatable issue how parents will teach their children the importance of money at such a young age, the demand for companies like Good Good Piggy and Mellow is high. Before the app’s official launch, the founder of Good Good Piggy was a participant in Shark Tank India, a reality show for angel investors and entrepreneurs. The app currently has over 5k waitlisted users who are testing the features of the app.

“We have also planned to partner with over 2k schools in India to teach financial literacy to young kids. Furthermore, we will make a game plan to co-invest with the leading bank of the country”, said Purva.

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