Molnar founded Afterpay back in 2014 with a little help from the Kardashians. Afterpay is a financial services company that allows online shoppers to buy something and pay it off in four installments. Molnar and Eisen pounded the pavement trying to get Afterpay off the ground. Then, on the day before Thanksgiving 2014, someone from the Kardashian camp made contact with the founders via the Afterpay website. A Kardashian filled out the online contact form. The Kardashians wanted Afterpay live on their site that day – the only problem was – it was Thanksgiving weekend and no one was at the company’s San Francisco office. The Kardashians wanted to be able to take advantage of Black Friday’s shopping frenzy. Molnar called his team and within two hours, Afterpay was live for the Kardashian beauty brands. That paid off when Kim Kardashian uploaded a post to Instagram (and her then 120 million followers) and Twitter (then 60 million followers) endorsing Afterpay. That was all the fledgling company needed to kick off their growth. By the end of March 2015, just 10 months after its launch, Afterpay had 1 million customers in the U.S. Molnar said that the Kardashians understood what his company offered and how well it would pair with their goals. Afterpay made its IPO in 2016 at $1 per share. It hit $28 in May 2019 before dropping to less than $8 in March 2020. It didn’t stay low for long and by July 3, had hit $66 per share fueled on investors buying into what Afterpay is selling. Afterpay also recently signed a deal with Chinese e-commerce giant Tencent, giving it the inside track on that country’s enormous retail market.
