DoughMain Raises $5 Million For Gamified Financial Education Platform For Kids

DoughMain, a startup that combines family coordination and financial education into a simple, realtime, and gamified platform, has announced that it has raised $5 million in seed funding from a series of private angel investors. The round of financing has been used to support the launch and rollout of DoughMain.com, as well as to contribute to the development of DoughMain’s mobile applications.

But what exactly is DoughMain all about? DoughMain President and CEO Kenneth Damato said that the startup’s goal is simple: It wants to give families across the country a simple solution that allows them to coordinate household activities and, in doing so, expose their children to important financial management skills.

DoughMain is attacking household management by offering its users services like an integrated family calendar, a chore tracker, and an allowance (or rewards) tool — as well as three initial age-relevant gaming sites to make American households run like clockwork and give kids a fun and useful tool to help them learn (in an age-appropriate way) how to save, use, and manage money.

The startup’s so-called “family coordination platform” allows parents to customize the DoughMain platform in such a way that it acts as a secure, personalized micro-network for their family. Within that network, family members can view each of their own responsibilities, what chores still need to be accomplished, for example, as well as that of the entire family. (Presumably so that they can bug their younger siblings until they complete their chores and learn how to balance their checkbooks.)

Parents can control the amount of information their children can access, be it the ability to create calendar entries or to show that a specific chore has been completed. Because the platform updates in realtime, parents can reward their obedient children for their accomplishments with “DoughPoints”, the startup’s virtual currency, or through boosting their allowances, via hard, American currency. designate that a chore has been completed. Since information is updated in real-time, parents can

On top of its family coordination platform, the startup offers financial education options that are neatly integrated with chores and the other financial experiences their children move through as part of interacting with the platform. The platform offers teacher-developed content through safe gaming platforms like TheFunVault.com, a Flash game that teaches basic money management lessons for kids ages 5 to 9, or through SandDollarCity.com, a multiplayer virtual world where kids ages 8 to 12 manage a family candy stop, or, finally, IRuleMoney.com, a site that features financial content and contests for teenagers.

The mobile version of DoughMain is scheduled to be released in September, which will allow families to stay connected and coordinate on-the-go. For more, check out DoughMain at home here.