Cheddar
Cheddar (GetCheddar, Inc.) is a Bloomington, Indiana-based subscription management and recurring billing platform that uses a decoupled architecture to let SaaS companies iterate usage-based and subscription pricing without code changes, serving hundreds of SMB SaaS customers via self-serve and consultancy-led tiers.
- Company typePrivate
- Founded2008
- HeadquartersBloomington, United States
- Headcount1–10
- GTM typeB2B
- OfferingSoftware
What Cheddar does
Cheddar (legal entity GetCheddar, Inc.) is a Bloomington, Indiana-based subscription management and recurring billing platform purpose-built for SaaS companies that need to monetize through usage-based, subscription, or hybrid pricing models. The company's core product is a decoupled billing engine: customer activity is tracked first via "Tracked Items" counters, then configurable "Pricing Plans" apply billing rules to that activity to dynamically generate invoices. This architecture isolates pricing logic from the customer's application codebase, allowing non-engineers to iterate pricing without code changes — a design choice explicitly aimed at reducing the engineering burden of monetization. Supporting modules include CheddarPay (built-in payment processor), Hosted Payment Pages, a real-time SaaS reporting dashboard (MRR, churn, LTV), automated dunning, customer communications, webhook integrations, and a Revenue Optimization Engine that claims to predict transaction failures using transactional data.
The platform is sold via two tiers: a Builder Plan at $99/month plus $0.30 per transaction for self-serve users, and a Growth Plan at $599/month plus 0.5% of customer revenue that bundles pricing consultancy with billing services. Distribution is primarily product-led — free API access until a customer starts billing — supplemented by content marketing (blog, Pricing Bootcamp email series) and developer relations. The go-to-market is hybrid: self-serve for early-stage and SMB customers (target buyers include developers and SaaS founders), with a consultancy-led sales motion introduced in July 2024 to serve growth-stage SaaS organizations. The customer base spans hundreds of SaaS companies, with named reference customers including A2X Accounting, Radius Lead Management, SmartFile, and TextMarks.
Cheddar is a privately held subsidiary of SproutBox, a portfolio of entrepreneurial companies co-founded by CEO Mike Trotzke and Brad Wisler. The company operates with a lean team of 5-8 people, no full-time workers, and has raised a single disclosed institutional round of $1.25M in August 2017 led by M25 with participation from SixThirty, Connetic Ventures, Cultivation Capital, Elevate Ventures, Harbor Street Ventures, Little Engine Ventures, and Warhawk Ventures. Incorporated in Indiana in 2008 (originally as CheddarGetter, rebranded to Cheddar around 2017), the company has operated the billing SaaS for over a decade with a claimed 99.99%+ uptime record.
Cheddar firmographics
Firmographics- Name
- Cheddar
- Legal name
- GetCheddar, Inc.
- Website
- https://getcheddar.com
- Company type
- Private
- Founded year
- 2008
- Operating status
- Operating
- Headcount range
- 1–10 employees
- Short description
- Cheddar (GetCheddar, Inc.) is a Bloomington, Indiana-based subscription management and recurring billing platform that uses a decoupled architecture to let SaaS companies iterate usage-based and subscription pricing without code changes, serving hundreds of SMB SaaS customers via self-serve and consultancy-led tiers.
- Ownership category
- akta.pro rank
Cheddar industry classification
Industry- Product category
- Subscription Billing Software
- akta.pro primary industry
- Recurring Billing & AutoPay Management (FSAMAJAE)
- akta.pro secondary industry
- Biller Direct EBPP Platforms (FSAMAJAA)
Keywords
Where Cheddar is headquartered
LocationHeadquarters
- HQ city
- Bloomington
- HQ country
- United States
- HQ region
- North America
Offices3 records
Markets served
Cheddar business model
Business model- GTM type
- B2B
- Offering type
- Software
- Cost components
- Personnel, Technology or R&D, Infrastructure, Marketing or Sales, Operations
Revenue model
- Builder Plan - Monthly Subscription + Transaction Fees: $99 per month base fee plus 30 cents per transaction. For customers using their own payment processor. Includes email-based support, knowledge base, and documentation.
- Growth Plan - Revenue Share: $599 per month plus 0.5% of revenue. Includes chat and phone support, pricing and migration consultancy, and advanced webhook integrations.
- Built-in Payment Processing (CheddarPay): When using Cheddar's built-in payment processor, fee is $99 per month and 2.9% + 30 cents per transaction.
- API Interactions Overage: Up to 500,000 API interactions per month included. Additional interactions billed at 25 cents per 1,000 interactions.
Pricing tiers
| Model | Billing | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Subscription | Monthly | Builder Plan - $99/month + $0.30/transaction |
| Subscription | Monthly | Growth Plan - $599/month + 0.5% revenue |
| Subscription | Monthly | CheddarPay - Built-in processor pricing |
| Usage-based | Monthly | Early Stage Special Pricing |
Go-to-market motion2 records
Distribution channels4 records
Marketing channels5 records
Cheddar product offering
Product offeringCore offering
Cheddar is a subscription management and recurring billing platform delivered as a SaaS API and dashboard. It enables SaaS companies to track customer activity via Tracked Items, apply configurable Pricing Plans to that activity, and dynamically generate invoices, supporting usage-based, tiered, flat, and hybrid billing models. The platform also offers CheddarPay, a built-in payment processor, plus integrations with dozens of third-party processors and Zapier for ecosystem connectivity.
Product overview
Cheddar is a subscription management and recurring billing platform designed for product-led growth with a usage-based approach. The core platform (Cheddar) tracks customer activity through 'Tracked Items' and applies configurable 'Pricing Plans' to generate dynamic invoices. The platform includes multiple supporting modules: CheddarPay (built-in payment processor), Hosted Payment Pages, SaaS Reporting Dashboard, Customer Communications, Revenue Optimization, Dunning Management, External Payments, and Webhooks. Two pricing tiers are offered: Builder Plan ($99/mo + 30¢/transaction) and Growth Plan ($599/mo or 0.5% revenue with consultancy). The platform integrates with multiple external payment processors via API while maintaining billing logic independence.
Differentiator
Problem solved
Functional benefit
Brands
- CheddarPay: Built-in payment processor allowing instant merchant processing account setup.
Products and services
- Cheddar Subscription Billing Platform Modern, decoupled subscription management and recurring billing platform built for product-led growth. Tracks customer activity first via Tracked Items and applies configurable Pricing Plans second, allowing SaaS customers to iterate pricing models without changing billing code. Delivered as a REST-like API (with Ruby SDK and language-agnostic endpoints) and web dashboard, supporting tiered, flat, flat + overage, flat + usage, and linear pricing models.
- CheddarPay Built-in payment processor from Cheddar that allows instant merchant processing account setup for customers who do not have an existing processor. When using CheddarPay, fees are $99 per month plus 2.9% + 30 cents per transaction. Part of Cheddar's payment-processor-agnostic approach, giving customers flexibility to use or swap processors.
Quantifiable outcome
- Integrate billing in as little as one day
- +2 more outcomes
Companies that use Cheddar
Customer profileNamed customers5 records
Segments4 records
Ideal customer profiles3 records
Cheddar technology and API
TechnologyTechnology focussed Yes
API detail
- Has API
- Yes
- API docs
- API detail
Core technology
AI maturity
App detail
Integration16 records
Feature6 records
Cheddar partnerships and signals
Strategic signalPartnerships
Ten partnerships are on record, tiered core and minor.
- StripecoreCheddar supports Stripe as an external payment processor. Customers can use Stripe for payment processing while benefiting from Cheddar's billing capabilities. This gives businesses flexibility and the ability to optimize for different geographies and customer types.
- BraintreecoreCheddar integrates with Braintree as a payment processor. Customers like A2X have used Braintree for direct card processing with better rates than PayPal.
- PayPalcoreCheddar supports PayPal as a payment processor option. Customers can use PayPal alongside other processors to offer more payment options.
- ZapiercoreCheddar integrates with Zapier allowing connections to thousands of apps. This enables custom integrations with little or no coding knowledge, including accounting systems like QuickBooks and Xero.
- Authorize.netcoreOne of the supported payment processors integrated with Cheddar's billing platform.
- XerocoreCheddar customers use Zapier integration to connect with Xero accounting software for financial reconciliation.
- QuickBooks OnlinecoreCheddar customers use Zapier integration to connect with QuickBooks Online accounting software.
- SproutBoxcoreParent company of Cheddar. Portfolio of entrepreneurial companies focused on growth. Founded by Mike Trotzke and Brad Wisler at Indiana University-Bloomington.
- Dimension Millminor19,000 square feet co-working and business incubator space in Bloomington, Indiana Trades District. CEO Mike Trotzke is an executive committee member and helped fund their renovation.
- CombineminorAnnual Midwest tech entrepreneurship conference in Bloomington. Mike Trotzke helped start this initiative in the mid-2000s.
Scale indicators3 records
Recent moves6 records
Expansion highlights4 records
Cheddar competitors and assessment
Company assessmentDirect peers
- Stripe Billing: Stripe's native recurring billing product competes directly with Cheddar, offering usage-based and subscription billing to SaaS companies. Stripe's massive scale, developer-first ethos, and bundled payments offering make it the most formidable direct competitor.
- Recurly: Recurly provides subscription management and recurring billing for SaaS, consumer subscription, and media businesses. It overlaps with Cheddar on subscription billing, dunning management, and revenue optimization features, serving a similar SMB-to-mid-market segment.
- Paddle: Paddle is a merchant-of-record billing platform handling subscription billing, payments, and tax compliance for SaaS companies. While its MoR model differs, it directly competes for the same usage-based and subscription billing use cases Cheddar serves.
- Maxio: Maxio (formed from the merger of Chargify and SaaSOptics) offers subscription billing and SaaS financial operations. It directly overlaps with Cheddar's billing platform and SaaS metrics dashboard, targeting similar SaaS customers with comparable pricing tiers.
- Chargebee: Chargebee is a subscription billing and revenue management platform targeting SaaS and subscription businesses. It offers similar usage-based, tiered, and recurring billing capabilities with stronger enterprise go-to-market and significantly more venture funding than Cheddar.
- Stax Bill (formerly Fusebill): Stax Bill offers subscription billing and management for SaaS and subscription businesses, with automated recurring billing and revenue recognition. It serves a similar SMB-to-mid-market SaaS customer base as Cheddar with comparable feature sets.
Broad incumbents
- Zuora: Zuora is an enterprise subscription management and billing platform serving large enterprises. While it competes with Cheddar on subscription billing capabilities, it targets much larger customers and operates as a broad incumbent in the broader subscription economy space.
Emerging players
- Lago: Lago is an open-source usage-based billing infrastructure that overlaps directly with Cheddar's decoupled billing architecture. It targets developers wanting self-hosted or API-first billing, appealing to a similar PLG audience as Cheddar.
- Orb: Orb is a usage-based billing platform purpose-built for modern SaaS companies needing flexible pricing models. It competes with Cheddar specifically on the usage-based billing and pricing iteration use case, with a more modern developer experience.
- Metronome: Metronome is a usage-based billing platform for B2B SaaS, competing directly in the same niche as Cheddar's usage-based billing product. It serves growth-stage SaaS companies with real-time metering and flexible pricing models.
Market position
Strengths4 records
Weaknesses4 records
Competitive moat5 records
Key risks6 records
Key highlights7 records
Customer concentration
Cheddar social profiles
Digital presenceCheddar financial estimates
Financial estimateRevenue estimate
Valuation estimate
Cheddar leadership team
Management profileNumber of profiles
Profiles1 record
Cheddar funding detail
Funding detailFunding overview
Funding rounds2 records
Investors8 records
Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Cheddar M&A and investment
M&A and investmentM&A
Investments
M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Frequently asked questions about Cheddar
What does Cheddar do?
Cheddar is a subscription management and recurring billing platform delivered as a SaaS API and dashboard. It enables SaaS companies to track customer activity via Tracked Items, apply configurable Pricing Plans to that activity, and dynamically generate invoices, supporting usage-based, tiered, flat, and hybrid billing models. The platform also offers CheddarPay, a built-in payment processor, plus integrations with dozens of third-party processors and Zapier for ecosystem connectivity.
Is Cheddar a public or private company?
Cheddar is a private company. It is classified as venture growth investor backed and is currently operating.
When was Cheddar founded?
Cheddar was founded in 2008. It employs 1 to 10 people.
Where is Cheddar based?
Cheddar is headquartered in Bloomington, United States, in the North America region.
How does Cheddar make money?
Four revenue lines are on record. Builder Plan - Monthly Subscription + Transaction Fees are the primary driver. The others are growth Plan - Revenue Share, built-in Payment Processing (CheddarPay) and API Interactions Overage.
Who are Cheddar's main competitors?
Direct peers on record are Stripe Billing, Recurly, Paddle, Maxio, Chargebee and Stax Bill (formerly Fusebill). Zuora is listed as a broad incumbent. Emerging players are Lago, Orb and Metronome.
Does Cheddar have an API?
Yes. REST-like API for subscription management and recurring billing. Supports customer creation, usage tracking via tracked items, billing status verification, subscription management, invoicing, and payment processing. Available via any programming language. Features include: Add Customer, Update Usage (tracked items), Check Billing Status, Subscription Billable Webhook for custom scripting logic. Developer documentation is at docs.getcheddar.com.
What industry is Cheddar in?
Cheddar's product category is Subscription Billing Software. Its primary akta.pro industry code is FSAMAJAE, Recurring Billing & AutoPay Management, with a secondary code of FSAMAJAA, Biller Direct EBPP Platforms.