Stori

FINTECH · INTERNATIONAL EXPANSION

Stori from

Mexico to Colombia.

Stori had reached 3M customers in Mexico by 2023. Expanding into Colombia was the company’s first international operation and part of building a stronger, more scalable business for its next stage (including future IPO readiness).

ROLE

Senior Product Designer

LAUNCH

July 2024

SCOPE

Mobile environment

INTRO

I moved from the Mexico team to Colombia to help rebuild the product around Colombian rules while protecting the patterns and guidelines already proven in Mexico. As a Founding Product Designer MTy work covered acquisition, onboarding, product education, KYC, fraud prevention, payments, customer service, waitlist growth, and launch readiness.

CHALLENGE

Mexico had scale,

Colombia was the next bet.

After years serving millions of people in Mexico, Stori was ready for its first international expansion. Colombia shared a similar credit-access problem, but required a new operating, legal, and brand structure.

3M+

PEOPLE SERVED IN MEXICO

Before the Colombia expansion.

4 years

BUILDING THE MODEL

Learning what first-time credit customers needed.

80%

FIRST CREDIT CARD

Share of Mexican customers receiving their first card.

WHY COLOMBIA

Credit access was still out of reach.

The opportunity was clear: millions of adults were still outside traditional credit products. Tarjeta S was designed to make a first credit experience easier to access and easier to understand.

64%

colombians had no credit product.

77%

colombians did not have a credit card.

This market gap shaped the product story: access first, then confidence, education, and healthy credit use.

BUSINESS COMMITMENT

A serious investment with a clear target.

Stori announced its first international expansion with a three-year investment plan and an ambitious first-year adoption goal for Tarjeta S.

INVESTMENT

$100M

planned for Colombia

COMMITMENT

3 years

to build the market

DOWNLOADS

500K

first-year target

Carlos José Ayalde, general manager of Stori Colombia, said they have a long-term vision and plan to bring all their products to the market.

"...what we're looking for is precisely for it to be a tool for financial inclusion, for people who don't have a credit history."

La República - original content in spanish

Read full article →

LOCALIZATION CONSTRAINS

Same mission.

A legally distinct

expression

¡Hola!

9:41

Quiero un producto

Soy cliente Stori

Tu nueva Stori comienza aquí, la tarjeta que te dice SI

Ayuda

Ingresar a mi cuenta

Quiero mi tarjeta

¡Hola!

Tu historia comienza aquí,

la tarjeta que te dice SÍ

9:41

Ayuda

Tarjeta de crédito

***9856

Crédito disponible

$850.000

Crédito total

$1.000.000

Fecha límite de pago:

5 de mayo

Pagar tarjeta

Mi tarjeta

Stori

NIP

Estados de cuenta

Aprende con Stori

Últimos movimientos

Tostao suba

30 Ago 2023, 1:30 pm

$8.700

Metro

30 Ago 2023, 1:30 pm

$25.980

Sanborns

30 Ago 2023, 1:30 pm

$45.50

¡Recibimos tu pago!

30 Ago 2023, 1:30 pm

+$245.50

9:41

Hola, Juli

Ayuda

Cuenta +

Crece tu dinero con el

15% de rendimiento anual

Abre tu CDT

Crece tu dinero con el

15% de rendimiento anual

Inicio

Storicard

Movimientos

Perfil

9:41

Hola,

[Nombre]

Ayuda

Inicio

Movimientos

Perfil

Inicio

Movimientos

Perfil

Crédito ***5678

Activa

Debes en tu tarjeta:

$638.030,01

Tienes disponible para utilizar:

$9.361.968,99

Fecha de corte:

5 julio

Fecha de pago:

25 julio

Pagar tarjeta

Congelar tarjeta

Últimos movimientos

24 de abril

Corte de tarjeta

Paga hasta el 05/05 para evitar mora

Typikos

1:30 pm

$25.500,00

Uber

1:32 pm

$17.800,00

Sanborns

1:30 pm

$45.500,00

Uber

1:30 pm

$17.800,00

Sanborns

1:30 pm

$45.50

Inicio

Movimientos

Perfil

THE DESIGN QUESTION

How do we preserve product consistency without making Colombia look like a recolored copy of Mexico?

SHARED FOUNDATION

We did not replace

the foundation.

We separated shared product rules from market-specific brand expression, then added new blue specs for Colombia.

SHARED FOUNDATION

Layout, spacing, typography, interaction patterns, accessibility, and core financial behavior.

BRAND LAYER

Color, product naming, illustration, launch communication, and market-specific content.

COLOMBIA SPECS

Blue tokens, local components, updated states, and documentation for Tarjeta S.

MEXICO

mx/color/verde/900#003A40

mx/color/verde/800#336166

mx/color/verde/700

#058E65

mx/color/verde/600#00D180

mx/color/verde/500#33DA99

mx/color/verde/400#66E3B3

mx/color/verde/300#99EDCC

mx/color/verde/200#B3F2D9

mx/color/verde/100#E5FAF2

mx/color/verde/50#F0FCF7

COLOMBIA

co/color/blue/900#132C42

co/color/blue/800#274662

co/color/blue/700#0064A5

co/color/blue/600#6BCAFF

co/color/blue/500#89D5FF

co/color/blue/400#A6DFFF

co/color/blue/300

#C4EAFF

co/color/blue/200#DCF2FF

co/color/blue/100#E7F6FF

co/color/blue/50#F4FBFF

Tarjeta de crédito

***9856

Crédito disponible

$850.000

Crédito total

$1.000.000

Fecha límite de pago:

5 de mayo

Pagar tarjeta

Crédito ***5678

Activa

Debes en tu tarjeta:

$638.030,01

Tienes disponible para utilizar:

$9.361.968,99

Fecha de corte:

5 julio

Fecha de pago:

25 julio

Pagar tarjeta

DESIGN AND OIMPLEMENTATION

We started beforethe card existed.

The Colombia team was building acquisition, local operations, support, payments, and the credit experience at the same time.

NO LIVE CARD

Tarjeta S had not launched.

LOCAL OPERATIONS

Colombia needed new rules, teams, and tools.

SECURITY GAP

KYC and fraud controls needed stronger foundations.

ACQUISITION IN PROGRESS

Tarjeta S had not launched.

LAUNCH

A local launch.

The work connected customer experience, operations, security, and design across Mexico and Colombia—creating a stronger base for international growth.

COLOMBIA LIVE

Stori completed its first international expansion.

TARJETA S

A legally distinct product and brand entered the market.

LOCAL SYSTEM

New blue specs supported a consistent Colombia experience.

STRONGER OPERATIONS

Product, CX, risk, and support worked as one launch system.

READY TO SCALE

The company gained reusable structure for its next stage.

SAFER ENTRY

KYC and fraud became visible product responsibilities.

METRICS

The launch created measurable signals.

The results covered more than adoption. They showed stronger acquisition, lower support pressure, sustained demand, and better payment behavior.

10K

NEW USERS

during one strong acquisition month

+20K

WAITLIST LEADS

without a marketing budget

6mo

FROM ZERO TO LAUNCH

~20 people. Full financial app launched from zero.

18K+

TARJETA S USERS

An important launch and expansion milestone.

+47%

PAY ON TIME (POT)

Improved after the Minimum Payment feature.

−42%

SUPPORT CONTACTS

after the WhatsApp AI chatbot implementation

BUSINESS IMPACT

Stori’s path to

scale.

The Colombia launch demonstrated that Stori could extend its product model into a new market—supporting broader growth and future readiness.

Mexican fintech Stori expects to go public in 2027, with positive projections

"Stori, which launched operations in Colombia last year, is still assessing when to launch a 'bigger push' there, said Chen, with the focus still on expanding operations in Mexico."

La República - original content in spanish

Read full article →

OUTCOMES

What made it work

We built the customer journey and the operational structure around it. The product had to acquire users, verify identity, answer questions, manage money, prevent fraud, and stay consistent with Mexico.

Operations are part of the experience.

A flow is not finished if support, risk, and fulfillment cannot run it.

Speed needs strong controls.

Moving fast worked because design stayed close to engineering, risk, and customer signals.

Localization is not copy and paste.

Colombia needed the same product quality as Mexico, adapted to local rules and behavior.

Metrics need context.

Growth, support, and collection numbers are useful only when the source and time period are clear.

APPENDIX

LOCALIZED SYSTEM

Localization is not

copy and paste.

Protect the product logic.

Keep the journeys and interaction rules that already work.

Separate brand from system.

Color and naming can change without breaking the full product foundation.

Legal limits can improve clarity.

The constraint forced us to define what was shared and what belonged to Colombia.

Document the bridge.

New specs need ownership, examples, and rules—not only new color values.

Stori

FINTECH · INTERNATIONAL EXPANSION

Stori from

Mexico to Colombia.

ROLE

Senior Product Designer

LAUNCH

July 2024

SCOPE

Mobile environment

INTRO

CHALLENGE

Mexico had scale,

Colombia was the next bet.

3M+

PEOPLE SERVED IN MEXICO

Before the Colombia expansion.

4 years

BUILDING THE MODEL

Learning what first-time credit customers needed.

80%

FIRST CREDIT CARD

Share of Mexican customers receiving their first card.

WHY COLOMBIA

Credit access was still out of reach.

The opportunity was clear: millions of adults were still outside traditional credit products. Tarjeta S was designed to make a first credit experience easier to access and easier to understand.

64%

colombians had no credit product.

77%

colombians did not have a credit card.

This market gap shaped the product story: access first, then confidence, education, and healthy credit use.

BUSINESS COMMITMENT

A serious investment with a clear target.

Stori announced its first international expansion with a three-year investment plan and an ambitious first-year adoption goal for Tarjeta S.

INVESTMENT

$100M

planned for Colombia

COMMITMENT

3 years

to build the market

DOWNLOADS

500K

first-year target

Carlos José Ayalde, general manager of Stori Colombia, said they have a long-term vision and plan to bring all their products to the market.

"...what we're looking for is precisely for it to be a tool for financial inclusion, for people who don't have a credit history."

La República - original content in Spanish

Read full article →

LOCALIZATION CONSTRAINS

Same mission.

A legally distinct

expression

For legal reasons, Colombia could not use the same product name or the same green brand expression as Mexico. That constraint led to Tarjeta S and a blue communication system.

¡Hola!

9:41

Quiero un producto

Soy cliente Stori

Tu nueva Stori comienza aquí, la tarjeta que te dice SI

Ayuda

Ingresar a mi cuenta

Quiero mi tarjeta

¡Hola!

Tu historia comienza aquí,

la tarjeta que te dice SÍ

9:41

Ayuda

Tarjeta de crédito

***9856

Crédito disponible

$850.000

Crédito total

$1.000.000

Fecha límite de pago:

5 de mayo

Pagar tarjeta

Mi tarjeta

Stori

NIP

Estados de cuenta

Aprende con Stori

Últimos movimientos

Tostao suba

30 Ago 2023, 1:30 pm

$8.700

Metro

30 Ago 2023, 1:30 pm

$25.980

Sanborns

30 Ago 2023, 1:30 pm

$45.50

¡Recibimos tu pago!

30 Ago 2023, 1:30 pm

+$245.50

9:41

Hola, Juli

Ayuda

Cuenta +

Crece tu dinero con el

15% de rendimiento anual

Abre tu CDT

Crece tu dinero con el

15% de rendimiento anual

Inicio

Storicard

Movimientos

Perfil

9:41

Hola,

[Nombre]

Ayuda

Inicio

Movimientos

Perfil

Inicio

Movimientos

Perfil

Crédito ***5678

Activa

Debes en tu tarjeta:

$638.030,01

Tienes disponible para utilizar:

$9.361.968,99

Fecha de corte:

5 julio

Fecha de pago:

25 julio

Pagar tarjeta

Congelar tarjeta

Últimos movimientos

24 de abril

Corte de tarjeta

Paga hasta el 05/05 para evitar mora

Typikos

1:30 pm

$25.500,00

Uber

1:32 pm

$17.800,00

Sanborns

1:30 pm

$45.500,00

Uber

1:30 pm

$17.800,00

Sanborns

1:30 pm

$45.50

Inicio

Movimientos

Perfil

THE DESIGN QUESTION

How do we preserve product consistency without making Colombia look like a recolored copy of Mexico?

SHARED FOUNDATION

We did not replace

the foundation.

We separated shared product rules from market-specific brand expression, then added new blue specs for Colombia.

SHARED FOUNDATION

Layout, spacing, typography, interaction patterns, accessibility, and core financial behavior.

BRAND LAYER

Color, product naming, illustration, launch communication, and market-specific content.

COLOMBIA SPECS

Blue tokens, local components, updated states, and documentation for Tarjeta S.

DESIGN AND OIMPLEMENTATION

We started beforethe card existed.

The Colombia team was building acquisition, local operations, support, payments, and the credit experience at the same time.

NO LIVE CARD

Tarjeta S had not launched.

LOCAL OPERATIONS

Colombia needed new rules, teams, and tools.

ACQUISITION IN PROGRESS

The first customer journey was still being built.

SECURITY GAP

KYC and fraud controls needed stronger foundations.

LAUNCH

A local launch.

The work connected customer experience, operations, security, and design across Mexico and Colombia—creating a stronger base for international growth.

COLOMBIA LIVE

Stori completed its first international expansion.

TARJETA S

A legally distinct product and brand entered the market.

LOCAL SYSTEM

New blue specs supported a consistent Colombia experience.

STRONGER OPERATIONS

Product, CX, risk, and support worked as one launch system.

SAFER ENTRY

KYC and fraud became visible product responsibilities.

READY TO SCALE

The company gained reusable structure for its next stage.

METRICS

The launch created measurable signals.

The results covered more than adoption. They showed stronger acquisition, lower support pressure, sustained demand, and better payment behavior.

6mo

FROM ZERO TO LAUNCH

~20 people. Full financial app launched from zero.

+20K

WAITLIST LEADS

without a marketing budget

10K

NEW USERS

during one strong acquisition month

18K+

TARJETA S USERS

An important launch and expansion milestone.

+47%

PAY ON TIME (POT)

Improved after the Minimum Payment feature.

−42%

SUPPORT CONTACTS

after the WhatsApp AI chatbot implementation

BUSINESS IMPACT

Stori’s path to

scale.

The Colombia launch demonstrated that Stori could extend its product model into a new market—supporting broader growth and future readiness.

Mexican fintech Stori expects to go public in 2027, with positive projections

"Stori, which launched operations in Colombia last year, is still assessing when to launch a 'bigger push' there, said Chen, with the focus still on expanding operations in Mexico."

La República - original content in spanish

Read full article →

OUTCOMES

What made it work

Operations are part of the experience.

A flow is not finished if support, risk, and fulfillment cannot run it.

Speed needs strong controls.

Moving fast worked because design stayed close to engineering, risk, and customer signals.

Localization is not copy and paste.

Colombia needed the same product quality as Mexico, adapted to local rules and behavior.

Metrics need context.

Growth, support, and collection numbers are useful only when the source and time period are clear.

APPENDIX

LOCALIZED SYSTEM

Localization is not

copy and paste.

A warmer way to introduce financial concepts, build confidence, and guide people toward the right next step.

Protect the product logic.

Keep the journeys and interaction rules that already work.

Separate brand from system.

Color and naming can change without breaking the full product foundation.

Legal limits can improve clarity.

The constraint forced us to define what was shared and what belonged to Colombia.

Document the bridge.

New specs need ownership, examples, and rules—not only new color values.

Stori

“She brings a rare combination of strong visual and logical design sense, deep expertise in design tools, and an ability to execute efficiently without compromising quality. She was essential in the team launching a new product in a new market in record time. (...)”

Links

Connect

Stori

Links

Connect

Stori

“She brings a rare combination of strong visual and logical design sense, deep expertise in design tools, and an ability to execute efficiently without compromising quality. She was essential in the team launching a new product in a new market in record time. (...)”

Links

Connect