Recognition Made Meaningful

Culcha – Gamified Employee Engagement & Recognition Platform

UX Design, Custom Development, Software as a Service

Culcha is a platform built to make workplace recognition simple, fun, and meaningful.

It started as an internal tool, created by the team at Starbright, to help employees connect and celebrate achievements in a natural way. Over time, it evolved into a scalable product that brings teams together through features like experiences, gamified rewards, and shared celebrations.

Whether your team works remotely, in-office, or both, Culcha’s goal is to create everyday moments of appreciation that strengthen connections and boost morale.

Culcha set out to revolutionise how companies recognise and connect with their employees. The goal was to create a platform that makes recognition easier, more social, and fun while bringing measurable cultural insights to HR and leadership.

Key objectives included:

• Making recognition simple, peer-driven, and rewarding.
• Using gamification to drive daily engagement.
• Centralising recognition, team-building, and celebrations in one social platform.
• Giving HR and leaders tools to track and shape workplace culture.

• Engagement tools are often rigid, formal, and hard for teams to adopt.
• Traditional recognition relies too much on managers, missing everyday peer appreciation.
• Turning an internal tool into a scalable product for all company sizes wasn’t easy.
• Balancing daily interactions with long-term team engagement was challenging.
• HR needed clear insights without overwhelming data or complexity.

Starbright partnered with Culcha from the start, working side-by-side to shape their vision into a product that’s a game-changer for workplace culture. Culcha’s SaaS platform is vibrant, gamified, and easy for teams to adopt.

Key features include:

• Interactive Recognition: Employees send and receive accolades at any time, creating a lively social atmosphere.
• Celebrations Feed: Space for birthdays, team wins, and other moments worth sharing.
• Gamification: Users earn experience points and Culcha Coins, driving 3× more engagement than other platforms.
• Admin Dashboard: Clear insights and trends for HR and leaders without the clutter.
• Team Building Tools: Fun weekly challenges and tools like randomised lunch pairings.
• Mobile-Friendly Design: Seamless access on any device for maximum daily use.

Built from scratch on a cloud-native, modular architecture, Culcha scales effortlessly from teams of 10 to enterprises of 1000+.

From its 2024 launch, Culcha has seen impressive results across South African businesses:

• 3× increase in daily recognition activities compared to prior tools
• Thousands of Culcha Coins earned and redeemed in customised shops
• 80% user retention thanks to engaging gamified features
• 85% of users reported feeling more connected with their teammates
• HR teams saved 5 hours weekly with automated engagement tracking

A well-designed SaaS platform can transform workplace culture by making engagement effortless and fun. Culcha shows how gamification, personalisation, and smart design turn recognition into a daily habit.

With the right development, any idea can become a scalable solution that delivers real impact.

Transform your workplace with Starbright’s expertise.

Book a free consultation today to turn your idea into a scalable SaaS platform.