The price of the default
COBRA because it's the form in the packet. The 401(k) because the money is right there. Signing because the letter has a date. Each default is reasonable, each has a price, and nobody puts the prices side by side.
PinkSlipped™ · Press Kit · October 2026
First, a place to land. Then the decisions, in order.
PinkSlipped is a free, worker-first place to land after a layoff. It starts where people actually are in those first days, before anyone is ready to make a list: what just happened, what can wait, and what can't. When they're ready, it turns the rest (the severance agreement, the health-coverage election, the 401(k), the unemployment claim, what to tell the kids) into one plan in the right order, with the real deadlines on it and people who can help beside the parts that need one. Background, founder bio, fast facts, and brand assets for working press.
Response within 2 hours during a writing window.
For your fact-check pass.
10 facts · Cite freely
- What it is
- A free, worker-first navigator for what comes after a layoff: a plan, free tools, and people to talk to where a specialist is needed
- Founded
- 2026 · Public launch May 2026
- Based
- Minneapolis, Minnesota · Open to workers nationwide
- Founder
- Jarrett Reed
- Who pays
- Workers never pay PinkSlipped. Partners chosen for the layoff moment sustain PinkSlipped. Worker information is never sold.
- Audience
- People navigating a layoff, and the people who care about them — partners, family, friends
- Live today
- The PinkSlipped Plan · The First 72 Hours · The Quiet Window · Unemployment, Runway, Insurance and 401(k) Checks · Severance Review Prep · Career help, decoded · Pack Finder · Field Notes · Layoff Wire · Policy Radar
- Stage
- Live and free · Partner network in beta
- Privacy
- The money tools run in the browser; what's typed into them isn't stored. Nothing from the intake reaches a partner without the worker's say-so
- Web
- gotpinkslipped.com · @gotpinkslipped on Instagram
The question readers ask first
How is it paid for?
Workers never pay. Not for the plan, the tools, or the help getting their footing. When someone is ready for an expert, we introduce partners chosen for the layoff moment, so the handoff doesn't feel like starting over. Those partners sustain PinkSlipped. We never sell anyone's information, and a plan never goes back to an employer.
- At a glance
- Jarrett Reed · Founder, PinkSlipped
- Based
- Twin Cities, Minnesota
- Background
- User experience design, 20+ years
- How to credit
- Jarrett Reed, founder of PinkSlipped
The founder
A career designing for people. Then he became the user.
Jarrett Reed is an accidental entrepreneur. He spent twenty years at a Fortune 50 retailer designing how places feel, lost the job in a fifteen-minute call in October 2025, and, instead of polishing his résumé, built the thing he couldn't find: PinkSlipped, a free, worker-first navigator for what comes after a layoff.
User experience has been the throughline since he was a bookish, introverted twelve-year-old who noticed everyone. It became a career with a trail he's proud of: a landmark Brooklyn theater turned into a store without losing the theater, a national remodel of hundreds of in-store Starbucks cafés, and a Lake Street store in Minneapolis rebuilt with its neighbors after 2020, community murals at its heart. Today he is also a partner at thursday., an operator-led consulting firm.
He learns by doing, which is how a grown man ends up building a video game and filming a short series. He has a soft spot for classic design (see: the Mercedes 500SL and the Chris-Craft) and for yard work that has quietly escalated into lawn art. He meditates, believes in the sauna, and gives his time to arts and culture on the Hennepin Arts board and as past board president of Springboard for the Arts. He's dad to two adult-ish children. His favorite meetings are long walks with his wife.
Short bio · About 70 words
Jarrett Reed is an accidental entrepreneur. After twenty years designing how places feel at a Fortune 50 retailer, a fifteen-minute call ended the job, and he built what he couldn't find: PinkSlipped, a free, worker-first navigator for what comes after a layoff. He's also a partner at thursday., an operator-led consulting firm. Off the clock: a classic Mercedes, a Chris-Craft, lawn art, the sauna and long walks with his wife.
From the founder, on the record.
Pre-cleared · Cite freely
Pre-cleared for use in coverage. Additional quotes available on request at press@gotpinkslipped.com.
"The paycheck is the loss you didn't choose. The defaults are the ones you didn't know you were choosing.
Jarrett Reed · Founder, PinkSlipped
"A company spends months preparing a layoff. The worker gets fifteen minutes.
Jarrett Reed · Founder, PinkSlipped
"I'm not building a marketplace. I'm building a place to land.
Jarrett Reed · Founder, PinkSlipped
"After the call, a clock starts. When you have limited time, very few things are as steadying and grounding as knowing what to ask and who to call. That is the moment PinkSlipped was built for.
Jarrett Reed · Founder, PinkSlipped
"When the income stops, the first thing you lose is the sense that you get to decide anything.
Jarrett Reed · Founder, PinkSlipped
"A progress bar during a layoff is a judgment.
Jarrett Reed · On why the PinkSlipped Plan has no countdown
A few ways in.
Story angles
Same layoff, different state
Severance and unemployment rules change at the state line. California doesn't hold benefits back for severance; in Texas, most severance delays them. Almost nobody learns which rules they live under until the first payment doesn't come.
One W-2, a whole household
A layoff arrives through one paycheck and lands on a spouse's income, the kids' school year and the retirement accounts. Most help still treats it as a solo job search.
The fifteen minutes
The company spends months preparing a layoff. The worker gets fifteen minutes, a folder and a date to sign by. What the law already gives workers 40 and over, and why so few use the whole window.
The designer who became the user
Two decades designing how places feel, then a fifteen-minute call. Building a worker-first navigator from inside the experience, starting with a room of laid-off colleagues.
Duress is expensive
Every consequential decision after a layoff carries a clock, and stress makes for expensive choices. Why the PinkSlipped Plan has no day counter, no progress bar and no overdue state.
Brand assets, print & web ready.
Request full pack →The PinkSlipped wordmark is one word, capital P and capital S, always on a single horizontal line. "Pink" is navy (white on dark); "Slipped" is always coral. Never stacked. For square or constrained placements, use the PS monogram.
PinkSlipped
Wordmark · On light
PinkSlipped_Wordmark_OnLight.png
PinkSlipped
Wordmark · On dark
PinkSlipped_Wordmark_OnDark.png
PS
PS Monogram · Square
PinkSlipped_Monogram_PS.png
Founder headshot
Jarrett_Reed_Headshot_Square.jpg
Founder headshot · Environmental
Jarrett_Reed_Headshot_Environmental.jpg
Color palette · Gloock, Inter and JetBrains Mono
Navy#1A2438
Coral#E8506A
Linen#F0ECE6
Teal#2D4E52
Ink#4A5568
White#FFFFFF
Boilerplate · For use in coverage
PinkSlipped is a free, worker-first navigator for what comes after a layoff. It turns the decisions that land in the first sixty days (severance, health coverage, the 401(k), unemployment) into one ordered plan with the real deadlines on it, offers free tools that show their math and their sources, and connects workers to partners, with the cost and any paid relationship stated up front. Founded in 2026 by Jarrett Reed and based in Minneapolis, PinkSlipped is open to workers nationwide. Workers never pay PinkSlipped. Learn more at gotpinkslipped.com.
Press contact
Jarrett Reed
press@gotpinkslipped.comResponse within 2 hours during a writing window. After hours, leave a message and we'll be in touch the same morning.
No paywall · No embargo games · Cite freely