Are NFTs the New Loyalty Cards? Starbucks Thinks So

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Brand loy­al­ty pro­grams become ever more rel­e­vant dur­ing the hol­i­day sea­son when con­sumers can expect rewards in the form of dis­counts, give­aways or gift packages.

Star­bucks is brew­ing up a new fla­vor of rewards pro­grams using Web3 tech­nol­o­gy. The cof­fee­house chain recent­ly launched its Star­bucks Odyssey pro­gram in beta to a few thou­sand cus­tomers and employ­ees in the US who have been on a wait­list since Sep­tem­ber.

Block­works’ Jason Yanowitz, the host of the Empire pod­cast, spoke to Adam Brot­man, the co-founder of the Web3 con­sul­tan­cy Forum3 that worked close­ly with the Star­bucks rewards team to devise the Star­bucks Odyssey plat­form. Brot­man also hap­pens to be the for­mer chief dig­i­tal offi­cer of Starbucks.

Brot­man said blockchain-based dig­i­tal col­lectibles can be an incred­i­ble loy­al­ty, sto­ry­telling and brand engage­ment tool. 

“The con­sumer is chang­ing,” Brot­man said, when asked why NFTs are need­ed when Star­bucks already has a suc­cess­ful mobile-based pro­gram that rewards mon­ey spent with dis­counts. The con­sumer, in Brotman’s view, “wants to be an own­er, a par­tic­i­pant, a com­mu­ni­ty member…to be part of the sto­ry of the brand.”

These chang­ing con­sumer habits pro­vid­ed an oppor­tu­ni­ty for Star­bucks to build anoth­er lay­er on top of its exist­ing loy­al­ty pro­gram, rather than a replacement. 

The Star­bucks Odyssey app, cur­rent­ly in beta

Star­bucks Odyssey was inspired by a Decem­ber-only pro­mo­tion for Star­bucks Rewards mem­bers called Star­bucks for Life, Brot­man told Block­works in a fol­low-up interview.

The more mon­ey users spend dur­ing Decem­ber and play in-app mini games, the more stick­ers they can earn — and the high­er their chances of win­ning free cof­fee or confections. 

Now instead of earn­ing stick­ers and stars, users can be reward­ed with dig­i­tal collectibles.

NFTs as coupons with personality

Brot­man framed the con­cept as “an always-on game lay­er,” and the objec­tive of the game is to “get as many points as you can” by engag­ing in “jour­neys,” or chal­lenges, and lev­el­ing up. 

The Star­bucks Odyssey app, cur­rent­ly in beta

Some exam­ples of jour­neys, accord­ing to Brot­man, include “going to a Star­bucks store you’ve nev­er been to this week, or try­ing a Star­bucks drink you’ve nev­er tried,” or watch­ing a video on Star­bucks’ agron­o­my prac­tices at a com­pa­ny farm in Cos­ta Rica.

When users com­plete these jour­neys, they earn the right to claim a Poly­gon-based NFT col­lectible known as a stamp, which also has points embed­ded in the meta­da­ta. In the case a user wants to buy more points, col­lectibles can be trad­ed on a sec­ondary mar­ket­place built into the Odyssey plat­form by Nifty Gateway.

These NFTs then act as access pass­es to cer­tain prizes and expe­ri­ences, such as a trip to a Cos­ta Rican cof­fee farm or access to an online cof­fee-mak­ing class or earn­ing free cof­fee for a month. Every redemp­tion peri­od lasts three months, so it won’t be until April 2023 that beta users can redeem rewards. 

“What if your points could come to life,” ques­tioned Brot­man, com­par­ing NFTs to coupons or vouch­ers “that have per­son­al­i­ty.”
Brot­man also men­tioned Nike as anoth­er com­pa­ny that is “approach­ing the [Web3] space in a smart way” when it comes to cus­tomer loy­al­ty. The brand, which owns the NFT project RTFKT, recent­ly launched an NFT mar­ket­place called .Swoosh that rewards the com­mu­ni­ty for engag­ing and co-cre­at­ing vir­tu­al products.


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