In this edition, we’re briefing you on Blackbird, a restaurant rewards app that rewards users with loyalty points, as well as native FLY tokens.
The platform has seen some serious backing, from the likes of a16z, AMEX Ventures, Circle Ventures, Variant Fund and Multicoin Capital, among others.
Learn how this unique project compares to other IRL applications of crypto, both past and present.
Over and out ⬇
Crypto Market Update:
- Top Gainer (24H) in the top 50 mcap: Maker $MKR increased in price by 12.1%.
- Top Loser (24H) in the top 50 mcap: Injective $INJ is down -7.7%.
- BTC dominance in the market is currently at 52%.
- The median gas price on Ethereum over the past 24 hours has been 39 gwei.
News:
- Aave Resumes After Security Scare: Aave's version 2 and 3 markets are back online with full functionality following a security vulnerability.
- Uniswap Labs Hits $1M in Fees: Uniswap Labs surpasses $1 million in front-end fees within a month, due to a new 0.15% fee on transactions.
- Poloniex Exchange Hacked, $126M Stolen: Justin Sun's Poloniex suffers a significant security breach, with promises to reimburse affected users.
- Near Foundation and Eigen Labs Collaborate: The partnership aims to improve Ethereum rollup transactions, promising faster, cheaper, and more efficient processes.
- Foresight Ventures Acquires Majority Stake in The Block: Singapore-based Foresight Ventures has completed the acquisition of a majority of shares in crypto news provider The Block at a $70 million valuation, aiming to expand in Asia and the Middle East.
- Ryan Wyatt Joins Optimism as Chief Growth Officer: Former Polygon Labs president, Ryan Wyatt, has transitioned to Optimism, taking on the role of Chief Growth Officer to expand the Ethereum Layer 2 scaling protocol's ecosystem.
Background on Blackbird
Blackbird is essentially a mobile app, that provides a rewards/benefits program that users can take advantage of when eating at certain restaurants.
The app also encourages users to visit partnered restaurants by rewarding them in native FLY tokens with each visit.
Blackbird users earn points through engagement, redeemable for benefits at restaurants.
Restaurants can tailor their loyalty programs within the platform, highlighting the importance of the points' ecosystem in the rewards experience.
The independent restaurant industry requires the collective scale of all participating restaurants to make loyalty points genuinely valuable and functional as a customer acquisition tool.
Currently, the app operates in New York City, with plans to expand to new cities and restaurants.
The platform is focused on building the next great restaurant thrill ride.
Blackbird offers a progressive onboarding experience, making it user-friendly and accessible without immediately immersing users in the crypto aspect.
Blackbird's goal is to provide new identity rails for restaurants, addressing their challenges in customer connectivity, retention, acquisition, and engagement.
In the future, restaurants may better understand and retain their customers through these new tools.
Blackbird’s Motive for Crypto Integration
Blackbird is led by Founder and CEO Ben Leventhal, who is also the Co-Founder of Resy.
Resy powers the world's best restaurants, using technology to imagine the future of hospitality.
Ben says that innovation in consumer technology often occurs when new "toys" or tools are available.
He observes a lack of new tools recently, with big companies like Google, Snap, Meta, and Twitter dominating the scene with their large-scale technologies.
Ben says he finds crypto exciting as it offers a new avenue for innovation, particularly in terms of ownership, which he views as a spectrum.
He has discussed the challenges and possibilities of different types of ownership in consumer applications, highlighting control and empowerment.
Ben highlights the role of ownership in Blackbird's consumer experience, using the example of dining history.
The shift in dynamics that Blackbird is facilitating gives consumers more control over their data.
The principles of Web3 are beginning to influence the broader technology ecosystem, including Web2 spaces.
Santi asks about the timing and rationale behind Ben's decision to venture into crypto, given the current challenges in user experience and onboarding.
Ben describes that the initial interaction with Blackbird typically occurs at a restaurant, where a consumer taps an NFC chip to receive a restaurant-specific membership card (an NFT).
The process connects the consumer directly with the restaurant for messaging and recognition, and the consumer accumulates a wallet of such membership cards in the app, with Blackbird curating the consumer's restaurant discovery experience.
Ben recognizes the early stage of crypto but sees it as an exciting time to enter without repeating early pioneers' mistakes.
He notes crypto's novelty to most people, adding to its appeal.
Ben explains that while Resy could incorporate some of Blackbird's features, Resy is more reservation-driven and focuses on larger-scale, near-term opportunities.
He foresees the possibility of restaurants layering Blackbird on top of Resy for enhanced functionality.
How Blackbird Benefits Restaurants
Blackbird serves as a passive CRM, automatically building a database for restaurants without requiring manual input.
This system provides restaurants with comprehensive customer information, streamlining the process of understanding and engaging with guests.
Ben says that the response from restaurants has been positive, especially around the implementation of loyalty programs.
Blackbird's Strategy: Stablecoins, $FLY Token, and NFTs
Blackbird is also becoming involved involved in the payments domain as it pertains to restaurants, allowing users to pay via stablecoins.
The $FLY token is designed to future-proof Blackbirds, similar to loyalty points in the current regulatory environment.
There are plans to create value and utility within the $FLY ecosystem, making it open and permissionless.
A cautious and value-focused approach is being taken by the team when it comes to the development and application of the $FLY token.
One key consideration is that the FLY token cannot be taken off of the app, preventing it from being permissionlessly sold.
It might be possible someday, but not in the near future.
Currently, users can only earn the token.
The team is testing the burning of points, where points can be redeemed for desserts and drinks at select restaurants in New York.
Blackbird's economy is closed, recognizing the challenge of speculative use cases in other projects.
The team recognizes the closed nature of their system and has discussed the potential future of opening it up and making it tradable while maintaining a balance of incentives and disincentives.
There will be two Blackbird wallets:
A wallet for NFTs with restricted control.
A wallet for $FLY tokens and possibly a stablecoin, with more user control.
NFTs will not be tradable for the foreseeable future due to substantial problems and restaurant industry readiness.
Illiquidity may be beneficial, as some projects have seen negative consequences of NFTs being too tradable and liquid.
Blackbird is currently focused on restaurants, but may explore other categories if they succeed in this vertical.
Something to consider is that there is a limit to how much users can engage with restaurants on Blackbird, unlike traditional yield farming in crypto.
Crypto IRL: Past & Present Attempts
The most obvious crypto comparisons for Blackbird that come to mind are Sweatcoin and Stepn, which both garnered serious attention.
These are platforms that reward users for walking.
Both of these project’s rewards tokens have faced significant sell pressure, with Stepn’s $GST down over 99% and Sweatcoin’s $SWEAT down over 88%.
It’s worth noting that Stepn’s $GMT still commands a serious valuation, with a marketcap of ~$350M and an FDV of ~$1.35B.
As Ben Leventhal and the Blackbird team have stated, they recognize some of the inherent flaws present in these systems and may be able to avoid them by taking a different approach.
Blackbird also differentiates itself as users who engage with the app have to provide measurable economic value in the real world, by dining at real restaurants.
This differs from the models of Sweatcoin and Stepn, who rewarded users for simply walking or running, an action that doesn’t necessarily cause any positive economic growth.
There is a growing number of crypto applications focused on merging offchain tokens with real-world economic output, particularly based on Solana.
Hivemapper aims to develop the world’s most up-to-date & AI-powered map, by rewarding contributing drivers with dashcams in $HONEY tokens.
Teleport is building decentralized ride sharing, allowing creators to publish their own local ridesharing apps in their region.
Helium incentivizes users to provide local hotspot coverage in exchange for native $HNT tokens.
Important Links
Become a Premium member to unlock all our research & reports including access to our members-only discord server
Join thousands of sharp crypto investors & traders by becoming a Premium Member & gain an edge in the markets. For just $33.25/month you’ll get:
Premium access to the entire Revelo Intel platform
*NEW* Raise Alpha- Weekly reports on interesting project raises
*NEW* Sector Overviews - 90 day Reports with data and insights on key sectors
Launch Alpha - Weekly report highlighting new projects
The Trace - Real-time onchain alerts for smart money movements
Airdrop Guides - Reports on airdrop opportunities
Members Only Discord server
Analyst Insights reports - actionable trade ideas
Project Snapshots - Monthly protocol-specific performance reports
Project Breakdowns & Timelines - Deep dive 50+ page protocol-specific reports
Notes - Summaries of your favorite podcasts & AMAs