November 9, 2022
By Murtuza Merchant
While NFTs have been used in the service, entertainment, fashion, and travel sectors, what are food NFTs, though?
While NFTs are entering the mainstream in the food industry as well, and no one can stop them from doing so.
Let’s examine how restaurateurs and businesses might employ NFTs for restaurants, food deliveries, and food loyalty programs:
What is a food NFT?
Food-related NFTs either feature food-related imagery or secret recipes from well-known online foodies.
They may take the form of memberships in elite food clubs, with the NFT serving as the key to the actual restaurant.
NFTs are now viewed more as a way for brands to market and raise awareness within the digital limits of Web3, which is one of the main reasons why food NFTs have grown in popularity.
Noted NFT curator Noel Saldanha says that NFTs can open doors to culinary experiences, works of art, and recipes.
He adds that for instance, Taco Bell published NFT depictions of their menu items, with the proceeds going to charity., he says.
“Since fast-food goliaths like Burger King, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell have started NFT collections as a part of their marketing campaigns, food NFTs are another approach to becoming more prominent on Web3,” he says.
“Another option considered by Stella Artois in 2021, when they unveiled an NFT of celebrity chef Marcus Samuelsson’s Fried Yardbird recipe, is the auctioning of recipe food NFTs. In fact, a recipe NFT marketplace has been established where professional chefs, foodies, and hobbyists may mint NFTs, according to Saldanha.
Recipe as with other NFT markets, NiFTy’s platform enables anybody to develop and sell recipe NFTs, and they also permit creators to get royalties from further sales of their recipes.
Businesses that have invested in the Metaverse anticipate growth once it is more widely accessible. That will enable them to promote their eateries more.
Two instances of eateries that are making efforts to ensure that their exposure in the real world is also present in the Metaverse, or the foodverse in this case, are McDonald’s and Panera Bread.
These membership food NFTs can also serve as a way to access food-related subscription services. The Flyfish Club is a prime illustration.
What is Flyfish Club
The first member-only private dining club in the world is called Flyfish Club. Gary Vaynerchuk and Chef Josh Capon of Lure Fishbar created the initiative.
The Flyfish Club membership is acquired as an NFT. The secondary market is where memberships are traded, and after someone purchases the token from Flyfish Club, all subsequent transactions take place on the Opensea.io secondary market.
There are no transaction fees required to make the reservations because they are not made on-chain.
Instead, to make reservations, members login and create an account on the Flyfish Club website. They include the Flyfish and Flyfish Omakase tokens. A token holder’s membership will be recognized.
According to the website, only people who are members of the Flyfish Club are permitted to make bookings within the club; family members are not permitted to make reservations on their behalf.
This is noteworthy since it appears to be a strategy for encouraging token owners to trade their tokens for the access of those who would like to join Flyfish Club. Of course, this results in secondary sales and royalties for Flyfish Club every time these tokens change hands.
Members of Flyfish Club will need to maintain access to the wallet where their membership is stored in order to prove ownership, as is the case with many NFT initiatives. The verification procedure for members of the Bored Ape Yacht Club is the same as this.
What is the foodverse?
The Metaverse is the virtual universe that fuses augmented reality with another digital world.
The foodverse is a blockchain-based metaverse that mixes popular NFTs, food, and games. NFTs, which may be exchanged for in-game products and traded just like in other Metaverse games, are available as ingredients and recipes.
According to NFT creator Mehjabeen Arsiwala, the foodverse is a virtual reality environment that may be entered, much like the Metaverse.
The foodverse hasn’t taken off with the same power as conventional NFTs, she says and adds that which is one reason why the Metaverse has several barriers preventing the general public from accessing it.
“The main force behind the foodverse and food NFTs is the gaming industry. This is due to the fact that game makers are launching titles with food-related NFTs as a means of commercial placement for goods and services,” Arsiwala adds.
Food NFTs as a product placement
Product placement in Web3 refers to the practice of paying for a service or product’s visibility in a Metaverse, NFT game, or NFT collection.
One of these cases was seen in the Fast Food Punks NFT collection, which featured all sorts of humanoid and animal avatars wearing fast-food worker hats. The collection was a parody of CryptoPunks.
The best application of NFTs in the food business appears to be product placement, which is superior to membership and loyalty schemes.
The conclusion
It is true that you can’t consume an NFT Big Mac in the same manner as you would a real one, but that isn’t the purpose of eating NFTs.
Whichever route you choose, McDonald’s acquires a tool for marketing Big Macs.
Secret menus and the recently announced recipe and food NFT marketplaces are just two of the fascinating possibilities that come with NFTs as a restaurant membership.
About the author
Murtuza Merchant is an avid follower of blockchain, cryptocurrencies and NFTs.
