Finance & Investment

CPG Transparency Platform Now Incentivizes Consumers to Choose Sustainable Products

Almond, a groundbreaking economic framework that aims to tackle the world of sustainable consumer goods, rewards those who make an effort to purchase sustainable products and help to combat cheap consumer goods.

Published 5 years ago | About a 3 minute read

Image: Almond

Almond has taken the next step in its growth trajectory by partnering with global investment platform TokenMarket. The partnership comes as part of Almond's plans to launch its own Security Token Offering (STO), as well as its own centralized stablecoin later this year.

Launched in the UK in June, Almond is a new economic model and blockchain application for iOS and Android designed to incentivize consumers to live more sustainably, reverse-engineering their wallets to become a tool in the fight against environmentally destructive business practices. The app is aiming to help combat cheap consumer goods by rewarding users for buying sustainable products, offering transparency in supply chains and helping sustainability-driven businesses to grow.

Almond follows in the footsteps of apps such as HowGood — which provides food shoppers detailed sustainability information on potential purchases for more informed decision-making — and takes the process a step further, by incentivizing better buying habits. The Almond Coin is a stablecoin designed to encourage users to replace the goods and services they buy with more sustainable alternatives, which have been approved by the Almond Foundation. Consumers of these sustainable products will be incentivized with Almond Coins worth 2 percent+ of the items wholesale value. To receive these tokens, users will need to scan a unique Almond Matrix Code (AMC), located on the packaging of the product or via a digital receipt, that will contain information about the product's story, as well as the supply chain and products’ CO2 footprint. Since November 2018, Almond has been trialing its IoT and AMC system with UK-based organic sparkling water brand FACT.

Consumers are rewarded for taking positive actions through a combination of 'Almond Coins' (a fiat-backed stablecoin) and 'Impact Points' (which improve status and unlock extra benefits). Along with transparency, the consumer earns crypto rewards that can be used for future purchases or, at a certain amount, cashed in via Paypal. Almond says it will offer brands that meet its environmental and social standards a marketplace to reach new customers, along with a robust set of tools and services designed to scale their market access and grow sales — ex: brands get anonymized information about the location of consumption of their product when their items are scanned.

TokenMarket will be playing an integral role in the Almond project by delivering a set of building blocks — including marketing, advisory services and constructing the token issuance — which will enable the project to run smoothly.

"Almond is designed to ensure that those who are shopping sustainably and truly changing their behaviour are rewarded for doing so,” said CEO Oliver Bolton. “TokenMarket's vast experience in the world of token issuance, advisory and technology meant that working with them was an easy decision. We are excited about our partnership with TokenMarket and the future ahead."

After receiving acceptance into Cohort 4 of the Financial Conduct Authority's Sandbox in July 2018, and revealing its new STO Service in September 2018, TokenMarket will ensure that the delivery of Almond's product is both compliant and regulated.

"Sustainable consumerism is an issue that we feel needs to be addressed. Almond's work is truly pioneering the way in which people can shop sustainably, incentivizing them to know more about what they are buying and using blockchain technology to track its supply chain,” said Ransu Salovaara, TokenMarket’s CEO and co-founder. “TokenMarket is proud to be working with a company that can truly help to change the way in which consumers shop."