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Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

metaverse

Wow Bao Launches Hot Bun Vending Machine In The Metaverse

You can now visit a hot bun vending machine in the metaverse.

No, this isn’t a plotline from the sequel to Hot Tub Time Machine, but the next chapter in the continuing push by digital-forward restaurant chain Wow Bao to expand into the Metaverse and web3. The company, which launched its NFT program a year ago, announced last week that Wow Bao has launched on Roblox, a hugely popular virtual gaming platform with over 200 million monthly global users. According to Wow Bao, their launch on Roblox marks the first time that a fast-casual restaurant has launched in the Metaverse with a loyalty program that gives away in-real-life perks.

Those physical, non-digital perks come in the form of a free box of Wow Bao products, which a player qualifies for once they enter the Wow Bao game (called Dim Sum Palace) on Roblox, complete a couple of achievements, and connect their Wow Bao loyalty program (called the Hot Buns Club). Those without a Hot Buns loyalty club membership are instructed how to join, a process that involves leaving the game, getting the loyalty website URL from from a pinned post on Wow Bao’s Twitter profile, and signing up.

With a free box of Wow Bao on offer, I decided to join Roblox and check out Dim Sum Palace. I found the mini-game slick, but after I finished my achievements—earning a bao-themed headdress and a coupon for a free box of Wow Bao—I didn’t have much to do. The most time-consuming part was signing up for and connecting to my Wow Bao loyalty account (which, to be fair, went quickly after I jumped off to Twitter and found the URL).

Stepping back, it’s worth asking why the fast-casual Asian food chain is spending all of this time and resources to create a Metaverse game that likely won’t result in any significant customer revenue in the near future. According to Wow Bao CEO Geoff Alexander, the push into the Metaverse is a long-term play that they believe will pay off as more and more gamers look to garner IRL rewards for their Metaverse exploration.

“One of the things Wow Bao has always wanted to do is be wherever the consumer is,” Alexander told The Spoon. “There are a large number of people who game, and nobody’s talking to them.”

How is Wow Bao going to attract Roblox players to its Minigame? Alexander said they plan to raise awareness through paid advertising in Roblox, discovery on the home screen, and the giveaway of 10,000 UGC.

The company worked with production studio Sawhorse Productions, which developed the mini-game, and loyalty tech companies Flaunt and Paytronix to integrate their rewards program into Roblox. The company also continued to work with Devour for their Web3 ordering.

The risk for Wow Bao is that they invest in building a Metaverse presence, and, as we’ve seen with many brand efforts over the past few years, engagement remains low and overly complex for the average user, and eventually, they exit. According to Alexander, the company thinks being patient will ultimately pay off.

“Anything that you do new and technology takes time for adoption,” Alexander said. “We’re betting that the adoption will come. Today, it might be small. Tomorrow might be a little bit bigger. It might fall, and then it might come back. We’re in for the long game.”

Meta Wants Your AR-Powered Ray Bans to Remind You to Buy Milk

We’ve covered augmented reality tech that helps you cook in your home kitchen or visualize items in a food court, but what about reminding you to buy milk or eggs at the grocery store?

That’s a scenario Facebook parent Meta describes in a new patent awarded to the company for a smart assistant for augmented reality hardware as first reported by longtime tech and entertainment reporter (and former coworker of mine) Janko Roettgers on his blog Lowpass.

According to the patent, the Meta smart assistant app would be used on smart glasses (such as its Ray-Ban Stories wearables) through both reminders and geo-aware contextual information provided by GPS signals:

  • Another example shown in the application (and atop this article, if you’re reading it on the web) is a reminder to buy milk. The assistant then figures out that the best time to deliver this reminder is when the user goes to the store.
  • From the filing: “The assistant system may determine that the user is at a supermarket/grocery store based on … the user’s location information captured by GPS signals or visual signals captured by the smart AR/VR glasses” and then remind them to buy milk.

I’d find this type of application useful, but where I’d really like to see this go is to provide in-store navigation information (like help me find milk in a grocery store) or to provide additional contextual information as I compare items on a store shelf (which items has lower sugar or doesn’t have gluten, for example).

That would require in-store beacons and sensors, which we’re already starting to see make their way into stores to power contactless retail systems. This type of in-store contextual AR info would be even more useful for grocery store employees, as they restock shelves, check prices or check to see if an item is in stock.

The Spoon Breaks Ground on New HQ in the Metaverse in Partnership With OneRare

Here at The Spoon, we are excited to announce we are breaking ground on a new company headquarters.

In the metaverse, that is.

That’s right, we’re building a new (virtual) HQ in partnership with OneRare. OneRare, an India-based startup building a food-centric metaverse, is busy laying pixels and helping us create a our new outpost in Web3, a multi-use gathering spot for all things Spoon. The Spoon HQ will include a virtual event space, a watering hole, and a desk or two where we can tap on our virtual typewriters to document the stories of innovators building new things in the world of food tech.

The idea for the new Spoon HQ first surfaced after talking with OneRare cofounder Supreet Raju in preparation for SimulATE, the Spoon’s Web3xfood summit. Supreet suggested that OneRare could help The Spoon build a virtual space in the metaverse and, not being one to pass up becoming a virtual land/media mogul, I decided to take her up on it. I mean, who doesn’t dream of having their own HQ in a virtual world?

We started the process by looking for specific building designs in the real world that could approximate what our new HQ in the metaverse could look like. Being partial to mid-century American architecture – and with a fondness for Seattle landmarks – I figured what better inspiration to model The Spoon HQ than the old Seattle Post-Intelligencer building?

Above: The Seattle P-I Building on July 14, 1956.

The Seattle P-I was one of Seattle’s two major print newspapers for over a century. The paper got its start in 1863 as the Seattle Gazette (it was renamed the Seattle Post-Intelligencer in 1867), and though it ceased its print edition in 2009 (the P-I is still available online), the classic P-I is still a fondly-remembered and storied part of Seattle’s media history.

As for the P-I’s famed circling globe, it’s still there, only a few blocks closer to the Seattle waterfront. The paper relocated to a new location in 1986 and moved the globe along with it, where it remains one of Seattle’s most recognizable landmarks, second only to perhaps the Space Needle.

And now, The Spoon will have its own globe-topped HQ in the metaverse. The building, which you can see at the top of the page in an early rendering, will also have two bar areas (we figured one isn’t enough for thirsty Spoon event attendees), the event space, and a TV where we can stream Spoon videos and content.

We’re excited. We’ve become pretty good here at The Spoon at hosting virtual events, trade shows, and meetups, and we look forward to throwing the doors open at our new HQ to welcome our community to connect in new and exciting ways. Once the art team has finished with the design renderings, the OneRare coding team will get to work, and we are hoping to have the space ready to visit in October.

We’ll keep you updated and hope to welcome you soon to The Spoon HQ in the metaverse!

SimulATE Spring Video Sessions: The Food Web3 Summit

Earlier this month, SimulATE Spring convened the leaders pioneering in food & web3. Now you can watch all the sessions here!

The second installment of the SimulATE event series, we explore how the world of web3 will impact restaurants, CPG, ag, community building, and more.

Subscribers to Spoon Plus can get access to all of the sessions below.

Front Of House Takes an NFT Program to Smaller Restaurants

If you’ve ever taken home a souvenir menu or ashtray from your favorite restaurant, you will understand the role NFTs play in the hospitality industry. The same goes for attending a restaurant theme night or local pop-up of a new dining establishment. As Front of House (FOH) co-founder Phil Toronto eloquently puts it, a restaurant establishing a successful NFT strategy is “a beautiful merging of the digital and physical experience.”

Launching on May 18, Front of House (FOH) is a marketplace for NFTs of digital collectibles and experiences for independent restaurants. Co-founders Phil Toronto (VaynerFund), Colin Camac (former restaurateur), and Alex Ostroff (Saint Urbain) represent a mix of people with backgrounds in digital technology, advertising, and the hospitality industries. Initial clients include Wildair and Dame, with upcoming partners such as Rosella, Niche Niche, and Tokyo Record Bar.

The company’s business model is for the restaurant to keep 80% of the sale of digital collectibles. If an establishment uses a collectible as an invite to a unique dining experience, the restaurant will keep all the money from the food event.

Toronto stresses that FOH’s digital collectibles will be the digital analog to buying swag (such as a sweatshirt or tote bag) from your go-to dining establishment. Over time, he adds, the digital representations can grow to become interactive experiences that can be shared and/or enjoyed as a personal keepsake. “It’s a passport of sorts from your favorite restaurant,” the FOH co-founder told The Spoon in a recent interview.

The early adopters of using NFT as a marketing and sales tool are “scrappy entrepreneurs,” Toronto added, who had to get creative to stay afloat during the pandemic. “The commonality is that every restaurant owner interested in our program is entrepreneurial and looking to go outside the box,” he said.

Marketing and being on the cutting edge are only part of it. The impetus for jumping on board the growing NFT trend is about money. In addition to their regular dining business, an owner can collect revenue from digital collectibles, but the aspect with the most upside is creating memorable dining experiences. A key to all the possibilities is to make it simple for the customer to engage. A key to FOH’s success will be what the co-founder calls creating a frictionless experience, making it a little more than a typical eCommerce check-out experience.

“One of the avenues we’d like to explore is ticketed experiences where Front of House will work with a restaurant to buy it out for the night and have a special ticketed experience,” Toronto said. “That experience is sold through a digital collectible that lives on as a memory and a digital ticket stub you can take.”

Toronto said he is surprised that 65% of the customers he approaches get the idea and understand its value but might have a wait-and-see attitude. Once the pioneers prove NFTs successful and more than a “get rich quick” concept, he believes any reluctance will disappear. Also, Toronto commented that the NFT opportunity for restaurants isn’t limited to New York, Los Angeles, and other coastal towns. Given the hospitality business’s everyday issues, the concept will work just as well for Des Moines or any eatery wanting to explore a new business opportunity.

Meet the Experts and Innovators Inside the Foodverse and Web3

Our second virtual event looking at the intersection of food, restaurants, agriculture and all things Web3 starts today.

SimulATE Spring Summit will tackle the impact of Web3 on the food, restaurant, agriculture and CPG industries and talk to experts and entrepreneurs in the space, including:

Join us at 9:00 am PT for a day of discussions, networking + talks on the impact of Web3 on various aspects of the food space; and if you miss a session or can’t join us live, grab a VIP ticket for full on-demand digital access to sessions after the event.

Hope to see you inside!

OneRare and Honeybee Burger Partner to Bring Plant-Based Food to the Metaverse

OneRare, the first dedicated food metaverse platform just announced a collaboration with LA-based Honeybee Burger to make plant-based food “more desirable, accessible and available everywhere.”

The vegan burger, founded by former Wall Street execs, is considered a mini-chain in Southern California but has grown in popularity alongside the plant-based movement and is planning to open locations in NYC and Chicago. Honeybee plans to leverage OneRare to enter the metaverse and create a virtual location accessible to anyone around the world.

It’s a good move and one that smaller restaurant groups should watch carefully; as giants like McDonald’s, Wendy’s and Chipotle unveil their proprietary “metaverse” environments that will act like virtual storefronts and communities (Wendyverse, anyone?), taking advantage of already established platforms like OneRare will be important to compete in the fast-casual dining space in the future.

Adam Weiss, CEO of Honeybee commented, “we like to think of Honeybee as an innovator, redefining the potential of vegan food in order to increase the appeal of plant-based dining globally. On the food side, that means bringing new and exciting plant-based products to our customers, including things like Nowadays chick’n nuggets…and also Akua kelp patties, which we were the first QSR to serve. This innovation extends to our business and marketing, where we were one of the first to use Regulation CF to raise funds, and now we want to be one of the first to market in the metaverse.”

For now, Honeybee will use the OneRare “foodverse” to promote plant-based food and sustainable dining and feature an NFT menu created by the vegan chain. OneRare has been busy since raising its first funding round in November 2021, announcing dozens of partnerships with food and restaurant brands along with partnerships with NFT and cryptocurrency platforms.

Food NFT + Metaverse (in a) Minute: NFTs for Purpose Driven Restaurants, Cereal DAO

It’s still early days at the intersection of food and Web3 and that means there’s almost always something new happening and more to learn. Stay up to date with our coverage and these 3 things in this week’s Food Metaverse Minute:

NFTs for Purpose-Driven Restaurant

Chefs using NFTs to fund their next restaurant is becoming a regular thing — but even more inspiring is chefs using NFTs to give back to the workers who are the backbone of the restaurant industry. That’s what St. Paul-based chef Brian Ingram and his group Purpose Restaurants are doing with their next project.

Partnering with Chicago artist Joey Africa, the NFT collection will feature 71 original digital and physical pieces, each token serving as a membership to Ingram’s newest restaurant. The Apostle Supper Club, opening this summer across from the Xcel Energy Center, will hold VIP events like private chef dinners and menu tastings. Ten percent of the NFT raise will go back into the community; Ingram’s restaurant group regularly contributes to Give Hope, his charity created to give funds directly to people in their community, particularly restaurant workers dealing with housing insecurity or addiction.

We’ll be keeping an eye on hose this project performs. The NFTs went on sale last week on Opeaseas but so far there’s been little activity. While there’s been lots of inspiration from the success of the membership of Flyfish Club, no one – not surprisingly – has been able to replicate the success of the Gary Vee-affiliated group.

The DAO-Driven Cereal Company

NFT-branded cereal makes a debut from the “first decentralized CPG company” last week at Bitcoin Miami. The new CPG DAO (decentralized autonomous organization) — named gmgn supply co — launched with its first product, gm cereal and introduced its governance structure. The goal of DAOs is to spread collective decision-making rights along with ownership benefits to all of the involved members.

To drive hype for their launch, gmgn used Web3 marketing with BoredBecky, a curated personality with famous NFT social influencer group Bored Ape Club. The new group hopes to “revolutionize the CPG industry and drive the next generation of beloved brands,” and will be the first consumer packaged goods company to embrace NFTs as a way to fund and the DAO structure to run and grow the organization.

“If you look at the current CPG landscape, the majority of brands we eat every day are owned by 11 giant CPG conglomerates. gmgn supply co is changing this and our members will have a say in what they eat, what products are going to be made and help lead the CPG industry in a new direction that’s been elevated by Web3. We are excited to be leading this change and kicking it off with the launch of our first brand, gm Cereal, slated to drop in the Fall of this year,” said Phillipe LeBlanc, Co-CEO and Co-Founder of Funday.” Funday is one of the founding companies that started gmgn.

SimulATE is Back

SimulATE is coming back! We’re bringing back the first virtual event dedicated to the emerging food, NFT, metaverse + crypto space and we’re going to be announcing our speaker lineup and agenda soon. Preview some of that here and if you use THIS LINK, you’ll get 50% off ticket prices through the end of this week (FRIDAY, 4/15 at 11:59 pm PST).

Slim Jim is creating a “Meata-verse” and a marketplace for virtual food

Last year, the meme-based cryptocurrency dogecoin got its first public earnings callout from the company that owns meat stick brand Slim Jim. Conagra Brands CEO Sean Connolly pointed to the social engagement from active dogecoin and Shiba Inu meme coin communities as big factors in Slim Jim’s win in the Adweek March Madness-style brand competition.

And now, it seems the company’s interest in Web3 technology goes beyond the gimmicky marketing campaign. Coindesk reported yesterday that Slim Jim had recently filed for trademarks under “Slim Jim,” “Meataverse,” and “Long Boi Gang” that announce plans for a virtual marketplace comprised of NFTs, virtual food products and virtual goods.

The filings also discuss “providing a metaverse for people to browse, accumulate, buy and sell virtual food products” and seem to indicate that the meat snack food brand will try and take a leading role in leveraging virtual environments to extend its reach and engage the next generation of consumers in immersive experiences.

Slim Jim joins other food brands like Nestle and McDonalds with forays into combining food and Web3 technology as consumer interest in crypto and NFTs continues to rise.

To understand what the food metaverse might look like and why food brands across industries including restaurant, grocery, and CPG are planting their flags in Web3, join The Spoon community on May 4 for Simulate Spring Summit: Food Metaverse + Web3 virtual event. Early bird tickets start at $75 – register here.

We’re Bringing Food and the Metaverse Back Together This May

We’re in the business of finding and reporting what’s happening on the bleeding edge of food and technology. Discovering invention and innovation and bringing together the people doing this work to talk about it and help others whose business and work will eventually be impacted — this is what we did in early February at SimulATE Food Metaverse & NFT Mini-Summit.

Want more future food? Join Spoon Plus.

Watch SimulATE mini-summit sessions like “Building a Crypto Powered Food Future” and “Making an NFT Restaurant with Gary Vee’s Flyfish Club” by joining Spoon Plus here.

And we were blown away at the response. Not only in registrations but in requests after the fact for the recorded sessions after the fact when recaps were being shared. Each session generated many questions and follow-ups and mentions of other work that we wanted to learn more about too.

That’s when SimulATE Spring Summit was born. Happening May 4, 2022 on our virtual platform, we’re coming back with even more sessions, talks and demonstrations to help shed more light on the metaverse, NFTs, cryptocurrency (and all Web3 technology) and their impact, disruption and role in food and related industries.

To take a look at more details and early-bird ticket options, visit the SimulATE Spring Summit registration page. For more info on how to get involved with speaking or sponsorships, email events@thespoon.tech for more details.

Tomorrow: Learn about the food metaverse at SimulATE 2022

Tomorrow (Feb 1st) we’re kicking off our first virtual event of the year, tackling a fast-growing area of food tech: the metaverse. We’re bringing together those helping to build the food metaverse and experts in crypto, NFTs and mixed reality to discuss the seismic shifts coming to the world of food tech.

SimulATE: the Food Metaverse + NFT Mini-Summit will kick off The Spoon’s virtual event series in 2022 and host speakers like David Rodolitz, the CEO of Flyfish Club who is working with Gary Vaynerchuk to build the world’s first NFT restaurant.

Another session with Amber Case from Unlock Protocol and Shelly Rupel from Devour Token will focus on cryptocurrencies and the role non-fungible tokens, the blockchain, DAOs and crypto overall will play in the future of dining, food retail and delivery.

We’re going to talk with Supreeet Raju, co-founder of OneRare about the work happening to build the “foodverse” and what it looks like to create a gamified and immersive food experience for users.

What does a Web3 burger chain restaurant look like? Co-founder of BurgerDAO Al Chen will discuss the work of building and funding a completely new operational model for quick service restaurants and the role NFTs will play in supporting the opening of each chain.

Register for SimulATE tickets + use SPOON for 25% off

Between sessions, you’ll have the chance to network with professionals across the channels and industries involved in Web3, crypto, blockchain, NFTs and mixed reality.

If you don’t work in those spaces but you’re trying to put your finger on the pulse of the “food metaverse” and need a crash course in the future disruption of food with metaverse tech, SimulATE is the place to be.

Check out the full agenda for SimulATE here and get your tickets; the event starts at 9:00 am Pacific on Tuesday, February 1, 2022 and runs until 1:00 pm Pacific. But, if you can’t make it live, grab a VIP pass that gives you total digital access to each session after the event.

We’re running a last-day sale — just click “TICKETS” in the upper right corner and use code SPOON to get 25% off both live and VIP tickets.

CES 2022 Preview: Carbon Origins Wants to Merge Robot Delivery With the Metaverse

If you’re looking to get a fresh start on a new career in 2022, may I suggest a new occupation as a virtual reality robot delivery driver?

Yes, that’s a job – or at least a new gig – being offered by a startup out of Minneapolis called Carbon Origins. The company, which is building a refrigerated sidewalk delivery robot by the name of Skippy, is looking to assemble a roster of remote robot pilots who will utilize virtual reality technology to pilot Skippy around to businesses and consumer homes.

The company, which launched in early 2021 and participated in Techstars Farm to Fork accelerator this year, will be showcasing the new technology at CES 2022 in January. This past summer, the company started testing an early version of the VR-piloted robot in the above-street skyway system around St Paul, Minnesota and plans to begin testing deliveries to offices and homes in the Minneapolis market starting in January.

You can watch a video of the company’s CEO, Amogha Srirangarajan, piloting a prototype of the Skippy robot using a virtual reality headset below. According to Srirangarajan, the robot uses machine vision to navigate the world using a neural network.

Skippy Demo (04/21)

“What you’re seeing now is Skippy’s neural network, detecting and classifying objects, analyzing the sidewalk, and segmenting safe zones for navigation,” explains Srirangarajan in the demo video.

The Skippy operators – which for some reason the company calls “Skipsters” – use virtual reality headsets to supervise and correct the robot as it navigates through the world.

“Remote human operators, who we lovingly call ‘Skipsters,’ use fully immersive virtual reality headsets to monitor and train Skippy’s neural network in real-time,” said Srirangarajan. “Like an augmented reality PacMan game, Skipsters monitor and correct Skippy’s trajectory, giving Skippy the ability to navigate the human world unlike any other robot on the planet.”

The company emailed me and asked if I wanted to try out piloting a Skippy while in CES next week, and, of course, I said yes. If you also want to become an, um, Skipster too, you can visit the company’s booth or fill out an application to become a driver here.