Post
Topic
Board Bitcoin Discussion
Re: A supermarket in Mexico now allows Bitcoin payments for all their items
by
AicecreaME
on 04/01/2022, 09:48:27 UTC
Elektra supermarket in Mexico recently started accepting Bitcoin payments and is encouraging their clients to do so, as they offer a 20% discount when paying with it (until end of the year).

Here's the promo banner (in Spanish):



Now people in Mexico are able to buy groceries, and retail in general using Bitcoin directly.

An interesting thing to consider is that the parent company, Grupo Elektra, has operations in these countries: Mexico, US, Guatemala, Honduras, Peru, Panama, and El Salvador.

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grupo_Elektra

That means that they already accept Bitcoin directly from at least 2 countries: Mexico, and El Salvador. Some of the other countries in that list could potentially be the next one.

It's a courageous move from this establishment to offer a promotional discount to their shoppers by using bitcoin as their payment option. A 20% discount is a huge discount especially if the buyer has a large total of shopping value. I wonder what were the terms and conditions they have set. Maybe there is some sort of capped and minimum spend for this promotion because if there isn't any, I think they will have losses instead of gains. Considering the amount a person can save by paying with bitcoin, they will shoulder it if it wasn't implemented right. So I suppose they have thought thoroughly and calculated already the possible margin of profit and losses before doing this because the duration of the campaign is also quite long.

This kind of action done by small enterprises and establishments will definitely create a ripple effect just like how it started from El Salvador accepting bitcoin as payment and eventually making it legally as their legal tender. I've read that the transaction fees were really negligible and it was a good thing because they won't have to spend a large amount of money over a processing fee unlike before and in other platforms wherein the transactions fees are high and such a pain in someone's pocket. In addition, by doing the promotional campaign, people would be curious about bitcoin which could make them search about it and use it themselves. I hope there would be more and more countries and businesses that would be open about the idea of giving their customers an option to pay in crypto. This could create a positive effect on their citizens and their economy in general, most especially if done continually.