Bitcoin is a popular digital payment system that utilizes peer-to-peer technology to manage monetary transactions on a decentralized platform rather than a centralized authority. You might have encountered a patron who insisted on paying in Bitcoin and didn’t know how to handle it.
With more than 46,000 merchants accepting Bitcoin across the globe, the popularity of the cryptocurrency is clearly on the rise. It’s about time the restaurant and catering industries jump on the bandwagon.
Should Your Restaurant Accept Bitcoin?
Restaurants and cafes that accept Bitcoin enjoy a number of benefits. First, if you’re an advocate of cryptocurrency and you want its usage to grow, you will be happy to accept Bitcoin payments and become part of the pioneering promoters. Again, you are likely to attract like-minded clientele while giving your customers more payment choices. Even if some of your customers don’t know about Bitcoin, they will appreciate the fact that you offer multiple payment options. Let’s look at the case of Danish restaurants to see how European pioneers are doing.
Danish Restaurants Embracing Bitcoin
More than 1,500 restaurants in Denmark accept Bitcoin for online orders. Known globally for its award-winning cuisine, Denmark is extremely Bitcoin-friendly when it comes to foods and drinks. Hungry.dk is an online food chain that accepts Bitcoin for a variety of foods ordered from more than 1,500 restaurants. While most of these restaurants don’t accept Bitcoin on-premise, Bitcoin users can be happy to make their orders online and have their favorite foods delivered to their doorsteps. The improved stability of the coin over the years reassures restaurant owners that accepting BTC is a real, if not especially profitable option.
Despite its current stability, only a few years back the coin was extremely volatile, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Remember the Bitcoin pizza story where a programmer bought two pizzas for a value of 10,000 BTC (valued at $30 in 2010). Less than a decade down the line, those two pizzas would cost more than $38 million. Will the Bitcoin miracle happen again? Hard to say. But so far it’s looking good in the first quarter of 2019, so accepting Bitcoin, a global currency, is likely to benefit your business as an investment to counter the risk of local economic downturns.
How to Start Accepting Bitcoin
Now, to begin accepting Bitcoin in your restaurant, you need to sign up for a merchant Bitcoin wallet. Websites like BitcoinPay, CoinGate, and BitPay provide easy-to-use wallets that integrate with many point-of-sale (POS), e-commerce systems like Shopify and Magneto, and various shopping carts.
When users make payments through these applications, they do so through a QR code that is scanned by the payer to send bitcoins to your wallet. Depending on the POS or bookkeeping system you use, the bitcoins can be automatically converted to USD for easy accounting and tax calculations.
After setting up the system to accept Bitcoin in your restaurant, the next step is to let your clientele and other potential customers know about the new payment method. You can do that with simple signage on your restaurant or on your website and social media sites. There are a number of websites that track businesses that accept Bitcoin, and it’s very helpful to get your business on those maps. Good examples are Coinmap.org and SpendBitcoins.
The original purpose of Bitcoin is to provide a peer-to-peer digital currency. So, it should be treated just like cash. As more people come to this realization and begin to spend their coins on everyday needs like food, traveling, and recreation, more businesses will fully benefit from the innovative currency.
Should Your Restaurant Start Accepting Bitcoin? posted first on happyhourspecialsyum.blogspot.com
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