http://bitcoinboulevard.us/bitcoin-film-premiere-cleveland-heights/

Bitcoin Boulevard US events for THE RISE AND RISE OF BITCOIN:

October 3rd, 2014:

4:30pm: Pre-party at The Wine Spot: “Bitcoin 101” education session and film VIP meet and greet.
6:00pm: Red carpet event at Cedar Lee Theatre.
7:05pm: Showtime, THE RISE AND RISE OF BITCOIN, followed by Q/A with Patrick Lope and Daniel Mross.
9:00pm: Post-party at Parnell’s Pub. Show ticket stub or mention Bitcoin, receive $1 off beverages.

October 3rd-October 9th, 2014:

Additional film showtimes: http://www.clevelandcinemas.com/moviedetails.asp?id=5355

The Katz Club Diner: Mention Bitcoin, order a diner burger and get a complimentary house made dessert or shake. Any payment method accepted.

Sweetie Fry: Order French fries or ice cream, show movie stub or pay with bitcoin and you are entered in a raffle to win 25 free scoops.

The Wine Spot: Show ticket stub and purchase a beverage, receive 25% off cheese plate.

Parnell’s Pub: Show ticket stub or mention Bitcoin, receive $1 off beverages.

Revive: Mention Bitcoin, receive 10% off any apparel, plus an additional 5% off if you pay with Bitcoin.

Mitchell’s Chocolates: Show ticket stub or pay in Bitcoin, receive 5% off.

Stay tuned to event updates at The Cleveland Bitcoin Meetup http://www.meetup.com/Cleveland-Bitcoin/events/202294862/.

Is "press" the appropriate place for this post?

While it may only last a few seconds, this is a very important step for us. Until now, the city of Cleveland Heights has largely been distant from commenting on our project. Now, they are highlighting us in their promotional materials.

A big thank you to our home city!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=KuG-dXfUPqo#t=197

Heinens would be great, and in fact we have already spoken with another grocery store in the area. But, we are still uncovering a lot of logistical issues for a store this size. There is simply not tight enough POS integration today to do this quickly and without development costs. Bitcoin revenues are so low right now, that investing in development is not something that has an ROI worth considering.

For instance, this issue also affects restaurants. Many of them use Micros POS systems. To even begin talking with Micros for a custom native integration is $15,000, and that does not include actually doing the work.

My hope is that the "bigs" (BitPay, Coinbase) will work with POS vendors to attain native integrations. Once this happens, it will be faaaar easier to approach larger organizations.

VGO: Observé, yo no estaba seguro de cómo trusworthy traductor Google estaría con los transalation de mi puesto. Voy a publicar tanto en Inglés como en español a partir de ahora!

(noted, I just was not sure how trusworthy google translate would be with the transalation of my post. I will post both English and Spanish from now on!)

Also, ensure they understand, from the beginning, that they are not in for a "windfall" from this. However, you will most likely attract a lot of press (especilly local press), brand awareness, and have a lot of fun. It will hopefully tie your community together and be a really exciting endeavor.

Used google translate to read page, and I think you are off to a great start.

For us, this began as a merchant focused event - not necessarily a Bitcoin focused event. With Bitcoin Boulevard US, the interested was driven by Bitcoin's potential to increase margins for small business. The business owners did not know about Bitcoin before, and I did not want to come about sounding like a salesman. But, many of them know me, as I have lived in this community for many years and have personal and professional relationships with these folks already. Moral of that story - start local, hyper local.

Once one business embraced Bitcoin, and had success with it, the others followed. Small businesses have way too much happening in their lives, and really, Bitcoin is not anywhere near on their radar. It was a leap of faith in many respects, but also they began to understand the void Bitcoin aims to fill in modern digital commerce. As we showed with Bitcoin Boulevard US, there is great potential for brand awareness. The Bitcoiners came, because they have an inherent interest in this - they are not the ones that are going to be the hard sell.

Keep your project it in the eyes of the merchant perspective, the business perspective. They probably all have one common pain - credit card processing. Almost anywhere in the world, credit card processing hurts small business. This is your golden ticket. But, Bitcoin is not perfect...

1. Bitcoin is not natively integrated with most POS systems. You will have to help figure out staff logistics for checkout processes, hardware availability, and so on. It sucks to be a restaurant in the heat of dinner, and someone asks to check out with Bitcoin - now your servers have to go to a separate POS system just to accommodate this. Then, how do you tip? These are all solvable, and most likely you will not have huge Bitcoin volume to be an issue. But, there are idiosyncaries to each location you will have to consider.

2. To offer Bitcoin at a retail business, they have to assume the risk on 0 conf transactions because they cannot have thier customers stick around for minutes/hours until confirmations. No payment processor grantees against issues with this, it is a risk the business will have to assume. So far, no problem at all in Cleveland. I see this as far less of a risk than forged credit cards or counterfeit cash.

3. Refunds - do you refund in BTC or in your local currency? How to you calculate the current exchange rate? In our case, items are either sold with no refunds, or refunds are in store credit at the sticker price at time of sale. You do not want to risk customers using your business as a way to play arbitrage games against the bitcoin market.

There are many more considerations. But, I think you are on the right track! Good luck and keep us updated. Use our site and our press as reference to hand our to your merchants. The merchants don't want to hear from Bitcoiners, they want to hear from other merchants.

Its going very well! Merchants continue to see customers, and the community is still talking about it. We have one business who has already switching from retaining USD to BTC. New businesses have reached out and are now learning about the POS systems. We have had a few new businesses (a software company and a PC repair company) join our project.

This is also a great locale to host Cleveland Bitcoin Meetup events, rotating these meetups between the various merchants.


I think they did a great job too. But, I also think it an often controversial topic. Part of our goal was to have a local for the community to disucss the controversies surrounding Bitcoin, and dispel the many myths and misunderstanding surrounding it.


When I heard Newsweek was on the street, I became extremely cautious and I was very concerned about what they were asking of the merchants. But, once I spoke directly with Joe, it became clear this was going to be a very interesting and fair piece. Newsweek did great on this one, and Joe is a great writer. Here is a PDF version of it if you don't want the hits to their site:

http://bitcoinboulevard.us/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Bitcoin-Makes-the-Jump-to-Brick-and-Mortar-in-Cleveland.pdf

Thank you Joe Kloc of Newsweek for visiting and presenting such an engaging story. I must admit, when I heard Newsweek was on the block, I was excited but part of me was also very cautious...

They did a great job.

http://www.newsweek.com/2014/06/06/bitcoin-makes-jump-brick-and-mortar-cleveland-252604.html

We are already seeing a decent stream of BTC customers. We are also seeing a great deal of customers and community members vocally applauding the efforts even though they are not Bitcoiners. They visit the stores and tell the merchants how great this is for our city. In fact, I personally can't recall having even one adverse reaction to date from anyone. The merchants love the experience, and one is already switching over from holding 100% USD to 100% BTC. We also have new merchants interested in moving forward, not only on the street but around greater Cleveland. So, our work is continuing.

Still working on the alcohol situation, just had some correspondence with them today in fact. No resolution yet, but far from over.

Congrats Arnhem!

Here is the link to the video:

http://fusion.net/Modern_Life/video/street-america-pay-bitcoin-683060

Fusion Live on Fusion TV expected to present Bitcoin Boulevard US in Cleveland Heights, premiering today 5/14/2014.

Bradley Blackburn from Fusion TV visited Cleveland Heights on Saturday from Miami. He spent the afternoon with me strolling our Bitcoin Boulevard US, spending his first bitcoins, and talking with merchants and residents of our community.

We had a blast, the merchants and community are totally energized around Bitcoin and the many ideas it represents, and of course the media exposure they are receiving for their small business.

Bradley's story is expected to air today on Fusion Live beginning at 5pm EST/2PM PST.

Here are photos from our day:

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.1420976978165160.1073741829.1406240282972163&type=3

And a link to Fusion Live's programming schedule:

http://fusion.net/site/story/schedule-fusion-134061

We all are on coinmap.org, that seems to be a leading site for Bitcoin merchants at this point in time. We already have new merchants, and new interest form merchants.

This is more about capturing travelers who are coming through Cleveland already. Not just from London or Asia, but from Pittsburgh, New York, Chicago and other US cities too. Also, this is not about trading Bitcoins, but spending Bitcoins. Having a community of merchants where one can spend a day shopping, eating, and experiencing our community through Bitcoin. It is an outreach initiative for our city.

Plus, we have had people from as far as London calling our merchants directly to congratulate them. The Bitcoin community worldwide has been incredibly supportive of these merchants.

More importantly, the community (not just the bitcoin community) has been supportive of them, worldwide. This includes individuals, other merchants, and mass media alike. This has been incredibly positive news for our merchants, and Bitcoin during a time when Bitcoin could have used a lift. 2014 was a rough start for Bitcoin, and I for one thank these merchants for sticking with the project even through the adversity.

I think the liquor ban will be re-evaluated - they are working on it as we speak. The State has been very receptive, they are trying to understand Bitcoin just as everyone else is. I am hoping for a positive result from them within the next few days/week. If not, there are plans. This is far from over.

9000 comments? Surely not me right?

The Hague: http://www.bitcoinboulevard.nl/ . Just had a video conference with them yesterday, and sent .001 BTC from Ohio to The Hague over skype. Bitcoin is revolutionary. https://twitter.com/BTCBoulevardUS/status/464134106729951233/photo/1

Yes, the nice thing about this concept is that is is community organized. The merchants are the ones that see the value, and they are not "bitcoiners" per se. I did very little initial cold-calling, but had every resource available to them for when they needed it. Bitcoin sold itself, when they had the material presented to them. They made this decision largely on their own, and then we worked together to make it happen. They are businesspersons who see a possible way to increase their margins, and lower the obstructions caused by aging payment infrastructures. For Lisa at Revive, she sees this as a potential way to get her payments to her artisans across the globe, without all the hassle (and fees) they often have to endure with government, banks, exchanges, wire transfers, etc.

These merchants know they are not in this for a windfall of Bitcoins, although any new income from this would be nice of course.  They see the potential Bitcoin holds for their individual and collective futures, are embracing a new technology, and celebrating grass roots innovation.

I dunno, I asked back in November 2013, and I can't suspect I am alone. Here is their response:



Hello,

Thanks for your suggestion about adding Bitcoin as one of Amazon Payment method.

I appreciate your thoughts, and will be sure to pass your suggestion to the appropriate department. Customer feedback like yours is very important in helping us continue to improve our website and services.

At this time, we don't accept Bitcoin as a payment method on our website.

We accept credit cards, debit cards, payment from U.S. checking accounts, Amazon.com Gift Cards, Amazon Payments Stored Balance, and the Amazon.com Store Card. Here are the credit cards we accept:

-- American Express
-- Diner's Club (U.S. billing addresses only)
-- Discover
-- MasterCard
-- Visa, Visa Electron, and Visa Check Cards
-- Eurocard
-- JCB
-- NYCE
-- STAR
-- China UnionPay (credit card only)

You can learn more about these payment methods on our Help pages:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html/?nodeId=513058

If you'd prefer to pay with cash, you can buy Amazon.com Gift Card claim codes from authorized resellers at a store near you. Learn more at:

www.amazon.com/cashgcresellers

Thanks again for your suggestion! We hope to see you again soon.

Best regards,
Stephany V.