Hi Kirk -

I was sat with a representative of a growers association in Queensland as she worked through your concept - she absolutely loved the potential to help farmers. In a discussion we had afterwards we discussed the idea of enabling the card owner to choose projects that they would like to support with their points / interest. We imagined a Kickstarter type interface which would engage users in making a decision - similar to the Waitrose Community Matters scheme in the UK which you can read about here: http://weijiblog.com/?s=waitrose

I thought that you might be interested in hearing these builds...

Congrats on a wonderful concept
Tom

Kirk, in terms of loyalty programme, why not have card types similar to the gold, platinum and black cards (and what have you). Maybe spending a certain amount of money with the card on local food can get you an upgrade of card-type, giving you access to exclusive food production (locally grown wagyu, special vegetables) or other incentives (VIP access to food festivals, table with discount in exclusive restaurants that serve local food).

As for partners, I think producer's associations and indeed a corporation like Visa could be the obvious ones. What you have to keep in mind with partnering with a credit card company is the fees they charge sellers and acceptance. I think Visa and Eurocard/Mastercard are generally best at that, but Diner's Club just sounds so right for this one.

Also, creating a community around the card seems like a great idea. Air France/KLM have a runners community around their Flying Blue program. They sponsor running events, and have special access and services around them for members. Think, again, food festivals, recipes from top chefs, cooking masterclasses, farm visits.

In London, we have the oyster card that allows transport on underground (metro) + trains + bus etc. A majority of Londoners hold this in their pocket from the youngest kids to the oldest pensioners, a larger audience than the credit card. In the last few years Barclays partnered with to make a credit + debit + oyster all-in-one card.
http://www.techdigest.tv/barclaycard-onepulse.jpg

Taking out my wallet to see my various cards, what other cards could this concept be applied to?? Transport card, Gym card, Work/Student ID card.

Incentivising ideas : if I did just get my Discover Local card, i would be more inclined to use it if I could somehow see statistics from the "top 10 users in my region" (perhaps remove identification so you cannot see their names but only their shopping patterns)

If I could form or join an informal and virtual "group" in my area or with a special interest (see Kiva.orgs user groups) the users can probably on facebook or another social forum give advice to each other on bargains and what time of week it is best to shop, to get freshest produce that just got delivered to my closest shop.

Perhaps getting groups to create informal second-hand-markets for coupons? and helping eachother out to find temporary bargains.

Perhaps shop-owners will be able to recognize a couple of the card-users that recommend certain type of in-season crops that generally are not selling so much, if there was functionality to discover the pattern of these groups, what they recommend to each other. (Identifying who is the early-adopter and spreading the good rumours?)
(i think I will copy this part and post on Louises TransparenceyApp, maybe this idea is relevant in her project aswell?)

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And i want to address one concern that I have about the cash-back : the other customers would maybe start to question why they need to pay higher price. And there is a risk that the shop just raise their price 5 dollars on an item that they will put a 5 dollar discount on. Do you understand?
So I would much more want to join the point-collection on a card along with another related type of service or benefit, such as the Bus-card that I proposed in my old concept.

I like your concept, but feel that there are a few parts that could make the whole system fail and become "abandon-ware", if you are not aware and prepared to tackle its potential downsides.

How about offers on this card the way sosasta offers deals in India or taste card which offers discount in resturants? And could it also mean, you have something in return for the restaurant making food from the local produce? This is just a very rough idea but something that can eb thought about

Participants at the Ideas Festival in Queensland got excited about this one! Areas discussed in our workshops that you might like to explore further – a supporting site to highlight the issues being raised by card usage and provide an avenue for positive story-telling and endorsement by known local food champions. Bring on the builds!

Hi Kirk

Great simple idea. From my experience a few years ago with retail systems, I think that there are a range of technical issues for different types of retailers that would need to overcome. Here are some thoughts on how to might overcome them:

1. Major supermarkets with a loyalty scheme and a credit card offering: Easiest for them to introduce since they should have most of the data at the right level of granualrity associated with an individual customer that I think that you may need, and they have the systems to pull it together. They should be able to calculate which products qualify for your cash back, and pass that information on to their credit card supplier to provide you with your cash back. They may just need to add a source / location code to their product database if they dont already have that info.

2. Primary Producers selling directly to the public: For these folks I'd suggest that they register with your credit card issuer (i.e. Visa, Mastercard, Amex) that 100% of their goods should attract the cash back if purchased in the right location. they would then just apply some business rules around the Primary Producers merchant identifying number to apply the cash back to the customers account.

3. Other retailers: (not 1 or 2) Trickier. The issue is that they will probably not able to make the connection between the detail of what you buy, who you are and your method of payment with their basic point of sale systems. They just send the request for the full payment to the credit card company for what to them is an anonymous customer. The solution for this group of retailers, and all retailers, could be enabled by the Point of Sale manufacturers adding in functionality to their terminals to work out if a discount should apply, and then sending that information "piggy backed" on the credit card transaction file to the credit card issuer (so then use solution 2). Major global point of sale firms include NCR, Verifone, Ingenico etc. Again their product database behind the point of sale would need a source / location code. (although in the future QR codes might carry this info on the individual product)

Hope the above helps you figure out a "back office architecture" to support your idea

I really like the concept. The challenge would be to finance the 5% discount. Could you elaborate a bit (with a link) what the Chase Freedom card does?

This idea inspires me. Here is how I would build on it:

Loyalty Points. Make points cumulative across all vendors at the farmer's market. Instead of cash rewards, provide exclusive benefits for the most-loyal members. For example, members that earn the most points get invitations to tours of the farm, special dinners using farmer's products, or access to exclusive "first of the season/buy before the rest" events.

An app, instead of a card. I see this as a smartphone app similar to Square (https://squareup.com/), which I have started to see at some farmer's markets. After you pay, the vendor asks "Would you like us to email you with what we will have next week?", and the customer can type their email into the smartphone and automatically start accumulating points.

A platform for market organizers. The app could include a back-end platform for market organizers with marketing tools, including points totals, email and social media tools, etc. Customers could visit the market's website to learn more about the farmers, see their points, and sign-up for notifications.

Combined with #1 (I am not from far away), and maybe, rather than cash, as credit on like goods (which will cost less to deliver), but … as with #1 – how to identify local/seasonal/organic/low food miles at point of sale and what about reconcilliations across the stores purchased and redeemed?

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Way to go on making the Shortlist on the Local Food Challenge! Selecting 20 concepts out of over 600 was a tough job and we're excited to have you move through to the Refinement Phase. You can get a low-down on how the phase works over on Field Notes: http://bit.ly/refine_lowdown

Basically over the next 10 days we'd like you to further fine-tune your idea. You might explore opportunities and challenges to implementation, visualise further, expand on engagement strategies or connect various dots and details that would assist bringing your concept into fruition.

If you hit the Update This button on the right of your post, you'll see we've added 5 new fields to help you refine: Concept Builds, Actions, Project Partners, Funding Sources and Virtual Team. Check them out and feel free to keep updating your post throughout the phase – based on feedback and collaboration with fellow OpenIDEATORS and your own ideating goodness!

Could make a range of image backgrounds to the card using images of farmers, growing, food etc. and posting these above.

You could make the Kangaroo a mascot or another animal, showing the Kangaroo in the background images of various local food photographs.

Once things cool off this weekend I'll push this idea forward...with your contributions, of course.

Clubbing this idea with Louise's bar code app idea where the information is provided could sort the details of how to implement it. Since the bar code would carry all the necessary information, the problem of finding what is locally grown can be sorted.

so admittedly someone might have said this and i missed it, BUT, perhaps the local currency tracker can be integrated into an app (like Eatcyclopedia [http://bit.ly/h1H5Pi] or some others on here), whereby you buy credit and you fill it up, and then redeem it via SMS or SmartPhone app. Just a thought.

Great build on my Local $, Kirk. I totally support it and would love it see it happen. Could we keep the Local $ too though for novelty value and for those starting out in business?

I think something to consider is the cost that is put onto the local farmers. They would be giving 5% back and pay a transaction or % fee for each purchase. I imagine that the credit card company imposes a buy-in/membership fee to allow a vendor to participate in the program. I don't think it's just a list of classifying products or vendors.

From a farmer's perspective, is there a financial benefit to buy into the program via increased business from the credit card's advertisement of the program?

I would think yes. So perhaps you could build more on this concept by addressing how this card will increase business to show that the investment is worth it.

simple. innovative. brilliant.