Now accepting cash, credit, and…Smug?
Thanks to Chris Hallberg’s new Smug, you may be able to pay for your drink by swiping your coffee cup, instead of your credit card. Hallberg has found a way to integrate radio frequency identification (RFID) inside a coffee cup, called a smug. According to an article by WISN, this will be “like having a debit card in your coffee cup.”
This may help build loyalty, but why limit it to individual shops? I know many people enjoy trying new coffee shops, even if they already have a favorite – Heine Bros. being mine. You would think there would be a way for credit card companies to pick this up and use it in a way similar to the popuar gift cards from Visa, Mastercard, or Discover.
Will this really benefit me all that much? Probably not. I take my Heine Bros. coffee cup with me almost every time I go, so it won’t save paper there. It’s really not much of an effort for me to pull out my wallet and swipe my card or hand them some cash. That being said, would I buy a Smug? I probably would if it were from Heine Bros., or it worked like a gift card as I mentioned above. It’s a cool idea.
You should be able to find the smug starting next year at the Milwaukee-based Stone Creek Coffee. Other independant coffee chains have shown interest, hopefully with large corporate chains to follow. I’ll be interested to see if this idea takes off.
Sources:
- Smug Coffee
- WISN Milwaukee’s Channel 12
- WISN: Read the full article
- WISN: Watch the video
