Blockchain-Based Sustainable Retail Loyalty Program

This paper addresses the issue of sustainability in retail sales, where the composition of the products themselves, their production and packaging process, and their transport to the point of sale play an important role. We propose a solution to apply a unified system of environmental product rating in different retail chains where trust is ensured through a distributed ledger. The system allows fair and transparent rewards for customers who purchase eco-friendly products while also maintaining their privacy. The prototype of the decentralized application for the uniform loyalty system based on the Algorand blockchain has shown promising results in terms of throughput and cost efficiency. We believe that the prototype has the potential to revolutionize loyalty systems and promote sustainable practices. This study provides key insights into how to interconnect retailers and customers into a uniform reward program, how to motivate customers to purchase sustainable and eco-friendly goods, and how retailers can manage the amount of reward for the given Eco-score categories.