Get a Cup of Coffee for Bitcoin in Palo Alto

Yes, Bitcoin is “hip” in Silicon Valley if you want to pay for some goods and services – at a coffee shop.

At the Coupa Cafe, which is located near Stanford University in Palo Alto, customers are afforded the option of paying through conventional means, which is to say a credit card or cash, or they can pay through the “new school” method, which is to use Bitcoin. That is done using a smartphone and an application that allows patrons to use their bitcoin wallet to get the transaction done.

Is it just a novelty? Or is there some genuine practical value for the proprietors of this establishment? Well, it’s a little of both, one can guess. Remember that when using bitcoins to make purchases, there are no chargebacks to be had, and that is nothing but good news for merchants who want a reliable outlet through which to take payments.

The cafe’s co-owner, Jean Paul Coupal, is a former Stanford student who is one of the developers of the technology that enables the Bitcoin transactions to take place.

The Coupa Cafe has multiple locations, but is featuring the Bitcoin option in just one of those places, the one located at Ramona Street. When a customer gets the bill, he or she sees the price in both dollars and Bitcoin. That’s a nice touch. And when they are paying, all they have to do is scan a QR code and they have completed a payment of their bill.

No, customers haven’t knocked the door down in an attempt to pay with the new currency; in fact, in about a month’s time there have only been about $200 worth of Bitcoin business, and that may be surprising to some people, along with the fact that it is the only brick and mortar business in the city of Palo Alto that accepts Bitcoin for payment.

We don’t want to leave the impression that Coupa Cafe is part of a growing trend; indeed there is not a lot of penetration into this marker as of yet. According to one publication that keeps track of such things, the Coupa Cafe is one of only eleven establishments nationwide that serve food and will take Bitcoin in lieu of conventional currency.

Similarly, a marketplace launched recently is solely based on cryptocurrency. At Zaamil.com you can sell, buy, rent or offer services or skills,   it could be social media account, Properties, vehicles, used items, services, crafts and many more. You can buy and sell using cryptocurrencies.