INS : First Global Decentralized Ecosystem Directly Connecting Grocery Manufacturers and Consumers

- Desember 18, 2017

The grocery market, one of the largest consumer markets in the world, is forecast to reach $8.5 trillion by 2020. It is reaching a digital tipping point, with much of its growth to come from online. Online grocery, being the target segment for INS, is expected to grow from $98 billion in 2015 to $290 billion in 2020, according to IDG estimates.

Despite the tremendous growth, the grocery market has two large interrelated problems - abuse by grocery retailers and ineffective trade promotions.

INS is implementing a decentralized ecosystem enabling consumers to save up to 30% on everyday shopping buying directly from grocery manufacturers. Direct interaction between consumers and manufacturers. Bypassing retailers and wholesaler

What is INS ?

INS is the decentralized consumer ecosystem powered by blockchain

GROCERY MARKET CHALLENGES

ABUSES OF BUYER POWER BY RETAILERS

The global grocery industry is dominated by mass-market retail chains. At the national level in many countries, a large share of the grocery market is frequently in the hands of few retailers. While some amounts of buyer power are understandable and simply desirable for competitive advantage, the high level of concentration causes a growing imbalance of buyer power within the supply chain.

Exerting buyer power is natural when not abused. It is understandable that any industry participant would seek bigger volumes as a tool for negotiating better prices. But retailers push the limits of what is fair. Grocery retailers are perpetually and aggressively extracting better terms from already squeezed manufacturers, going far beyond the benefits a player should receive for attaining economies of scale.

Large or small, no manufacturer has enough power. Global constituents, such as Procter & Gamble, Nestle, and Unilever, do play a role in the industry and have more negotiating power than small manufacturers. Still, these companies simply are no match for the extensive control retailers have on end-customers throughout the supply chain. For example, Wal-Mart’s sales are approximately 5 times greater than those of its largest supplier, Procter & Gamble. Wal-Mart accounted for 16% of Procter & Gamble sales in 2016.

Retailer buyer abuse extends beyond normal pressure. The explanation of this pressure is abuse of buyer power. Such power allows retailers to determine what will and will not be stocked, and on what terms, such as sources, quantity, quality, delivery schedules, packaging, returns policy, and above all, price and payment conditions. Indeed, a supermarket company wields an important bargaining chip, namely the threat to stop selling one or more products.

Evidence of retail power abuse - The Competition Commission in the UK, for example, did find
that major retailers enjoy a price advantage that exceeds the cost difference. Additional departures from proper retail conduct included: delaying payments to manufacturers beyond the terms in the contracts; and changing quantities or product-quality specifications at less than three days’ notice, and without paying compensation to manufacturer. The figure below offers specific evidence of retail buyer power abuse and lack of adherence to codes of conduct, which was covered in various news outlets.
Recent evidence of retailer abuse and lack of adherence to codes of conduct

SUPPLY CHAIN INEFFICIENCIES

High distances between manufacture and consumption. The average meal in the US travels about 1,500 miles to get from farm to plate. This problem is relevant for many countries and leads to acute financial and ecological consequences with significant adverse impact in the long-term. Food miles, the distance food travels from the place it has been grown to where it is ultimately consumed or purchased, increase significantly when buyers import food from other parts of the country, region or world.

Waste in various areas of the supply chain. In distribution centers and on grocery store shelves,
food is being wasted. Every night, some perishable items must be thrown out. According to a recent survey, 400 million pounds of food is served by supermarkets, yet nearly a third of it is wasted annually. Unfortunately, current retail systems are designed to reduce stock-outs rather than measure and manage food waste. Therefore, managers optimize to ensure food is left over on the shelf.

INS will decrease food miles, enabling consumers to unimpededly access local
manufacturers, including farmers. INS will implement the effective "pull" system
to reduce inventories and out-of-stocks that would decrease the food waste.

TRADE PROMOTIONS ARE INEFFECTIVE, COSTLY AND OUTDATED

Grocery manufacturers spend up to 17% of their sales on trade promotions. Trade promotions comprise a growing category of manufacturer expenses directed to wholesale and retail distributors rather than to consumers. Manufacturers spend more than $500 billion on trade promotions annually , and according to some reports 66% of that spend generates negative returns and leads to higher grocery prices.

INS is targeting to replace trade promotions with a more personalized, direct and efficient marketing, thus driving grocery prices down and facilitating the effective direct interaction between manufacturers and consumers.

INS Token

Structure

After the ICO period, all contributors will receive an ERC20 exchangeable INS tokens on the Ethereum network. Whenever the INS blockchain is launched with its own token mechanism, the ERC20 token will be always accepted for exchange to a new token 1-to-1.

The INS token is a core component of the INS ecosystem and is designed to facilitate all kinds of operations that make the token an integral part of the ecosystem and the driver for its economy. The INS token is fractionally divisible, transferable and fungible.The token balances and transfers will be tracked by INS. In the case of any force majeure, such as large token theft, contract compromise, or a disrupting change of Ethereum protocol, INS may opt to freeze token transfers and issue a new token contract with balances replacing that of the original token registry by certain date. In the case of an Ethereum fork, INS will properly announce which branch it will support.

INS Token Contract Address: 0x5b2e4a700dfbc560061e957edec8f6eeeb74a320

Usage

The INS token is planned to be the only means of exchange for handling all types of rewards

and one of the means of payment within the INS ecosystem. We plan that INS tokens will be

accepted as a payment method in partner services.

INS Token Usage

Manufacturers

Rewards: loyalty, promotion, cross-marketing, feedback
Minimum balance hold

Consumers

Payment for orders

INS

Referral rewards to consumers

Adoption

One of our key goals is the introduction of a decentralized consumer marketplace to audiences

that have little experience with cryptocurrencies and likely to have little-to-no knowledge of blockchain-based technologies. The INS ecosystem will be expanding beyond the crypto community and focusing its activity on the broad audiences. Providing services to this audience requires perfect knowledge of the grocery industry and its specifics.

Given extensive industry experience, our team knows exactly what consumers want. We will make it very simple and straightforward for consumers to buy, earn and use INS tokens. The complexities of opening and maintaining a cryptocurrency wallet will be made seamless in the INS website and apps.

Token Sale

Summary

Start date : 11:00 AM (GMT) on DECEMBER 4, 2017

Payment methods : BTC, ETH, LTC, DASH, USD (bank transfer)

Soft cap : 20,000 ETH

Hard cap : 60,000 ETH

Token exchange rate : 1 ETH = 300 INS tokens

Total token supply (max) : 50,000,000

Min purchase : 0.1 ETH

The exact number of tokens generated depends on the amount of funds contributed
No token creation, minting or mining after the end of the ICO period
Tokens will be transferable once the ICO is completed
If the soft cap is not reached, funds will be returned to the participants
Upon reaching the hard cap, the ICO will end immediately

The token distribution is proportional to the number of INS tokens generated:

INS team’s tokens are locked for 2 years with four 6-month vesting periods
Advisors’ and early supporters’ tokens are locked for 6 months
The Reserve Fund’s tokens distribution will start in 2019 and last for up to 2 years with the primary goal to incentivize new customers to join and accelerate adoption of the INS ecosystem by broad audiences