Oliver Bolton, CEO of Almond Impact Ltd – Interview Series

Oliver Bolton is the CEO of Almond, a free app that rewards consumers for buying responsible brands and helps them understand and reduce their carbon emissions. They are currently accepting investors for their STO.

AT: What inspired you to launch Almond?

OB: 2 years ago my son arrived (and last month my daughter!), and with the climate crisis I can't stop thinking about their future and what type of world they'll live in. I really want to use my time to make a positive impact and have decided to focus on consumption which in the UK represents 50%+ of our personal CO2 emissions

AT: Almond has a huge environment mission which includes rewarding consumers for buying sustainable products. Can you tell us what some of these sustainability goals are? Does it involve reducing excessive packaging, sustainable harvesting of products, etc.

OB: Our overarching goal is to help people lower their CO2 footprints by at least 50% over the next decade (with a focus on consumption). Specific assessment metrics are still being developed and will be based on the UN's SDG. Packaging, ingredients, processing and the LCA of products will all be contributing factories to certification. The foundation will ultimately develop its own impact assessment program for accreditation.

AT: Almond will enable consumers to learn about the carbon footprint of each product. Can you elaborate on how this is done and what information will be available to the consumer? 

OB: Using the supply chain data (ingredients origin and production processes) and other product information that is uploaded, we can calculate an LCA CO2 footprint at point of manufacture. We then plan to use a dynamic per mile average CO2 score (to represent storage/distribution/display emissions) to calculate the footprint from point of production to point of consumption to create an estimated total footprint score.

AT: What type of process will brands have to go through in order to be selected for the platform?

OB: To start with we are aligning with best in class certification labels in their respective categories. For example ‘B Corp' in Food & Drink and ‘Cradle to Cradle' in clothing. Over time we will build out our own impact assessment which will integrate the supply chain data above, accreditation and a detailed business questionnaire to reach an Almond score (run by the foundation).

AT: You’re launching with food products initially, what are the other types of products that you plan to add to the platform?

OB: In 2019 we are piloting several cross-sector consumer products including food, drinks, clothing, health, beauty and fresh produce products. We want to include any consumer product (and some services) that contribute to our user's carbon footprints

AT: Almond s launching in the United Kingdom first, what markets will you be targeting afterwards?

OB: The richest 10% around the world are responsible for 50% of CO2 emissions. The wealthiest consumers in developed economies will be our priority. A US pilot is planned for early 2020.

AT: The Almond token model has both a security token (ALMA) and a utility token to offer rewards (ALMD). Can you tell us about the use cases of the ALMD utility token?

OB: Due to the structure of the project, the tech and IP is owned by the foundation and can never acquired by a third party. The ALMA security token allows investors to exit their investment post their lock-up periods. We also hope to democratise investment into the project and will make ALMA security tokens available for purchase to the wider community through ALMD reward coins conversion. To clarify, the ALMD reward token is a fiat backed stable-coin rather than utility token. The reason for taking this route is that often products are sold in multiple countries so we need a cross-fiat global rewards currency. This ALMD stable-coin for good also opens up other potential opportunities for the project.

Can you tell us about the ALMA security token, and the benefits it offers investors?

OB: ALMA security tokens will offer similar rights to traditional equity such as ownership, dividend rights and are EIS eligible (subject to conditions). We plan to list them on an exchange in late 2019 to provide early liquidity to our investors.

AT:  Investors are obviously interested in the business aspect of Almond. Currently, you plan on generating revenue via a ‘Tokenisation Service Fee' which is a fee incurred by merchants. Can you tell us about this fee?

OB: There are multi income streams, the core being the Tokenisation Service Fee which is charged when physical codes are created to be placed on partner products. The fee structure scales down from 0.5% of the tokenised product's retail sales value to 0.2% of retail sales value. Other income is projected from marketing and ecommerce solutions.

AT:  In a perfect world, where do you see Almond being positioned in five years?

In five years we hope to have a presence in those key countries that are contributing to climate change and an active user-base around the world. We hope to show hard data and evidence that we are helping our users reduce their carbon footprints (in line with our 10-year plan to reduce by 50%) and evidence to show how we have helped responsible brands rapidly gain market share.

To learn more about Almond visit the Almond Website

Investor information is available here

You can find Oliver Bolton on LinkedIn or follow him on Twitter