Balenciaga’s flagship stores on Madison Avenue in New York and Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills will begin accepting bitcoin and ether starting next month.
Balenciaga becomes one of the top luxury fashion brands to accept cryptocurrencies earlier this month and now allows cryptocurrency payments.
The French fashion giant has announced the launch of NFT’s “Cristobal Balenciaga: To the Moon” collection on the NFT Crypto.com marketplace.
Major luxury fashion brands, such as Gucci and Off-White, have started accepting cryptocurrencies in their flagship stores in the United States. Now, it’s Balenciaga’s turn to venture into the cryptocurrency space.
Balenciaga’s most iconic couture designs using cryptocurrencies
Starting in June, a few Balenciaga stores in the United States will accept payments in bitcoin (BTC) and ether (ETH), CEO Cédric Charbit said.
Charbit told the Wall Street Journal that the recent deep selloff of cryptoassets-TerraUSD (UST) and Terra (LUNA)-did not affect his commitment to introduce cryptocurrencies. He said he was thinking “long term.”
Demna Gvasalia, Balenciaga’s creative director, posted on Instagram that the brand would also accept cryptocurrencies for purchases on the website.
Stores on Madison Avenue in New York and Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills would initially begin accepting crypto payments.
The brand that recently dressed Kim Kardashian in a sparkly dress for the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner has not yet decided on its crypto payment solution provider. The company hopes to add other currencies in the future.
The obsession with NFT and the Metaverse
The decision to embrace cryptocurrency payments shows how luxury fashion brands are appealing to younger generations by catering to emerging trends.
Balenciaga and other fashion houses such as Gucci have innovation teams exploring strategies for the metaverse and web3 space. Balenciaga announced in December 2021 that it was launching a metaverse business unit.
Charbit sees “the metaverse as a country” and called it a business opportunity with a clear profit and loss benchmark.
In October, Facebook parent company Meta’s Twitter account tagged several companies that seem to fit its metaverse vision, including Pinterest.
Interestingly, Meta also asked Balenciaga about the “dress code in the metaverse.”
Hey @Balenciaga, what’s the dress code in the metaverse?
— Meta (@Meta) October 29, 2021
On the non-fungible token (NFT) front, every week seems to bring the announcement of another brand making NFTs, including Givenchy, JW Anderson, Dolce & Gabbana, Gucci and Adidas.
Morgan Stanley estimates that luxury branded NFTs could become a $56 billion market by 2030.
This will likely shed light on the growing obsession with NFTs and why big brands have jumped on the bandwagon.