Balenciaga to start accepting crypto as payment

Starting next month, French luxury brand Balenciaga will start accepting Bitcoin and Ethereum as online payment methods and at select brick-and-mortar locations. The luxury brand is also designing a long-term Metaverse business strategy. 

Initially, the offering will allow customers to pay with Bitcoin and Ethereum, the two largest cryptocurrencies, at the brand’s shops on Madison Avenue in New York and Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, Los Angeles. The cryptocurrency payment methods will expand and extend the offer to other regions in due time.

Top brands vouch for crypto’s potential 

This move makes Balenciaga the latest fashion industry giant to accept cryptocurrency as a payment method, following Gucci’s embracing of cryptocurrencies earlier this month. Last year, it was one of the top fashion brands to launch NFT collections. Balenciaga also announced its metaverse business unit in December. Balenciaga CEO Cédric Charbit declined to disclose the unit’s plans to WSJ, and instead says he views ‘the Metaverse as a country’, alluding to the Metaverse’s importance.

Meanwhile Gucci has also implemented a Web3 unit and acquired virtual real estate in The Sandbox. The brand also disclosed it will start accepting 10 cryptocurrencies as payment method towards the end of the month. 

In March, Off White also began accepting eight cryptocurrencies at its flagship stores in Paris, London and Milan.

In 2021, German fashion retailer Philipp Plein started accepting 15 cryptocurrencies as payment methods for its products. In April 2022, Plein announced that cryptocurrency payment made up around 3% of the company’s US$ 105 million online revenue in 2021. Plein expects that settlements with digital assets will form up to US$ 21 million of the company’s annual returns.