South Africa has its first travel-based NFT


Community of NFT homeowners.

TRENDING


If the world of NFTs seemed daunting before, buckle up, because South Africa has just taken its first step into the world of NFT travel with the NFT-based travel collection, which is an initiative started by local premium short-term rental management company Euphoric Leisure.

NFT stands for non-fungible token, and this incredible initiative that started as an internet hobby has quickly taken the world by storm. An NFT is a unique digital identifier that cannot be exchanged or replicated. Similar to the way bitcoins are bought and sold, the token is a form and unit of cryptocurrency on a blockchain.

READ: Watch | Young Famous & African season two is jampacked with drama

In the past, we saw things such as the sale of digital art and music on the blockchain, but now Euphoric Leisure is expanding the horizons of the platform with their Pangolin Collection NFT. Minting just 111 exclusive and unique NFTs, this initiative will give NFT owners lifetime access to travel perks and long-term returns.

“We’ve been a professional holiday rental company with a national portfolio for a long time,” said Dean McLuckie, the founder of Euphoric Leisure.

“First there was a calling for rental, then there was time-share travel, then Airbnb – which revolutionised travel and leisure – but this is the first time tangible, real-world travel benefits and privileges are being attached to tradeable, transferable digital assets in this way by a local company.

We wanted to make short-term rentals an absolute breeze, and we have been rebranding for a while. We’ve just created the Pangolin Club, which gave way to the Pangolin Collection and this brilliant idea to expand our portfolio into the tech space.

The inception of the Pangolin Collection initiative came in 2017, when McLuckie first heard about NFTs, having been active in the cryptocurrency industry since 2015.

Once he found out that it was a real way to tokenise real-world assets, he was hooked.

“It was so cool to me. I found out that there was a way to attach a title deed to a token and effectively sell that token. I could see that there was a genuine opportunity to revolutionise property in South Africa, and actually be able to make transferring property much easier, not just for us at Euphoric Leisure, but even for the government.”

Making this dream a reality was easier said than done for McLuckie and his team. Once they had conceptualised their plans, it was time to get the people on board to effectively make the dream become a reality. First, they had to get the homeowners on board by negotiating the terms and exclusive member rates that they would agree to. Then, they had to get exclusive NFT artists to design the Pangolin Collection NFTs, and then, finally, came the consultants, who were able to adequately advise the team about how to effectively launch the Pangolin Collection.

Making the dream a reality

“We wanted to create this really exclusive community of NFT holders and homeowners, so we gave our customers two ways to join the Pangolin Club. The first is to buy one of the 111 exclusive NFTs, and the second is to have a listed property in our Pangolin Collection, which will automatically give them a membership with the collection,” McLuckie said.

The marriage between tech and leisure is one that hasn’t been embraced much yet in South Africa, but, with companies such as Euphoric Leisure pushing the boundaries, the future seems pretty bright. As they build a consumer base, they hope to continue to push the boundaries of travel and create access that may allow for more travel benefits for their customers.

To date, an owner of a Pangolin Collection NFT will get customer perks such as 50% off a seven-night stay throughout the Pangolin Collection’s accommodation offering, with the exception of blackout dates such as Christmas or Easter.

They will also get 20% off all stays of less than seven nights, even during blackout dates, among many other perks that McLuckie says have the potential to grow and be added.

READ: Mbali Mbatha | Sophiatown bleeds through song and dance

The Pangolin Club is making international travel fun and easy, and is moving with tech advancements, which can never be a bad thing.

It might be time for you to move with the times too and take a leap of faith by getting your hands on your first NFT.