Crypto Kiosk acceptance in self service: How fast is it moving?
Elliot Maras in a doctored photo has been writing for 30+ years on vending, kiosks and payment.
One key takeaway from Bitcoin 2025 in Las Vegas last week was promising signs of retail acceptance of cryptocurrency as a method of payment, a development that bodes well for crypto acceptance in self-service kiosks. The growth of crypto payment acceptance jibes with the ongoing expansion of retail self-service as consumers become more comfortable with unattended, cashless payments.
Both of these dual trends played into Steak ‘n Shake’s introduction at the show of its self-order kiosk that accepts bitcoin along with other payment methods. While attendees lined up at the Steak ‘n Shake booth on the trade show floor to order sandwiches, the introduction was cited during Bitcoin 2025 education sessions as the first nationwide restaurant chain to accept Bitcoin payment.
[Editors Note: interesting to see Steak and Shake accepting bitcoin — see video]
“Our experience so far with bitcoin is that it has been faster than credit cards, and when customers choose to pay in bitcoin instead of credit cards, we are saving about 50% in our processing fees,” Dan Edwards, Steak ‘n Shake’s chief operations officer, said during a presentation at Bitcoin 2025.
[Note — 50% is nice but UPI in India or Pix in Brazil save 100%. See Reforming Retail]
Edwards said the company began accepting bitcoin in all locations where permitted by law at all stores on May 16, including the U.S., France, Monaco and Spain. The company has also added Bitcoin to its logo on its website.
“This means that bitcoin is a win for the customer, it’s a win for us as the merchant and it’s a win for you in the bitcoin community,” Edwards said. “There’s no question we have seen an upsurge in our business.”
Since the day of the launch, Edwards said there has been a sustained spike in customer guest counts thanks to Bitcoin.
“Accepting bitcoin just allows us to meet our customers where our customers are,” he said. “We understand that allowing customers to pay with bitcoin alongside cash and credit cards puts bitcoin on par with those other globally accepted payment methods.
“We believe we have enhanced the utility of bitcoin,” he said, adding that the company is also allowing franchisees to pay for their franchise fees in bitcoin.
A new era for crypto acceptance
According to veteran observers, Steak ‘n Shake’s announcement marks a significant achievement for both attended and unattended retail crypto acceptance. The evolution can be traced to Bitcoin’s early years.
The payment industry recognized the benefits of crypto in self-service equipment shortly after Bitcoin emerged in 2009, when cashless payments were making inroads on the self-service landscape.
In 2012, Upstate Networks introduced a software solution that enabled bitcoin use in a vending machine, as reported by vendingmarketwatch.com. The Utica, New York-based company manufactures hardware and software to interface vending machines with PCs. Some tech-savvy vending operators invested in the solution, but the industry’s focus then was on credit and debit card acceptance. [Ref: Vending market watch link]
[Note — Upstate sued several kiosk companies in 2004. Patent 5822215. Several settled including AT&T and remember Moonrise? We have complete writeup in kiosk history 2004]
Fast forward to 2016, LibertyX, a provider of cash-to-bitcoin kiosk software, introduced an over-the-counter bitcoin cashier platform allowing users to purchase bitcoin at retail checkout counters. NCR Corp., the retail point-of-sale equipment provider, acquired LibertyX, in 2022 to enable crypto acceptance for retailers, restaurants and banks.
Crypto acceptance faced challenges
The adoption of crypto acceptance in self-service, however, was hamstrung by the complications of redeeming the value of a fluctuating electronic currency for fiat currency. Not to mention lengthy transaction times compared to other forms of payment.
In 2021, Cantaloupe Inc., a provider of digital payments for self-service equipment, announced a partnership with Bakkt Holdings LLC to enable users to pay using the digital assets in the Bakkt payment app, including bitcoin. The solution, however, did not come to market.
“As far as crypto, we worked to integrate it but we never took it to market,” Elyssa Steiner, Cantaloupe’s chief marketing officer, told KioskIndustry.org in a recent email interview. “I just think crypto fluctuates a lot and it’s hard to manage the value when purchases are made, money transferring, etc.
“It’s a payment type that may take off eventually, but I think the biggest challenge is we haven’t as an industry or even in the payments world found an easy way to make it completely frictionless to accept,” Steiner said. “Similar maybe to like 10 years ago when contactless was just so hard to get people to attempt to use their mobile wallets, and now, look at society.”
Innovation continues
Nonetheless, payment innovation continued.
PayRange Inc., a payments services provider to the self-service equipment trade, introduced crypto acceptance to its prepaid payment app in 2023. The app allows crypto users to load crypto onto the prepaid app instead of paying for purchases directly with crypto. The solution is available for laundry machines, vending machines, amusement machines, car washes and other self-serve machines.
“It is a way for somebody to utilize the cryptocurrency they hold in a transactional nature through unattended retail,” Matt Birchard, director of marketing at PayRange, told KioskIndustry.org in a recent phone interview. “The user can use Bitcoin to add funds to their PayRange wallet, and then they have a balance that they can spend on any PayRange-enabled machine. At the time of purchase, at a machine, they’re not using cryptocurrency per se, they’re just using their prepaid PayRange balance.
“That’s the same as it works if they add balance to their account with ACH in their checking account or credit or debit card, Apple Pay, Google Pay; there’s a lot of ways to get funds into the PayRange app.”
PayRange does not disclose the number of its crypto users or the amount of crypto purchases. However, Paresh Patel, company founder and CEO, said activity has increased since crypto acceptance was introduced.
“It’s not our most popular payment source, but you’d be surprised how many people load our wallet through cryptocurrency today, because people just have that, and so we have that as an option as well,” Patel said during a presentation at the recent NAMA show in Las Vegas.
Faster payment networks, stablecoins, bitcoin treasuries
Tech innovation has since delivered new ways to improve retail adoption of crypto that are destined to impact unattended retail – innovations, such as faster blockchain transaction networks, stablecoins, which are designed to reduce crypto volatility, and “bitcoin treasuries” that allow businesses to allocate a portion of their revenues to bitcoin.
Much attention at Bitcoin 2025 focused on Lightning Network, which supports the Steak ‘n Shake bitcoin payments. Lightning Network, according to the company’s website, enables blockchain payment transactions in milliseconds. By transacting and settling transactions off-blockchain, the Lightning Network also enables low transaction fees, which allows for emerging use cases such as instant micropayments.
“Bitcoin payments act faster than credit card processing,” said Jeff Gopehring, vice president of technology services at Steak ‘n Shake. “They’re also cheaper.”
Crypto technology innovators say the best is still to come.
“Having that (Lightning Network) on top of bitcoin I feel is almost like the tipping off point of ‘we’re here,’” said Bobby Shell, vice president of marketing at Voltage, which provides Lightning Network infrastructure, during a Bitcoin 2025 panel session on retail crypto tools.
Panelist Lyle Pratt, CEO of Vida Global Inc., a provider of AI voice solutions, pointed out that the Lightning Network can also transact in multiple currencies.
Panelist Stephen Cole, CEO of Orquestra, a crypto solutions provider, pointed out that “bitcoin treasuries” enable even small businesses to allocate a portion of their revenues to bitcoin automatically. This capability allows for a company to accumulate bitcoin on an ongoing basis and could motivate more businesses to accept bitcoin.
“You as the business owner can select whatever percentage of exposure (to bitcoin) is right for you,” Cole said. “Whatever percentage that is will be automatically converted behind the scenes and customers don’t have to do anything differently.
“Bitcoin eventually absolutely needs payments,” Cole continued. “Right now I would observe a lot of merchants over the years would adopt bitcoin at the point of sale because they see it as a better savings tactic…I think the whole ecosystem is doing a fantastic job of kind of leveling up all the products, making them usable so you no longer need to be tech savvy in order to be successful with bitcoin as a merchant.”
Here Come The Feds
The federal government, meanwhile, is moving forward on creating a regulatory structure for stablecoins under the GENIUS Act, thereby supporting stablecoins as a payment system for Americans. The Senate passed the act and is awaiting Congressional approval.
JD Vance at Bitcoin 2025
In his Bitcoin 2025 presentation, Vice President J.D. Vance said President Trump supports the GENIUS Act. “In fact we view them (stablecoins) as a force multiplier of our economic might,” Vance said.
Cole of Orquestra compared the current state of crypto payments to the early Internet days.
“I think an interesting parallel is the early days of the Internet,” he said. Those who wrote off the Internet as a “computer thing” were disproven.
“If you (as a merchant) were early to embrace the Internet and do online marketing and SEO, then you had this incredible leg up on all of the competition,” Cole said “I think bitcoin has this similar trend of adoption where there will be early adopters who take a calculated bet, investing into it, whether it’s accepting it as payment or allocating to it in their treasury, and they will just get this incredible leg up on all the competitors. Competition will drive its adoption.”
“Crypto adoption is no longer an option of ‘if’ but when,’” agreed Ali Tager, vice president of communications at the National Cryptocurrency Association, in a KioskIndustry.org interview at Bitcoin 2025.
[Side Note — Coinbase makes big announcement at Bitcoin 2025 that they are major sponsor of America250 4th of July event]
How soon will it arrive?
Some observers interviewed at Bitcoin 2025 said the adoption will be gradual rather than sudden.
“Bitcoiners are not very energized to spending (bitcoin), so there isn’t a market incentive to accept it,” said exhibitor Garrett Glass, a customer support specialist at Blockstream, a blockchain technology provider. “ He further noted there are tax consequences to spending crypto.
“The network and support system needs to evolve a little more,” said exhibitor Scot Johnson, president and CEO of Digital Shovel, a bitcoin mining company that introduced a desktop mining solution at the show. “You can’t buy a coffee with something that takes 20 minutes to transact.”
Anonymity
Crypto’s user anonymity also presents a challenge for retailers who want to collect customer data, said Rob Chilcoat, president and co-owner of Unattended Card Payments Inc., in a recent KioskIndustry.org phone interview.
“A lot of credit card and point-of-sales systems have a huge amount of data-driven AI tools behind them,” Chilcoat said. “They (retailers) have all sorts of AI tools now that apply customer profiles to, like, ‘Rob likes Bud Light and he comes at this time of the day,’ and they’re able to understand all of that based on my purchase habits and my credit card history, whereas with bitcoin they’re not able to make those assumptions about their customers to tailor their products at certain times to maximize their profit. Implementing a loyalty program is always an option for merchants who want to accept Bitcoin and or alternative payment methods while still being able to collect valuable data regarding their customer’s purchasing habits.”
“For anything in self-service to be successful, it must be intuitive and easy to use, and accept all forms of payment.”
Exhibitor Jahmarley Henry, vice president of business development for Toeshee, a provider of blockchain services, said more customer education is needed for retail adoption to reach its potential. He thinks the industry could be doing more in this area.
“It takes some education and some time to take over from fiat currency,” Henry said. “I think it will happen.”
Comments
From Kevin Medina, “At Mojave Technologies, we aim to stay on track and ahead of evolving trends in the payments space. We see the rise of BNPL, SoftPOS, and other rapidly advancing payment method innovations gaining traction. It’s clear that embedded and unattended systems must support more than just credit and cash; they should accommodate a wide range of tender types for the consumer’s benefit.”
Resources
- https://bitcoinmagazine.com/news/steak-n-shake-reveals-bitcoin-payment-success-at-bitcoin-2025-conference
- https://reformingretail.com/index.php/2024/04/30/why-everyone-in-payments-needs-to-pay-attention-to-pix/
- https://www.hdfcbank.com/personal/resources/learning-centre/pay/is-there-any-upi-transaction-charges
- Why Everyone in Payments Needs to Pay Attention to PIX – Reforming Retail