Say a Restaurant owner wants some printing done and wants to pay for it in meals. The printer looks at his cost and quotes 100,000ksh for the job. As a direct Barter that would be a lot of meals and may take a long time to offset! However, if they were both members of Tradetrove and we acted as 3rd party record keepers of all the transactions, this trade can take place immediately. The printer’s account would be credited with shs100,000 trade credits and the restaurateur’s account would be debited with shs100,000. This means the Restaurateur now owes shs100,000 worth of meals to the network and not to the printer only. So over a period of time brand new customers and community members will come in and reduce the Debit balance, i.e. a solicitor may take his client to dinner and spend shs20,000, a retailer can book a staff function and spend shs50,000, etc. That way the balance owed by the Restaurant keeps reducing. Let’s look at the printer situation. The printer has picked up a brand new client and has been paid shs100,000 trade credits straight away. The printer can now spend his credits whenever & wherever he likes, instead of spending cash, e.g., he might need courier services, legal or maintenance. So if he could use his credits to pay for these cash expenses, he would keep more cash in his business.“A win-win for all”!
