Shantel
ValuesCo (www.values.co), a Web3 startup powering community-driven rewards ecosystems for good, has closed a $2.7 Million seed round. With the climate crisis, rising inequity, and hyperpolarization, 83% of Millennials & Gen Zs desire brands to align with their values (5WPR’s 2020 Consumer Culture Report). ValuesCo is enabling a collaborative future for brands, creators and nonprofits to co-create social & environmental impact with their audiences. The platform transforms marketing and community engagement into participatory experiences driving quantifiable impact.
“I started ValuesCo to empower young people to feel more agency and understand that grassroots solutions to the world’s biggest challenges are possible,” says Co-founder & CEO Andrew Berkowitz.
ValuesCo (formerly Socialstack) has been used by watersports brand Starboard to incentivize cleanup of 770,000 pounds of ocean plastic, AfrofutureDAO to drive $1.1 Million to African history preservation, Christie’s to launch a social token experience, and the first two nonprofits to launch rewards tokens – Gen Z-founded OneUpAction debuted at Billie Eilish‘s 2022 tour.
The startup has begun working with global advertising holding companies Publicis Groupe and dentsu on client concepts and projects. 43 of the top 100 brands (Interbrand Best Global Brands 2022) have entered Web3 – including Nike & Reddit – with loyalty being the most common use case. Learning about this technology by harnessing it to build connection and community has become standard. However, brand purpose hasn’t been a core component, though acting on and communicating purpose has soared over recent years.
Investors in the round include leading Web3 funds including Flori Ventures, Metaweb Ventures, OWN Fund, and angels such as Celo President Rene Reinsberg and entrepreneur Richard Spanton Jr. ValuesCo has brought on key strategic advisors such as actor & UN Goodwill Ambassador Adrian Grenier, Gen Z activist & Muhammad Ali Foundation Humanitarian of the Year ’21 Chelsea Miller, ex-Lyft head of global policy & social impact Mike Masserman, and philosopher & author of Sacred Economics Charles Eisenstein.
“I am honored to join ValuesCo as an advisor – building blockchain tools that are easy to use and align monetary value exchange with real human value, are the foundation to an inclusive Web3,” says Adrian Grenier. “The team’s mission is fully aligned with my personal values.”
ValuesCo focuses on several gaps in Web3: education, consumer adoption of Web3 wallets, hands-on support required to launch a social token, and real-world impact. New paradigms of communities will emerge this decade through Web3’s enabling technology, and ValuesCo is committed to steering brands, nonprofits, and creators to build with purpose.
Values disrupts rewards & loyalty and the experience economy with purpose-driven communities and activations. Missions enable brands to enter Web3 without directly interfacing with blockchain.
The Values App enables rewards ecosystems for communities – and time-bound activations launched by brands. Values empowers communities to design & launch a social token with no code or blockchain knowledge. Community members create wallets instantaneously with phone/email login and earn tokens by completing actions and submitting proof via photo/social media, scanning QR codes, and more. Tokens are redeemed for rewards like products, experiences, and digital collectibles.
Starboard’s customers have participated in beach cleanups and verified goods purchased to earn branded tokens that can be redeemed for trees planted, discounts, and merchandise.
Today, the company unveils its new product Missions to drive shared purpose activations where brands and consumers embark on journeys together. Missions call on brands to champion impact goals that are reached through community action. “Corporations have largely not built in-roads to incentivize their communities to contribute to ESG performance,” says Justin Markell, ValuesCo Chief Strategy Officer “It’s time for a shift where consumers help fulfill on shared purpose with their actions and produce exponential change.”
With Missions, brands fund a reward pool and invite collaborators, including nonprofits & creators on ValuesCo, while unlocking the storytelling potential of the metaverse. The climate positive app is built on Ethereum, Polygon and Celo.
Over the past year, ValuesCo has cemented itself as a leader in the Web3 community space, empowering its communities to receive $2 Million in grant funding from blockchains including its own $350,000 grant fund, backed by Celo and its Climate Collective. It launched tokens for BridgingTheGap Ventures, which calls World Health Organization & Pitbull collaborators, and renowned DJ/activist BLOND:ISH‘s Bye Bye Plastic foundation. AfrofutureDAO, the first community on ValuesCo, is announcing a $1.65M grant from The HBAR Foundation, and the launch of its app for museums and cultural institutions. The DAO is a collective of African creators monetizing and digitizing art and historical archives to uplift the continent.
The name reflects the organization’s belief that society must realign economic value with values to create a just, regenerative future. “Value” in Latin is to be worth, or importance of something. “Co” is together. “Web3 enables new means of exchange, but we’re after something deeper – to help communities create value together,” Berkowitz explains. “By providing tools that align value with values through action, we see Web3 as a way to drive thousands of experiments that incentivize positive behavior through new forms of rewards and shared ownership.”
About ValuesCoÂ
ValuesCo is a climate-positive Web3 technology and experience company that powers rewards ecosystems for good. Brands, nonprofits and creators use our tools to inspire action that aligns value with values for the next gen. Founded & led by Millennials & Gen Zs, we believe a thriving world is realized through radical collaboration, access, and fun. ValuesCo is a 1% for the Planet member.
https://values.co/
About Publicis Groupe
Founded in 1926 and headquartered in Paris, Publics is the 3rd largest communications group in the world. Through a powerful alchemy of creativity and technology, we are driving business transformation across the entire value chain. Clients include Walmart, Verizon, Disney, and Visa.
https://www.publicisgroupe.com/
About dentsuÂ
Dentsu is the network designed for what’s next, helping clients predict and plan for disruptive future opportunities in the sustainable economy. Taking a people-centered approach to business transformation, dentsu combines Japanese innovation with a diverse, global perspective to drive client growth and to shape society.
https://www.dentsu.com/
About CeloÂ
Celo is a carbon negative blockchain. It began with the intention of becoming the first carbon neutral platform by contributing offsets through the network protocol, making the resources powering it carbon-negative from the get-go. To date, Celo has offset over 2,285 tons of carbon through its work with Project Wren. It’s equal to the CO2 absorbed by 320,000 pine trees for a year. It’s enough to make Celo 8 times carbon negative based on Wren’s estimates.
https://celo.org/
