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[narrator] Join us on Tomorrow's World Today,

as we journey through the worlds

of inspiration, creation, innovation and production

to find the ideas and technologies

that are shaping our future.

In this episode, we visit the world of innovation

to explore how digitized cash-back programs

are helping shoppers save with every trip to the grocery store.

From Inventionland world headquarters,

here's your host, George Davison.

Well, there are two goals for any innovator.

First, can they invent a new product

that benefits our everyday lives?

I mean, think about it.

Where would we be without the telephone,

or the automobile,

or the internet for that matter?

A second goal of innovators

is to improve an existing product.

And we've seen huge improvements in...

the automobile industry,

since the first cars came out.

The same with the phone, and the internet.

Well, just recently, we've also seen huge changes

in the world of couponing.

Now, coupons have been around quite a while.

In fact, in 1887, the first coupon was invented,

and it was for...

a free glass of Coca-Cola.

Since then, coupons have existed

to save customers money and improve brand loyalty.

But they're also a little cumbersome to carry around.

And it's very time consuming

to clip them and keep them organized.

With everyday consumers relying on technology more and more,

it's no wonder that they're looking for an easier way to save

than to have to leaf through the Sunday paper.

I'm sending Greg over to Ibotta headquarters,

to explore how one app

is innovating the way we save when we shop.

[Greg] It doesn't take a scientist to tell you that people love to save money.

One of the ways a whole lot of people like to do that

is by clipping the coupons that come to you each week

in your Sunday paper.

But did you know, that last year

almost 14 million trees were used

to make those coupons,

and 99% of them went unused.

They were either recycled, or worse yet, thrown away.

Well, as we become a more sustainability focused society

that waste of paper has become a real concern for consumers.

But does the end of paper coupons mean

the end of saving money at the grocery store?

Not quite.

I'm here in downtown Denver, Colorado,

across from the offices of Ibotta.

We're here to learn, first hand,

how they're gonna take you from

taking a bundle of coupons to the grocery store,

to taking this.

Let's head inside now, and talk to Bryan Leach.

He's the founder and CEO of Ibotta.

Hey, Brian, great to meet you.

Hey, Greg, welcome to Ibotta.

Thanks, you ready to show me the magic behind the curtain?

- [Bryan] Let's do it. - All right.

So, Bryan,

when it comes to innovative products like yours

one of the things that people always want to know about

is the Eureka moment.

What was the bolt of lightning

that sparked you to create Ibotta?

You know, I was sitting on an airplane,

coming back from a conference in Rio,

and I saw a woman take her mobile phone out

and start snapping pictures of her receipt.

And I got to thinking,

wow, if you had all that information about everything you bought,

what else could you do with it?

And that led to the idea of giving people cash back

based on what they buy.

So you have this idea, and, uh, now of course

you have to start thinking about

development and financing and everything.

What was your next step?

First thing was just to say it out loud,

and to get past my shyness about it.

I went out, then, to Silicon Valley,

and met with Larry Sonsini,

who was the lead lawyer for Apple and Facebook.

And I was very coy about this,

but I eventually blurted out my idea

and asked him for advice.

And to my surprise, he suggested that

he'd be interested in helping me, in funding this

as long as I'd be willing to quit my job as a law partner.

And in the moment I said, "Of course I'll quit my job!"

And then afterwards, I had to explain to my wife

that I had just promised to quit my job

as long as we somehow found a way

to raise $3 million together.

What was her response?

My wife said, "Well, don't worry,

the odds of doing that are pretty slim."

So how did you manage to put that money together?

Well, I ended up finding angel investors,

friends and family, who were interested in putting in

small checks, $20,000, $30,000

and after 50 of them did that, we came up with the $3 million.

That's excellent, so now you've got the money.

And you've gotta start working on development now,

you don't have a product yet.

Just me and the money,

and sitting in the front of my house,

with no office and no team.

Had to go out and recruit a team,

people that knew how to build a mobile app.

We began to figure out what consumers actually wanted.

What was the best way for you to do that?

We tried a lot of things, but my favorite technique

was putting, uh, a table out in front of the ballpark in downtown Denver,

and as passersby, uh, came by we just

gave them a bottle of water in exchange for

their honest thoughts on whether they would use this free mobile app.

So it's really a consumer-developed product?

It is. You know, there's,

there's no substitute for just asking people,

and iterating and trial and error.

And eventually you get something

that tens of millions of people want to use.

That's excellent.

So now, you've got this thing put together,

but it's not gonna work if you don't get, uh, the big brands

or the big stores on board. How'd you manage that?

We were unheard of technology,

so we had to find that entrepreneurial person

within Coca-Cola, within Unilever, within Kraft,

who was willing to take a flyer

with a test budget, a pilot,

and then prove it out with a case-study over time.

And that is what Erik and his team did so very well.

Well, I'd like to find out more about that.

- So can we go meet Erik? - Sounds great, let's do it.

Greg, this is Erik.

He helped build our relationships

with some of the biggest brands in the world.

That sounds amazing. It's great to meet you, Erik.

Likewise, nice to meet you.

Bryan, thanks a lot.

So, Erik,

you did some really important work with this company,

helped take it from proof of concept

all the way through to getting

some of the biggest brands in the world involved.

How did you do that?

It was a challenge. Especially in the early days.

Uh, we have a two-sided market,

which makes it even more challenging.

Meaning, we have CPG manufacturers

that aren't gonna want to advertise their products

on a platform that doesn't reach a broad audience.

And then you have consumers that are never going to download an app

if they don't have the ability to earn cash back from those CPG manufacturers.

Right, that makes it even more important

to get a, a big brand like, say, Coca-Cola,

which I know was one of your, one of your biggest involved

because it not only shows other brands that the platform is viable,

it shows consumers that,

"Wow, I can save on products that I know."

Absolutely, yes, we needed to get the big manufacturers on board.

And I think we made some smart decisions

as it comes to the go-to-market strategy.

So, specifically, we price the product

on a pay-per-sale pricing, which was a novel idea at the time.

And it allowed these CPG manufacturers

to run their offers on Ibotta, risk-free.

They only pay if they actually physically move a unit

through the Ibotta platform.

And that's gotta be really important

for brands that have used coupons for decades,

maybe even a hundred years.

And you know that they paid to print out thousands of coupons,

They all go out, and only a few of them get used.

With your product, though, they don't pay unless it actually works.

Absolutely, and then we would also add on

some additional value for the CPG brands.

So things like robust data and analytics reporting.

We also allow them to put

media engagements behind their offer.

So, a coupon is just a discount.

We actually allow them to put videos, facts, recipes

behind those offers to educate consumers about their products.

Great, well, I think at this point

the only thing left for me to do is learn how the app works,

and maybe even do a little shopping.

Absolutely, let me introduce you to Luke.

Sounds great.

So, Greg, I'm excited to introduce you to Luke Swanson.

He's Ibotta's chief technology officer.

And while we talked about how we built our relationships with the CPG brands,

none of it is possible without Luke and his team building the actual app.

So I'm excited to have him walk you through

how it all works,

and I'll let you two take it from here.

- Sounds great, thanks Erik. - Thanks.

Luke, great to meet you.

Great to meet you as well, Greg.

So I am fascinated to see how the app actually works.

But before we get into that,

I want to talk a little about the history.

You were here from the very beginning.

I was. I joined the company right after our CEO, Bryan,

raised the initial seed-round of funding.

And, uh, he a presentation and a great idea,

but didn't have experience with building a product or technology,

and so I came on board to help with that.

All right, so you had to put some folks together,

because, I guess, parts of this technology existed,

but not the way you wanted to use them.

Exactly, so we set out to make an app

that would work at any retailer for grocery shopping.

And to be able to do that, uh,

we couldn't partner with, uh, grocery stores at the time

because we were just a small start-up.

And so the only way to make that happen was with receipts.

Which I have a couple of here,

- let me show you what we've got. - [Greg] Okay.

Um, the challenge with receipts is that

a receipt is different at every retailer,

and, uh, you can see that the items on the receipt,

aren't necessarily descriptive of what product was purchased.

And so there was a lot of work,

both in digitizing the receipts

so that a user could take a picture of the receipt

and we can understand the text that was on there,

but also then, once we had that text,

mapping that to a product.

Right, and, and as you said,

every retailer has a different format for their receipts,

- different shorthand for their products. - Correct.

So how does the, how does the, the app translate that?

Well what we did is we got receipts

from our users, we essentially crowdsourced that

from all across the country.

And we had to understand...

was the receipt of the same at a given retailer

across the country, was it different?

And then, what did it look like

across all of those different retailers?

Once we had that,

we were essentially able to create a product database

that mapped the items on this Publix's receipt,

for instance, to a given unique product.

So that we could understand if the saver

is getting credit for what they're purchasing.

And that's sort of the part of the technology

that you guys invented.

Because, being able to translate that

over that many different formats didn't exist.

Exactly. Elements of the optical character recognition technology

were out there, but they were really optimized

for, uh, documents, like legal documents.

They weren't optimized for the format of receipts.

And so we had to do a lot of customization

to that technology,

in order to be able to make it work.

[Greg] As consumers become more focused on sustainability,

paper coupons are becoming less and less desirable.

But can you still get the savings from your Sunday paper

without having to cut down trees?

I'm meeting with the people at Ibotta to learn how

their fully digital cash back system works,

and benefits everyone.

From brands, to grocery stores, to consumers.

- So, let me open up the app here. - Okay.

[Luke] When you come into

the app you're going to see I'm gonna go into what we call the Publix gallery.

Which is the area of the app

that contains all of the offers.

I would come in here and I would add offers

for my shopping trip.

For instance, on here I see Prego sauce.

- [Luke] You can see that I've added that to my list. - [Greg] Mmm-hmm.

Also, I have 18 things in my shopping list right here.

So I can easily find them when I go into the store.

And I can barcode scan their product UPC's

to ensure that those products match the offers.

- [Greg] Okay. - [Luke] You'll purchase the products.

And then once you have your receipt you come into the app,

and tap this Upload Receipt button, at the top.

And essentially, you're taken into a special camera view

on your phone.

[Greg] Mmm-hmm. And when it goes green, you snap the picture...

[Luke] Goes green, you snap the picture.

You submit that.

And we detect all of the items on that receipt.

And, in real time, it says

that you have seven offers,

uh, that you're going to earn cash back on this trip.

And that money goes right back into your account.

Goes right back into your account

within a few minutes of submitting the picture.

That's amazing. Now, I'm looking at this Walmart receipt,

and it's clearly very different

than the Publix receipt.

It's obviously a lot smaller.

Uh, also, the items are coded differently.

Then, it's got this long barcode at the bottom.

[Luke] Yes. Yeah, so,

for each trip to Walmart,

uh, for each store, and unique items purchased,

it creates a identifier.

And that's encoded in this barcode at the bottom of the receipt.

And the really cool thing is, is that we've integrated with Walmart.

So that all you have to do when you go into Walmart,

is scan that barcode on the bottom of the receipt.

So let me show you how that works.

You tap Walmart.

And this is going to be an in store trip.

So I'm going to tap In Store.

And then, all I have to do is scan receipt barcode.

And then I'm gonna hover over that barcode.

It's going to see, say that it was accepted.

And then you can see that we got three offers for $5.55.

So every shopping trip to Walmart

- has a unique barcode? - Yes.

And you didn't even have to press the button to scan it.

Yeah. It's even easier than taking a picture of a receipt.

[Greg] Then how do you finish that up and actually take that--

[Luke] All we have to do is hit collect $5.55.

And there you go.

Sweet. $5.55 will be in your account in the next few minutes.

[Greg] Okay, so now...

Say you're shopping at a store

that has its own loyalty program, does that interfere with how Ibotta works?

It doesn't. We actually partner

right alongside the loyalty programs of retailers.

So, we've integrated with over a hundred different retailers

in the last nine years, and their loyalty accounts.

So as you can see, I've connected

my Weis loyalty card here inside of the app.

All I have to do is hit view card,

and you can see my Preferred Shoppers Club Card come right up.

I can either show this to the cashier at checkout,

or I can use my phone number or loyalty card when I checkout.

And behind the scenes, all the purchase data

is sent directly with no receipts involved at all.

So, you're going to get the benefits of both programs by doing that?

Exactly. You're going to get your loyalty rewards from Weis

and you're also gonna get cash back from Ibotta at the same time.

Now, what if I want to do my shopping online?

Great question.

So, I'm going to go back here

and then I tap on Walmart.

And rather than hitting In Store this time,

I'm going to hit Online, where you can see

we have up to 6% cash back.

So we have, uh, 1% cash back on personal care,

all the way up to 6% cash back in different categories.

The other great thing is that all the same offers

that I unlocked for Walmart in store,

things like grocery products are available online.

So all I have to do is hit Shop Walmart.com.

You go to Walmart's website.

You make your purchases as you normally would. Checkout.

And that same purchase information

that's on the receipt, is sent to Ibotta

in real time, and you get your credit almost immediately.

That's amazing. Well, I'm excited.

I'm excited to actually get into a store

and try some shopping for myself, so I'm

going to go ahead and do that.

Great news! And I've actually got a Weis loyalty card

for you here, right here. You can go check it out.

-Excellent. I'm gonna do it! -Okay.

- Thanks a lot, Luke. - Thanks, Greg.

[Greg] So far, we've learned a lot about

the history and development of Ibotta.

But now it's time to put our money

where our phones are.

I've got my list loaded up,

I've got the app all ready to go.

I'm outside of a Weis market in Allentown, PA.

I'm going to head inside now and do some shopping,

and find out if Bryan, Luke, and Erik are right

and the Ibotta app is as user friendly as they say it is.

Ha! This is great, we are going to need one of these.

And it's got a handy holder here for my phone.

That is awesome.

So, we open up the app.

I go to the Weis gallery.

Look at my shopping list.

It's got 16 items on it.

First one up is Prego sauce.

Let's go see if we can find it.

All right. So, here we are in the pasta sauce aisle.

Looking for Prego. This looks like the item right here.

So, we, uh,

call up the barcode scanner.

And... [scanner beeps] It's a match.

Which is great.

Now, the deal says we have to buy two.

So, two we buy.

There we are. And on to the next.

And as I look at the app here.

My shopping list tells me that

Kraft Deluxe Macaroni and Cheese is the next item.

So why don't we take a look in the next aisle

and see if we can find that?

Okay. Kraft Deluxe Macaroni and Cheese.

Got some Kraft Macaroni and Cheese here,

but that's not the item that we are looking for.

Let's see what we... Ah, here we go.

Okay. We've got Deluxe Macaroni and Cheese,

but a lot of different varieties.

Let's try this one. See if this, uh,

matches our deal.

Get our scanner going.

And... [scanner beeps] There we go, it's a match.

Now, I look at my list. It also says we need

Bumblebee Chunk Light Tuna.

And I see some canned seafood here, so let's see if we can find it.

And here we go. Bumblebee Chunk Light Tuna.

And... Call up our scanner.

[scanner beeps] And there we go. It's a match.

It's fun. It makes shopping like a treasure hunt. It's cool.

[Greg] For every offer I purchased,

I can expect to see cash back in my Ibotta account,

within 48 hours.

Now that I have everything, all that's left to do is checkout.

My Weis Preferred Shopper Club Card was accepted.

So I got some instant savings there.

And within 48 hours, I'll get cash back

in my account, from Ibotta.

Sounds like a pretty perfect system to me.

Time for me to get out of here.

Greg, I'm glad I caught you.

- Hey, Ron! - How are you?

Ibotta told me you would be here today.

Yeah, and I had a really good time.

It turned shopping into more of a, uh, treasure hunt.

It was really fun today.

- That's great, let me show you what they are doing today. - Okay.

[Ron] We're actually building a display for the Ibotta products

to make it very simple for the customer.

So, we have all these items.

Plus, you can go to their app and see

all the extra items they have on file.

That's excellent. And now I know there's a lot more

on the Ibotta app than there are in this display. There's hundreds of things.

There's hundreds of items for Ibotta, and we make it

very easy. It's electronic.

Plus, when you take our loyalty shopper card,

on top of that, you get all of our discounts,

and coupons and offers and rewards.

And then, you can compound it with all of the cash back

that you get with Ibotta.

And it's super convenient too.

You don't even have to scan a receipt. It all just happens automatically.

It all happens automatically.

You just have to scan and go.

Excellent. Well, I'm going to head back to Inventionland.

-Ron, it was great to see you. -Good to see you, Greg. Take care.

- Hi, George. - Hey, Chris.

Welcome to Inventionland.

- Thanks so much for having me. - You bet.

Well, I'm glad you're here now because I'm working

on these new, innovative hard goods.

And I was curious. Is there anything that Ibotta can do to help us?

We do! And your timing is perfect.

We've just decided that we're going to move beyond

the world of grocery rewards,

to allow people to get cash back on hard goods,

and general merchandise.

Which we're all buying on a regular basis as well.

So brands like this can get the same power

that our CBG brands have, historically.

[George] That's beautiful.

Wow. So like, like at, Father's Day,

that might pop up?

Exactly right. Or let's say for example,

we know that you're buying salad,

this would be a great opportunity for us

to give somebody a tool that's gonna make their salad fresher.

- Nice. All right, that's a big innovation. - Yeah.

Any more?

Yeah. So, we're always trying to make it easier to find those rewards.

And we really want to meet people where they are.

So, let's say for example, you're looking at a recipe site.

A particular brand of flour

wants you to try their flour.

They're going to serve you up an offer say,

"$2 when you try this product for the first time."

We can also make it easier to add that item to the basket.

Oh, my gosh. My youngest daughter loves to bake.

She's going to love that. Mom and dad will love it too.

'Cause we're going to save some money.

Okay, so that's two big innovations. Do you have a third?

Yeah. Let's say you're at the grocery store.

We want to be able to use augmented reality

to help you find the specific items that are on your list,

and also figure out which items are on promotion.

So that you can maximize the value you're getting from the grocery store.

Well, that's a third big innovation.

But you guys are so busy. You know, I don't want to hold you here, Chris.

That sounds great.

But, before I go, I've got a gift for you.

This is a Giant Eagle Advantage Card.

It's the gift of time.

So instead of having to upload a receipt,

simply link this card once.

Every time you use the platform, we'll go out

and find rewards for you.

Saving you time and money when you go to the grocery store.

That's great!

Thanks a lot for having me. I've got to get back, but I really appreciate being here.

- Safe travels. - Thanks a lot.

- I'm loading it right now. - Bye-bye.