On Tuesday, Landry’s Restaurant Group announced a partnership with cryptocurrency firm NYDIG that will allow visitors to earn $25 worth of bitcoins for every $250 spent at the hotel conglomerate’s restaurants.
Landry will also begin to hold a portion of the company’s financial reserves in Bitcoin under NYDIG custody. The company is best known for dozens of franchise divisions including Morton’s, Bubba Gump Shrimp Company, Rainforest Cafe, and Palm. Landry’s is owned by television billionaire Tillman Fertite, who is also the company’s CEO.
Landry’s director of digital asset strategy, Trey Zelaff, said in a statement:
“We see Bitcoin as a good option for a portion of our vaults, so we want to offer that option to our customers as well. We are proud to be at the forefront of this hospitality industry vision in partnership with NYDIG.”
Landry’s first showed signs of interest in the crypto space earlier this year when they began accepting Bitcoin payments at several of their restaurants in April. At the time, the company’s CEO said, “It’s amazing how easy [cryptocurrency] is to transact, and it is here to stay. That is where it is, and it is inevitable.”
CEO Fertita’s interest in cryptocurrency appears to have extended to other aspects of his career, with his NBA franchise making headlines in the industry in recent months. In June 2021, Tillman also announced that he would begin block validation for the Akash network, stating that it was time to “initiate mining or block validation research as the next logical step in our digital asset strategy.”
NYDIG has also become an active player in the blockchain space, raising hundreds of millions of dollars in 2021 to create Bitcoin-centric solutions for insurance, banking, and clean energy. Cointelegraph also revealed earlier this month that the company had acquired Bitcoin micropayment firm ButylPay in hopes of “unlocking the financial infrastructure of the future.”
