[Discussion] Grape's NFT Dex - (How) should we monetize it?

[CryptoPawz]

Hopefully, many of you already found the time to test the amazing new features our ever-expanding dashboard provides: making and accepting offers on NFTs; on-chain and non-custodial!

If you didn’t know, you can read about it here or check it out on any NFT preview page, e.g. here. And while you’re at it, give feedback on #grape-marketplace. Any constructive and structured feedback directly shows our devs your appreciation

As a short recap, there are 2 key features that are at the core of our NFT marketplace: Non-Custodial Listings and Community Owned Instances.

Non-Custodial using Stateless offers

• Never give up ownership of your NFT — unlike the marketplaces of today that require you to hand over custody, Grape NFT DEX never takes ownership of your NFT.
• Be in every snapshot — never again will you miss out on an airdrop because it’s listed. Noncustodial sales mean you never have to list your NFT to receive offers on it!
• Keep every DAO role — because your NFT never has to leave your wallet, you always keep the roles in Discord that you have earned for holding that NFT
• Always open to offers — never think about listing ever again. All of your NFTs are always open to receiving offers and you’ll never miss out on a great trade.

Community Owned

• Listings for all — centralized marketplaces become gatekeepers to what can and cannot be listed. On the Grape DEX, every NFT can be listed.
• Exchange fees for community treasury — each community is able to receive revenue directly to their treasury with Grape NFT DEXx.

Right now, while in the testing phase, the DEX functionality can be used for free and I’d like to discuss how we should proceed from here. To be more precise, I’d like to discuss ideas on what the terms and specifications of using the DEX could look like?

The most interesting questions revolve around fees or fee structures.
We could, e.g.,

• introduce marketplace fees,
  – for markers/takers as a percentage of the set price, paid in $SOL, or
  – for markers/takers as a percentage of the set price, paid in $GRAPE, and
  – that depend on the Membership Level.
  – create a Grape NFT that is a) needed for trading or b) reduces fees.
• not introduce marketplace fees, but
  – make holding a certain amount of $GRAPE a requirement for trading, or
  – create a Grape NFT that is required for trading, or
  – limit the simultaneous offers unless you hold $GRAPE or a Grape NFT, or
  – make a Grape Membership a requirement for either selling and or buying…

There are a lot of options here and I obviously brushed over just a few ideas but you instantly see that every possibility has its pros and cons. Now, I’m curious about what you think we should do.

While asking myself this same question I tried to keep in mind that one of our goals at Grape is to strengthen the Solana community and ecosystem, so every decision we’re making should be in line with that and we should remember not to be too restrictive for people who aren’t (yet) as involved in Grape as we are.

I’m still not sure what my preferred solution looks like.
With that said, happy brainstorming!

[DeanMachine]

I think fees are the way to go, and each community sets up their own fee structure for their community. We would provide a minimum fee that needs to be set and they would choose how much to increase it

[its.kirk]

I am more for keeping the transactions in SOL (at least for the launch and near term iterations) - this does not mean that we cannot support tokens, and we do have the majority of the work done for supporting tokens too, I think though it would add additional complexities in the setup process

[TheRipTyde]

I think it makes a lot of sense to initially keep things denominated in SOL it would be what most in the solana space are comfortable with.

One question i had, if our market fee is part Grape market place transaction fee and part a fee decided by the community that lists the collection, will we see those broken out? X% Grape Transaction Fee, Y% Community Fee, and I assume standard Artist Royalty is also on top of that?

I’d expect if we’re to be competitive in the marketplace space it might be difficult to have combined Grape market place and Comminity fee’s above 2% (what ME & Apha.art charge), or 3% at a stretch (what Solanart & Solsea charge).

If each comminity has the ability to set their fee structure maybe we say grape market place has a minimum and maximum fee with 50% going to grape and 50% going the community collection? Or will we be letting comminties having much more free reign on deciding fees?

“This does not mean that we cannot support tokens, and we do have the majority of the work done for supporting tokens too”

With project specific tokens as that’s a more niche offering I’d suggest we could put a greater grape market place fee on those if we so chose. Is the thought with tokens that it’s an either or situation? (Either SOL or a specific community token) or would multi-demoniated listings be possible?

Would love to see reduced fee’s for Grape Membership levels, or a Grape NFT providing a similar function. I’d imagine from a buisness case a Grape NFT could be a better earner, and from a community sense the membership level fee reduction route might bw better? I’m sure that’s debatable

[GLOBO]

this is my fav quote " * Never give up ownership of your NFT — unlike the marketplaces of today that require you to hand over custody, Grape NFT DEX never takes ownership of your NFT."
from my side even though everyone feels comfortable using SOL, I think the fees should be in Grape, this will give more utility for the token and increase circulation.
Ultimately they will be using the Grape NFT Dex because they want to keep control over their NFTs.
OFC thats my Opinion ! congrats to the team and everyone working on this.

[TheRipTyde]

I agree with the principal of an added use case/utility for Grape

But Would having fees in Grape be a barrier for non-grape users and a faff that would put people off?
Could this be a user setting? User decides SOL fees or Grape fees, and could we incentivise transacting in Grape with slightly lower fees?

@GLOBO

congrats to the team and everyone working on this.

Well done to everyone

[Durden]

@TheRipTyde

But Would having fees in $Grape be a barrier for non-grape users and a faff that would put people off?

A significant barrier. We shouldn’t make them buy GRAPE; just buy it ourselves with whatever fees we get.

[rustandmoth]

I completely agree. Imagine if ME required buyers to use their own coin for fees. No one would like it and they’d miss a lot of sales. IMO the success of the market is priority; it should be as easy to use as possible, ie with SOL.

[Tariqstp1]

Availability of using both Grape or Sol as a fee should be made… this is a win/win for everyone.

[Tariqstp1]

I also believe that the Game changer of the dex, is to add a staking mechanism… i dont know if we have this planned already. @its.kirk @sultanpeyek.eth @DeanMachine

[Arximedis]

Aligning suggestions to a set of objectives:

1. Adoption - Attract Users and Projects
2. Scale - Grow Usage / Manage Cost / Optimize Performance
3. Innovate - Features / Updates
4. Compliance - Mitigate Risks / Scams / Fraud

My 2 Grapes on how this could be approached to simplify and incorporate the ideas outlined in 3 Tiers:

A.) Standard Default fees

Default fees for markers/takers as a percentage or fixed amount of the set price, paid in $SOL or $USDC (it wouldn’t be a terrible idea for $GRAPE to be included as a means of paying for fees, or even enabling the option to pay/purchase using GRAPE)

Fees are needed to make it cost prohibitive for spam / scams while enabling adoption. I propose enabling all 3 Currencies, but fees paid in SOL

Default Fee Percentage 2% capped at a Min Fixed fee of least 0.00005 SOL, whichever is greater between % or fixed. Min Fixed Fee is universal and accounts for a min listing sold at 0.001 SOL, (subject to change depending on market value of SOL). I consider a general fixed fee is also very intriguing but less dynamic to real-time supply/demand or price fluctuations

This would be the initial state we launch under to promote objectives 1 & 2. Tackling 3 & 4 is a bit more challenging, but cost seems to be necessary.

Default Features:

• Buy & Sell
• Listing Discovery
• Basic Dashboard Features
• Default Integrations sync & Reporting

B.) Premium Benefits subscribers

Yes - For $GRAPE Token or NFT holders make a time-based requirement that user must hold for at least 1 day before activating benefits to avoid snipping or gaming the system. Holder validation checks would need to ensure a user is still a holder each time a transaction is processed or staking with locking may be another way to guarantee integrity with minimal strain, whether tokens or NFT.

Assuming a user meets the criteria, I propose reducing fees to 1.5% and maintaining the minimum fixed cost of 0.00005 SOL for $GRAPE Holders of X amount or above and/or Future iterations of Governance, Staked, NFT, or any other future single or combined mechanisms.

Benefits could include:

• Reduced Fees
• Exclusive Dashboard Features or Events
• Advanced Reporting or Functionality Capabilities for communities on whichever platform Grape is integrated and supporting
• Eligibility for Whitelist, Lottery Giveaways and Rare NFTs or Gaming Promos

3. OG Members: OG = Original Grape

For Grape members part of Discord or participating in Governance: Gibbons, Great Apes, Gorillas, that hold $GRAPE and/or Grape NFT, further discount applied to fees bringing the fees to 1%, 0.7% or Complimentary (min fixed fee only) respectively, maintaining a Min fixed fee of 0.00005 SOL.

Adding to this for Partners: Any Grape member holding at least 1 Grape Access Partner NFT, gets a further 0.2% reduction, making fees 0.8%, 0.5% and Free, respectively, maintaining a Min fixed fee of 0.00005 SOL.

Benefits could include:

• Lower Fees (or GFF - Gorillas Free Forever)
• Added Grape Access Membership + Grape Community fee decrease
• Exclusive Dashboard Features or Events
• Advanced Reporting or Functionality Capabilities for communities on whichever platform Grape is integrated and supporting
• Eligibility for Whitelist, Lottery Giveaways and Rare NFTs or Gaming Promos

[TheRipTyde]

I agree with everything you’ve laid out there it sounds class.

I’ll shoot myself in the foot here with what may be a contentions view point, but I’d suggest Gorillas/Partners shouldn’t have % fees completely wiped, or rather that I’d like to see a higher threshold or combined membership - nft approach to achieve those free % fees, so as not to undervalue the service.

I’d look to the examples set by Solanart and Alpha.art

Badger FP currently 2.25 SOL, and would require 45 SOL worth of Badgers to reach 0% Fees

Piggy FP currently 2.2 SOL, spending 20 SOL would = 9 Piggies for staking for 90% fee reduction

[Arximedis]

TIER	FEES	$GRAPE	gNFT*	gapNFT
Marketplace	2%	0	0	0
Premium	1.5%	100	1	0
Class - C	1%	1,130	1	0
Class - B	0.7%	5,635	1	0
Class - A	0.00005	22,555	1	0
Partner - C	0.8%	1,130	1	1
Partner - B	0.5%	5,635	1	1
Partner - A	0.00005	22,555	1	1
* Optional	min 0.00005 SOL	Min Grape 100

gNFT = Grape NFT

gapNFT = Grape Access Partner NFT

[Arximedis]

I find the other models very intriguing and love these examples!

Digital Eyes: typical service fee is 2.50% on all sales – we currently have an ongoing promotion where service fees are now 0.99% until 28th Feb 2022. We do not charge fees for listing/delisting, however, typical Solana gas fees will apply.

Magic Eden: Magic Eden takes 2% on all transactions. Magic Eden honors the royalties set by creators. 0% for listing or cancelling. To increase the probability of matching offers, we currently set the minimum offer price as 50% of the listing price.

Solanart: A 3% marketplace fee is taken on the selling price of every transaction.
A creator’s fee, which is chosen by the creators and therefore varies depending on the collection, is also taken on the selling price and fully perceived by the creators.
Make sure you have enough SOL to cover transaction fee before listing your NFT for sale.

AlphaArt: Alpha art doesn’t charge any listing/unlisting/offer fees. We have 2% flat seller fee which is taken at the time of the sale.

Solsea: There is a 3% marketplace fee which occurs on every successful NFT sale. Artists can also decide their own creator’s fee (royalties). There are NO other marketplace fees, only Solana network fees for other transactions (minting, listing, delisting, creating collections).

Opensea: OpenSea’s model is simple - we take 2.5% of every transaction that happens on OpenSea. That’s it. Users and partners can create NFTs for free at any time. You can set a creator earnings amount of up to 10% . This means you can earn revenue every time your NFT sells on OpenSea. To learn how to set your creator earnings, click here.

ExchangeArt: 2.5%

[Arximedis]

Awesome examples @TheRipTyde !

[TheRipTyde]

ExchangeArt

[DeanMachine]

Id hope that we are cheaper than 2.5%, but at the same time understand that this is a decision for each community to make

Our base would be maybe 0.5%?

[CryptoPawz]

Love it when you’re in top form and at it! Saves so much time for me
I thought about it along the same lines, you went a bit further though so I won’t repeat everything and only add what I think could be incorporated/added.

1. I’m not sure that a 1-day holding period is the best approach since many people in this space hate waiting. At the same time, they also hate overpaying. Plus this one day doesn’t solve the problem of them dumping their $GRAPE after the transaction. That’s why I thought about limiting the maximum amount of simultaneous offers someone can make while not meeting specific criteria instead of introducing a waiting period.

2. I’d also opt for using x% of the fees for automatic $GRAPE-buybacks on the open market like Durden mentioned. We need to start doing something for the token itself and people need to see us doing it.

3. I’d actually start with 1.5%. Grape Membership would then remove the limit. It’s basically what you wrote in your table except for ‘Premium’. My reasoning behind it is increasing membership benefits. Like so:

|TIER|FEES|comment
| — | — | — | — | — |
|Marketplace|1.5% |3 simultaneous offers|0|0|
|Class - C|1% |no limit in simultaneous offers|1|0|
|Class - B|0.7%|—|1|0|
|Class - A|0.00005|—|1|0|
|Partner - C|0.8%|1,130|1|1|
|Partner - B|0.5%|5,635|1|1|
|Partner - A|0.00005|22,555|1|1|

[adamdelsol]

I think there are lot of great strategies collected in this thread. Before any decisions are made, I would recommend that some user interviews are done. Ideally this would be with people that are not grape holders but are active NFT exchange customers.

Perhaps some could be sourced from partner NFT project communities. User interviews are more of an art than a science, but the key is to go into them with as little bias as possible so the user’s opinion is expressed in the research.

[BloodBath1]

That is a terrible example tbh
Agree on Sol and buy Grape with fees ourselves