Is the Polygon Blockchain Cost Effective for NFTs?

We are in the process of determining the most sustainable blockchain, which aligns with our mission and vision. Our goal is to make e-commerce more sustainable in the long run. For example by using blockchain technology. I am happy to share that we have recently completed a successful proof-of-concept (POC) for NFTs (non fungible tokens) using the Polygon blockchain. In this post, I will shed light on the following topics:

• What made us select Polygon blockchain as a first choice?
• What are the characteristics of the POC?
• Validating Polygon cost-effectiveness with a business case
• View NFTs via Opensea marketplace
• View NFTs via Polygon smart contract

What made us select Polygon blockchain as a first choice?

• Polygon is a secondary scaling solution for Ethereum and so it is secure and stable.
• It can handle up to 65K transactions per second.
• The average gas fee on Polygon is only $0.002.
• Most importantly, Polygon is eco-friendly as it is proof-of-stake not proof-of-work.

What are the characteristics of the POC?

• Minting 100 NFTs for 100 historic Icecat products.
• Attach a QR code as art to each NFT. The QR code contains a product datasheet permalink.
• Attach additional metadata: IcecatID, Brand, ProductCode, Category & TimeStamp.
• List the 100 NFTs in the Opensea marketplace.

Validating cost effectiveness of Polygon with a business case

In case we would like to mint NFTs in real-time for every new product in the Icecat database, the per NFT minting cost is on average $0.002. It is evidenced by the below chart that with increasing new products per year, the Polygon becomes less and less cost effective. In conclusion, this might be problematic given our aim to bring the minting costs close to zero. 

Year	New products in icecat database
2017	1,088,487
2018	3,243,068
2019	3,270,094
2020	6,292,030
2021	5,955,487

View NFTs via the Opensea marketplace

Here are the easy steps to check our 100 NFTs:

1. Search ‘ICURY’ shows the collection of 100 NFTs.

2. NFT with Token ID 33 shows: QR code, Permalink, and Properties

3. A QR code scan shows the Icecat permalink and redirects to the Icecat data-sheet:

4. Single click on ‘View on Icury’ opens the live product datasheet:

View NFTs via the Polygon smart contract

Here are the easy steps to check our 100 NFTs via the Polygon smart contract:

1. Single click on ‘Contract Address’ shows polygon scan

2. [Contract -> Read Contract -> tokenURI] shows response for Token ID 33

3. The JSON file shows permalink, QR code image, and additional metadata

To conclude, our investigation for the most sustainable blockchain on parameters of cost and eco-friendliness continues. Because we are not convinced that Polygon is scalable to our business case in which millions of products are published every year.

If you have any questions about NFTs, please let us know.