RFID at the rickhouse (bulk-scan thousands of casks per minute, no line of sight). NFC + QR at the finished bottle (cryptographic security paired with universal phone-camera scanning). Blockchain anchored on Polygon — the only platform that closes the loop from distillery fill to consumer scan with the right technology in each place.
The Rickhouse
Stock-takes take a full day. Cask IDs handwritten on chalk. Environmental conditions logged in someone's notebook. A misplaced cask costs thousands. We use UHF RFID here — bulk-scan the whole rack in seconds.
The Bottle
A QR on the bottle is the universal door (everyone scans QR codes). On its own it's just a link a counterfeiter can copy. We pair it with a hidden cryptographic NTAG424 NFC chip — same identity, two scan paths, unforgeable backbone.
The Story
The maturation history, the master distiller's notes, the warehouse rotations, the angel's share — none of it reaches the customer. The most interesting story is locked in a database.
Post-COVID, every adult knows how to scan a QR code. We put one on every finished bottle — the universal door for the bar customer who wants to learn about the cask. Underneath the same label sits a cryptographic NFC NTAG424 chip — the unforgeable lock for the serious collector or auctioneer who needs proof. Both share the same Polygon-anchored cask identity. The right scan path fires automatically based on which one the customer reaches for.
Printed on the back label. A bar customer scans with their phone camera — no app, no NFC reader required. Opens the cask's story page, master distiller video, tasting notes.
Hidden behind the same label. A serious buyer or auction house taps their phone — each scan produces a cryptographic one-time signature anchored on Polygon. A perfect clone of the chip still fails on the next read.
Plus UHF RFID at the rickhouse — three scan technologies, one cryptographic identity, used where each makes sense.
We use the right technology in the right place. RFID is invisible bulk-scan magic for the warehouse. NFC is tap-to-verify magic for the bottle. Both point to the same cask record. Both are anchored to a blockchain you do not need to trust us to operate.
UHF RFID bulk-reads hundreds of casks per minute. Walk the racks once a week, every cask is accounted for, location-mapped, and environmental data captured.
Every fill, transfer, sample, and bottling event is hashed and anchored to the Polygon blockchain. Buyers can verify a cask's history without trusting us as an intermediary.
Track temperature, humidity, and angel's share across every warehouse rotation. Critical for premium cask sales — buyers want the maturation conditions on record.
Every finished bottle carries both a printed QR code (universal — any phone camera, no app) and a hidden NTAG424 DNA NFC chip (cryptographic, per-scan signature). The QR is the friendly door; the NFC is the unforgeable lock. Both open the same cask record.
Private cask buyers get a verifiable certificate. Transfer ownership in one click — the blockchain records the new owner. Secondary market valuations are pulled into the dashboard.
NTAG424 cryptographic per-scan signatures mean a cloned tag fails verification on the very next scan. Counterfeit bottles bearing your name are detectable instantly.
New cask numbered, RFID tag applied. Mash bill, char level, fill ABV, cooperage source, master distiller — all signed into the first block.
Rickhouse walks log temperature, humidity, position rotations. Sample pulls record cask strength evolution. Every event hashes onto the chain.
Cask emptied, every bottle gets both a printed QR code AND a hidden NFC NTAG424 chip — sharing the same cryptographic identity. The QR is the universal scan path. The NFC is the per-scan unforgeable signature.
A bar customer snaps the QR with their phone camera. A serious collector taps the NFC chip. Both routes open the same blockchain-anchored cask page. The master distiller introduces the cask on video. The chain is closed.
A QR alone is shallow. An NFC chip alone has no consumer reach. Enterprise blockchain is deep and unaffordable. We combine all three layers — the universality of QR, the cryptographic depth of NFC, the permanence of blockchain — at a price boutique distilleries can actually afford.
| Capability | ScanToProve RFID + QR + NFC + blockchain | Standalone QR link only | Enterprise blockchain B2B only, $$$ | Spreadsheet paper + chalk |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| RFID warehouse scanning | — | rare | — | |
| Consumer NFC + QR at the bottle | basic | — | — | |
| Blockchain anchoring (Polygon) | — | — | ||
| Counterfeit-proof NTAG424 chips | — | — | — | |
| Environmental data per cask | — | rare | manual | |
| Private cask ownership transfer | — | enterprise-only | — | |
| Distiller-branded consumer page | basic | — | — | |
| API for distillery management software | sometimes | — | ||
| Survives provider shutdown | yes — Polygon + BYOK | — | manual |
A premium cask matures for decades. Whatever proves its provenance has to last just as long. We anchor every event to the Polygon blockchain — public, decentralised, and verifiable without us. Your media is stored on Cloudflare's global edge or in your own S3 bucket (Bring Your Own Keys). Your data exports as standard JSON + CSV any time. A cask we register today is verifiable in 2060 even if ScanToProve no longer exists.
They do different jobs. QR is the universal door — any phone camera, no app, post-COVID familiar. Perfect for a curious customer at a bar who wants to see the cask's history. NFC NTAG424 is the cryptographic backbone — each tap produces a one-time signature anchored on Polygon, so a perfect physical clone of the chip fails on the very next read. We put both on the bottle, linked to the same cask identity. The QR is convenience; the NFC is proof. A counterfeiter cannot fake the cryptographic chain behind either.
Bonded warehouses hold thousands of casks. Walking the rickhouse with a phone scanning QR codes one by one is hours of work. UHF RFID lets you bulk-read a full rack in seconds without line of sight. We use the right technology in the right place: RFID where it makes operational sense (warehouse), NFC + QR where it makes consumer sense (the bottle in your hand) — all sharing the same blockchain identity.
Every event is anchored to public infrastructure that does not depend on us: Polygon blockchain (decentralised, permanent) for the cryptographic proof, and Cloudflare R2 (or your own S3 bucket via Bring-Your-Own-Keys) for the media. Your data exports as standard JSON + CSV at any time. The QR code keeps working because the verification page is hosted on global edge infrastructure, not a single server. A cask record we mint today is verifiable in 2065 even if we are not here.
Yes. We have a public REST API with documented endpoints for asset creation, event logging, and provenance read-back. If your warehouse system already tracks cask IDs, we ingest those as identifiers — you do not need to renumber anything.
A branded page (yours, not ours) with the cask's fill date, mash bill / grape variety, warehouse history, distiller's tasting notes, video from the master distiller, the bottling date, and a blockchain-verified provenance timeline. They can leave a tasting note, save the bottle to their collection, and share it.
Every event is hashed (SHA-256) and batched into a Merkle tree that is anchored to Polygon. A counterfeit cask cannot reproduce the chain of hashes because each one references the previous block. Our NFC tags use NTAG424 DNA chips with SUN authentication — every scan produces a new cryptographic signature that cannot be cloned even if the tag is physically copied.
Free for your first 50 casks. No credit card required.
ScanToProve Whiskey
Cask Provenance Specialist