Go ahead, roll your eyes. Bill Ritcey and Jim Dobinski already know what you think about blockchain. But when it comes to manufacturing, preconceived notions don’t matter. The technology is poised to revolutionize supply chains and become part of everyday business — whether you like it or not.
While “blockchain” is often mentioned in the same sentence with the sometimes-controversial “cryptocurrency,” linking their identities is extremely tenuous, explains Ritcey, a retired food industry executive who now serves as senior director of strategy for the Appleton-based tech company Farm To Plate. When cryptocurrency was introduced, he says, it needed a secure, immutable platform on which to transact, and the answer was blockchain. One utilized the other, but they’re not the same thing. “What even is blockchain?” has already proven to be a massive public relations hurdle for the technology.
“A lot of people think of blockchain as another ERP (enterprise resource planning) system, like Oracle or SAP or something like that,” Ritcey says. “It’s not. It’s a different way to look at data. Most companies organize their data by function; blockchain creates an environment where it’s organized by asset. You have all the transactions having to do with that asset in one place, and it’s a snapshot of everything going on.”
Bringing a base level of blockchain understanding to Northeast Wisconsin is the mission of Ritcey, Neenah-based Stellar Blue.ai founder Dobinski, and other passionate Web 3.0 advocates who have met every Wednesday for nearly a year to discuss technology implementation in the New North region. While the group initially formed with a focus on blockchain, it has recently expanded its purview to include other emerging technologies. Dobinski says he welcomes business leaders to join the discussion. And with a technology like blockchain, he adds, the most important conversation to be had is not necessarily how the technology works and what it is or isn’t, but how it can benefit business.
“Companies get too caught up trying to understand what blockchain is. They don’t need to know, and that sounds odd,” Dobinski says. “But what they need to understand is what blockchain can do for them. It’s a tool like any other tool.”
Right now, the group is growing but still small. He says he would love to add a Northeast Wisconsin blockchain development company to the mix, but none exists. Not only is Northeast Wisconsin behind the proverbial eight ball nationally for its adoption of blockchain, he adds, but the United States is behind other countries, including Canada, China, the United Arab Emirates, India and much of Europe.
“What we can do right now in Northeast Wisconsin is spread the word, so that’s the mission,” he says. “Northeast Wisconsin is ripe for the opportunities to get this thing into production and get ahead of a lot of other industries.”
Focus on food
Some industries are riper than others. When it comes to food, the timing of blockchain adoption isn’t necessarily in manufacturers’ hands. Section 204(d) of the Food Safety and Modernization Act has called for compliance with its new food traceability recordkeeping requirements by Jan. 20, 2026.
The rule, designed to facilitate faster identification of and response to foodborne illnesses and contamination, requires high-risk items like seafood, produce and dairy to be part of a digitally interconnected supply chain that can produce digital responses to U.S. Food and Drug Administration inquiries within 24 hours of receiving them. In Northeast Wisconsin, Ritcey explains, the cheese industry is affected and needs to pay close attention.
While the federal government stops short of naming a specific technology to handle this new requirement, blockchain is pretty much the only solution that’s up to the massive task, Ritcey says.
“Almost every restaurant buys seafood, cheese and produce, and they may have 5,000 customers; they’ve got to connect with all of them,” he explains. “And we have a saying in the food industry: The FDA don’t play. If they give a regulation, you adhere to it or you’re gonna find chains on your door the next day when you go into work.”
Ritcey says there is no standard ERP platform utilized by the food industry, so “universal translation” using artificial intelligence will also play a key role in the process of digitally connecting the food chain, which was the impetus for the creation of Farm To Plate. But with multiple steps to take in the process and multiple players to engage in an effort that has been spelled out since January 2023, the clock is ticking.
“The FDA gave the industry three years, which is a fairly good amount of time,” Ritcey says. “But we stuck our finger in our ear for one-third of that time. I had a guy say to me, ‘I’ll call you in 2025’. I said, ‘Don’t expect me to answer.’”
‘Obvious benefits’
Beyond compliance with health and safety regulations, Ritcey says, the nation’s food industry is rich with blockchain use cases. During the COVID-19 pandemic, for example, the nation faced empty grocery shelves — but not because of an actual product shortage.
“[The food] was packed for restaurants as opposed to grocery stores,” he says. “But no one had visibility throughout the supply chain of where this product was [so they could] coordinate [repackaging]. Everybody just had their own four walls that they could look at. If we had an interconnected supply chain with visibility through it, we can make a decision that’s best for the whole supply chain as opposed to everybody acting individually.”
And experts agree: Interconnectedness, transparency and immutability are among blockchain’s top benefits, while economic viability, acceptance and participation are hurdles standing in its way. Eventually the benefits will outweigh the obstacles, Ritcey and Dobinski say, but it will likely require more government interventions like the Food Safety and Modernization Act to get people on board.
Ritcey says getting ahead of the blockchain curve would well position Northeast Wisconsin, given the region’s strong bases in both manufacturing and logistics, so he has no plans to stop evangelizing soon.
“[You’re taking] a product and putting it through the supply chain, giving it a lineage of where it has been and who has done what with it; that’s something we’ve never had the ability to do before,” Ritcey says. “By doing this, we can make decisions collaboratively, as opposed to individually. And that has obvious benefits.”
