VendScope Privacy Policy
Last updated: 2026-04-23
VendScope (“the app”) is a mobile tool for traveling vendors, artists, and market sellers. This policy explains what the app does with your data.
Short version: nothing leaves your device unless you explicitly turn it on. Everything you enter stays in local storage on your phone by default. If you opt in to the Community Index, the app sends anonymous, coarse-grained show outcomes to our server so we can publish community-benefit statistics.
What VendScope collects by default
By default, the app does not collect, store, or transmit any personal information to us. We do not operate a backend for your personal data, we have no user accounts, and we do not run analytics or tracking of any kind.
Everything you enter into the app — your route list, retail search history, logbook entries, scope notes, and any optional API key — is stored only in the app’s local storage on your device. Uninstalling the app removes it all.
What VendScope fetches from the internet
To do its job, VendScope makes direct network requests from your device to the following public services:
| Service | Purpose | Data sent |
|---|---|---|
| OpenStreetMap (Overpass API) | Find art shows, markets, and retail stores near a location | Geographic bounding box only |
| OpenStreetMap (Nominatim) | Convert city names to coordinates | City name or address string |
| Wikipedia | Look up facts about locations | Location name |
| FRED (St. Louis Federal Reserve) | Fetch US consumer sentiment index (UMCSENT) | Series ID only |
| Anthropic Claude API (optional) | AI-generated show/retail insights | Only if you enter your own API key in Settings. Sends the city name and show type to Anthropic. |
None of these requests include personal identifiers. They behave like your browser loading a public webpage.
Community Index (opt-in, off by default)
Settings > Community Index is a fully optional feature that lets you contribute anonymous show outcomes to help fellow vendors pick winning events and help show organizers improve their markets.
Nothing is sent until you turn on the master toggle. Each additional field is its own toggle — you share only what you explicitly enable.
When the master toggle is on, and only for the fields you enable, the app transmits to vendscope-index.jason-welsh-edu.workers.dev:
- A random 128-bit ID generated on your device the first time you opt in. This is not linked to your phone, your Google account, your IP at rest, or any other identifier. It lets us dedupe accidental duplicate submissions and enforce rate limits. Turning the master toggle off wipes the ID; a fresh one is generated next time you opt in.
- Show name (as you typed it), city, two-letter US state, year-month (no day).
- Foot traffic band: low / mid / high.
- Weather band: great / okay / rough.
- Consumer sentiment band at the show’s month (derived from publicly-available UMCSENT index).
- Sales vibe 1-5: a coarse band derived from your net revenue (revenue minus booth cost). The dollar amounts themselves never leave your device. We only ever see the 1-5 band.
- Vendor profile (if you enable): vendor type, years-doing-shows band, typical booth-fee band, optional 2-letter home state. These are self-tags you type; we never verify them and we never associate them with any identifier.
- App version.
What we never collect, even when Community Index is fully enabled:
- Your name, email, phone number, or any other personal identifier.
- Dollar amounts — revenue, booth cost, product prices — none of these are sent, only the derived 1-5 band.
- Your GPS coordinates. (The app may request location for “near me” search, but that never enters a Community Index payload.)
- Personal notes from your logbook.
- Product lists you’ve entered.
- Your Anthropic API key or any AI request content.
- Your device model, advertising ID, or any Google Play-supplied identifier.
How the Community Index data is used:
- Contributions are aggregated into coarse per-show, per-month statistics.
- Aggregates are published at a public web page, free, no login required. This is the explicit purpose of the data collection: building a free community resource.
- Raw contributions are never published. A show only appears in public aggregates after at least 3 independent contributions.
- We do not sell raw data. We may publish free aggregate reports (e.g., state-level vendor-earnings bands).
Revoking consent: Toggle the master off in Settings. Your random ID is wiped immediately. Previously-submitted anonymous aggregates cannot be linked back to you, but since they were never linked to your identity in the first place, there is nothing to “delete” about you specifically.
Optional AI features
VendScope has an optional AI layer powered by Anthropic Claude. It is off by default. If you turn it on and enter your own API key:
- The key is stored only on your device (localStorage).
- Requests go directly from your device to Anthropic’s API.
- Anthropic’s terms and privacy policy apply to those requests: https://www.anthropic.com/legal/privacy
- We do not see, log, or proxy the key or the content.
Location
The app may ask for your device location to find shows and retail near you. If granted:
- Location is used only on-device to build a search bounding box.
- Coordinates are sent to OpenStreetMap’s public Overpass and Nominatim servers as part of the query.
- Location is never transmitted to our Community Index servers, even if Community Index is fully enabled.
- We do not store or transmit your location anywhere else.
You can deny or revoke location access in your device settings. The app still works with manual city entry.
Children’s privacy
VendScope is not directed at children under 13 and does not knowingly collect data from them. The app is a business tool for vendors.
Third-party links
When you tap a link for a retail store or show, the app opens it in your phone’s default browser. Once you leave the app, the destination site’s own privacy policy applies.
Changes to this policy
If we change this policy we will update the “Last updated” date above and push a new app version.
Contact
Questions? Email jason.welsh.edu@gmail.com.