Vending Business Blog
Comments (0) As many of you know, Congress has been debating legislature to 
regulate vending machines in all K-12 schools to require that vending machines provide only healthy options. The debate is rather interesting…
NAMA has urged the USDA to clarify and consider the 
economic impact of the Initial Regulatory Flexibility Act on these issues: Continue reading 'NAMA Speaks Up: USDA School Vending Restrictions'»
The winners of the Automatic Merchandiser’s Readers Choice Awards
for “Products of the Year” were recently announced in a number of categories. Winners for new products of the year include: Continue reading 'Best Vending Machine Products Of The Year'»
An interview with Neil Swindale of VendCentral
Continue reading 'Smartphone App Connects Consumers With The Vending Operator'»
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
When it comes to using vending machines, we all 
have our fond associations. For many, vending machines bring connotations of going swimming when we were young and eagerly tucking into a packet of chips and cup of soup from the cafeteria’s vending machine after the swim! For others, vending machines may remind us of our university years, when the students would gather outside the lecture hall’s vending machine in order to stave off hunger pangs after a rather laborious two-hour lecture!
Continue reading 'Vending Machine Cameras Catch Crooks (Video)'»
An interview with John Whitwell of Buffalo Rock
Continue reading 'AMS Vending Machines: A Durable, Dependable Product or Not?'»
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
An interview with Paresh Patel of Vendscreen
Continue reading 'Vendscreen: Displaying Nutrition Info At The Vending Machine'»
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Tara Burnaman and Ken Shea of DS Waters welcomed conference goers.
Carla Balakgie, president and chief executive of NAMA shared the strategic plan the OCS committee has been working on and is now executing.
Continue reading 'Quick Overview of Coffee Tea & Water 2012 Conference'»
The Hartman group has completed a recent consumer survey on eating habits and found that among US consumers in 2012, more than half of all eating occasions were snacks on a daily basis.
More consumers said they considered eating smaller meals more frequently to be healthier and that snacking helps to bridge the gap between meals.
In the 1960s coffee consumption in the US began to decline due to the growing acceptance of instant coffee. Younger consumers, however, grew up without the knowledge of great tasting coffee. Other factors caused the price of good coffee to go up as well. It wasn’t until the late 1990s that coffee began to taste good again and a new generation understood that better quality comes only at a higher price.
Continue reading 'Office Coffee Service’s Role In The Rebound of Consumer Coffee'»
Coca Cola Japan has announced what they call the peak shift vending machine. It shifts the use of power from the peak daytime hours to the nighttime to reduce the strain on the power supply. In the summer, the machines can produce cooled products for 16 hours and at the same time reduce daytime power consumption by 95%.
Continue reading 'Power Shifting Energy Saving Vending Machine'»
At the One Young World Summit in Pittsburgh, show goers were attracted to a booth where a vending machine gave instructions to tweet a unique hashtag to @thecompany. Upon tweeting the screen flashed back the product was “vending” and each person received either a message on a slip of paper related to the show event or that he or she had won a prize to claim from exhibit personnel.
The latest research from Mintel on the breakfast food market in the US shows:
Continue reading 'Consumers Will Pay More For Higher-Quality Breakfast Products'»
According to a report from NPD Group, a market research firm, consumers on the healthiest diets snack twice as often as consumers on the least healthy diets or eating habits.
The report also found that consumers on the healthiest diets eat a wide variety of healthy snacks like fruit, yogurt and snack bars.
According to a report by Rabobank’s Food & Agribusiness Research and Advisory group, the US market for snack bars has more than doubled to almost $6 billion over the past decade. “Snack bars have found broad appeal among a large consumer base that ranges from athletes to couch potatoes, from working mothers to professionals on the go.”
Emily Refermat of VendingMarketWatch says the new smartphone app to help consumers find vending machines will likely be available sooner than later. She points to Michael Kasavana’s article about V-Engineering that discusses marketing to consumers via mobile devices. The article is due out in the December issue of Automatic Merchandiser.
An interview with Seden Harrison of
Smart Source Vending
Continue reading 'School Vending: How Does Healthy Vending Integrate?'»
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Persephone Theme by 
Themocracy
