Beef, seafood bowls, cakes… The forefront of “food vending machines” that can remotely manage inventory and sales via the cloud

The Latest Information from Vending Machine Distributors and Manufacturers

Since Corona, the number of vending machines selling a variety of food products has continued to increase in the city. Initially, they only sold frozen foods such as gyoza (Chinese dumplings), but now we frequently see vending machines that allow the purchase of refrigerated products such as side dishes and sweets.

Although food vending machines have been steadily evolving, there are many things that are surprisingly unknown about them, such as their expansion since Corona, the evolution of the vending machines themselves, and their expanding contribution to the stores and consumers to which they are introduced. We explored the latest information surrounding vending machines.

The trend is not frozen vending machines, but refrigerated vending machines.

Frozen vending machines for frozen foods first appeared in the spring of 2021. This was quickly followed by media coverage, which led to the creation of frozen vending machines selling a wide variety of food products throughout Japan.

Mr. Masaru Shiono, Tokyo Branch Manager of the Sales Department of Pulsar Corporation, a sales agent with over 600 installations of food general-purpose vending machines, says, “Since becoming Corona, many major chain stores and individual stores have contacted us and handled frozen vending machines for a wide variety of industries and business categories. Recently, some local companies have opened frozen vending machines in the city center as test marketing, and some stores share one machine. This has led to an increase in the variety of products available in frozen vending machines,” he says.

Until now, the size of the containers that could be set in the vending machines was a bottleneck, and there were some products we couldn’t handle. This year, however, we are planning to release larger containers, which we believe will increase the number of companies and stores that have given up because they could not resize their containers.

What has propelled vending machines into a more unique existence is the refrigerated vending machine, which was introduced last May. It is rapidly gaining popularity as an easy-to-use machine that can sell in both refrigerated (10°C or lower) and lightly refrigerated (18°C ±5°C) temperatures.

I have the impression that inquiries for refrigerated vending machines have been increasing recently. Refrigerated vending machines can be installed as an extension of our existing manufacturing and storage operations, but in the case of frozen vending machines, a quick-freezer and a freezer for storage must be provided in addition to the vending machine itself. In addition, the frozen type is structurally a higher-end model than the refrigerated type, so the cost of a refrigerated type is about 1 million yen, but a frozen type costs about 1.5 million yen. By the way, if you lease, the monthly cost for refrigeration is about 17,000 yen and 26,000 yen for freezing.

If you have been manufacturing and selling frozen foods for a long time, or if you use a Corona-related subsidy such as the “Business Conversion Support Project,” you will not have to pay that much, but if you are completely new to the market, I think the hurdle is high.

It seems that the latest keywords in the food vending machine industry are “frozen vending machines with larger containers” and “refrigerated vending machines with a wide variety of uses. To further explore Mr. Shiono’s point, we asked a long-established vending machine manufacturer, Fuji Electric Co.

The latest two models from the long-established vending machine manufacturer

Fuji Electric’s frozen vending machine “FROZEN STATION” has been growing steadily since its launch in February last year, and the company expects to sell 1,000 units as planned in the fiscal year ending March 31, 2012. The newest model, FROZEN STATION II, which is scheduled for release this month, features larger containers that can be set.

Masahiro Yoshino of the company’s Product Planning Department says, “We made this improvement in response to requests from customers who wanted to sell many larger containers than the existing size. The size of the container has been increased by approximately 30% (from a maximum width of 230 mm x depth of 155 mm to a maximum width of 250 mm x depth of 180 mm), while the size of the main unit remains the same.

Since it is compatible with standard size food pack containers such as those sold in supermarkets, it eliminates the need to change containers for frozen vending machines. Of course, the outlet has also been enlarged, making it easier to take out products. In addition, the brightness of the LED lighting that illuminates the product panel has been doubled to increase the appeal of the product.

Along with the frozen vending machines, the “Multikun,” a compact general-purpose vending machine, is also gaining popularity. The multi-rack system allows the user to freely choose the size of the containers that can be set, making it possible to sell a variety of products, including food, goods, and beverages, with a single machine. At maximum, 220 products of 10 types can now be sold.

The product storage space in conventional general-purpose vending machines is spiral-shaped, and products are sandwiched between them. Therefore, the size of the products that can be sandwiched between them is fixed, but the inside of MULTI-KUN is a rack shelf, so it can sell any shape or material of containers as long as they can be placed on the shelf. If the height is adjusted, even slightly larger items such as sandwiches, which are wrapped in plastic bags, can be placed.

Another key point is that the product selection buttons are all in one place, so the product display can be freely configured; one product can be promoted prominently, and advertisements can be displayed in the empty space.

The upper half of the display can be used to display panels promoting recommended products in a large scale, while the lower half can be used to display product samples. The ability to think up and implement their own staging methods is advantageous for both sellers and buyers, he says.

Aiming to reduce food loss, the company is also considering installing a service.

We are looking into the possibility of installing a service that aims to reduce food loss. Our philosophy is to contribute to society through our energy and environmental business, so we are also focusing on energy conservation and decarbonization. In our mainstay beverage vending machines, we launched the new Sustaina vending machine series last month. These machines are equipped with technology that efficiently cools and heats the inside of the vending machine and technology that reuses waste heat from cooling for heating, reducing annual energy consumption by up to 20%. We have also developed products for frozen vending machines and general-purpose vending machines in pursuit of energy savings.”

In the future, Mr. Yoshino says he would like to focus on services that can contribute to human resource shortages and food loss reduction.

Every industry has the same problem of labor shortages,” he says. Currently, to enable efficient operations even with a small number of staff, we also support electronic money and have an option to remotely control inventory and sales management using a cloud service. In the future, we are considering taking this a step further and adapting dynamic pricing using our proprietary communication terminals. This system fluctuates selling prices based on information such as inventory status and expiration dates, and we would like to use the latest technology like this to help with the food loss problem.

Pulsar Corporation

Fuji Electric Co.