This is how industry veterans sum up the trends driving unattended retail.
Stephanie Begley, Vendors Exchange International, Inc: The number of connected devices will grow and operators will then be able to better understand real-time information about machines that will lead to increased efficiency and profitability.
Jim Chico, U-Select-It: Consumers, especially Millennials, will continue to drive the retail experience and we will see vending equipment mirror that. I also think that energy-efficiency will continue to be important to the machine. But the number one trend I see is improved style and dispensing at the machine. Traditional vending will always be around, it just might look different.
Tom Glomski, Crane Merchandising Systems: In the near-term, I think you’re going to continue to see growth in cashless deployments and digital product advertising — two proven applications for improving same store sales.
Frank Guzzone, Mondelez International: Our whole business model for diji-touch® is a twenty first century machine for the times we live in, not for the past. It can be current now and with enough technology it will stay current at least 5 years in the future. I envision a machine that will expand with different formats including large screen, small screen and combo. I also see the ability to become a sampling machine, to be in different venues from retail to supermarkets. Instead of getting a hand-to-hand product, you could get a sample from a machine, a recipe and instant coupons.
Shannon Illingworth, AVT: Creating destinations is the future. In the future I also see more companies realizing that their business has to be 24/7.
Brendan Kehoe, Streamware: The trend is getting real-time data at an increasingly granular level to operate more efficiently and effectively; however, I think it’s hard to see beyond the next two years. As the rate of change in technology and consumer trends increases, our ability to predict it decreases. It will evolve over time as technology advances, and we learn how to use it to continually grow our businesses.
Angela Olson, Seaga: These new retailing solutions offer operators new opportunities and threats. They are opening up the opportunity for vending to become a much more profitable retailing solution but this will require learning new skills and competing against new entrants to this market.
This part of a larger story titled, "Re-Imagine the Machine" which appeared in our May 2015 issue. Read the full story here.
