If you’re curious about the future of vending, you don’t have to wait any longer: it’s here. The latest vending machine technology advancements are revolutionary, making machines smarter, more efficient, and more appealing.
Discover the newest vending machine technology, and learn how it can increase revenue, customer satisfaction, efficiency, and more.
1. Customer Engagement Advancements
A successful vending business is all about the customers. Engaging customers with vending machines and products is the key to increasing revenue.
Many of the newest vending machine tech advancements revolve around improving the customer experience and engaging consumers more.
Artificial Intelligence
AI is easily the most impactful vending machine technology in recent years. While other industries still aren’t sure how to implement this technology, the vending machine industry is already using it with great success.
Using AI software, vending machines can collect and analyze a wealth of data. This can improve the customer experience, optimize inventory and machine management, and increase profits.
While AI is just one new vending machine technology in a long list (this list), it’s one of the most powerful and has a ripple effect on almost all the other new technologies we will mention. The analytical data collected by AI is invaluable.
IoT Connectivity
IoT connectivity, similar to AI, is one newly implemented technology with a long reach. Giving vending machines the power to access the Internet paved the way for many other advancements.
IoT connectivity means machines can now connect to the Internet of Things. This means they can communicate with remote servers, receive updates, accept online payments, and send data.
Many of the latest vending machine technology advancements are only possible because of IoT connectivity.
Smart Device Connections
Nowadays, we can effortlessly connect all our devices so they communicate with one another. You can start a text conversation on your phone and finish it on your laptop, pay your parking meter from your iPhone, or watch the movie you just downloaded on any device. Vending machines can now connect to smart devices, too!
With these smart connections, customers can easily find machines, browse their inventory, view prices, and even pay with mobile payment methods. This puts vending machines at people’s fingertips, giving customers fast access to familiar products and information.
Facial Recognition and Biometrics
Facial recognition and biometric features in new vending machines improve customer engagement and allow machines to collect more data. Customers can walk up to a vending machine and scan their fingerprints or retinas for access to products, discounts, and secure payment methods.
Imagine walking up to a vending machine that greets you by name. Then, it lets you know that your favorite chips are on sale right now. Without ever unlocking your phone or grabbing your wallet, you can pay using one of your on-file payment methods.
This type of convenience and familiarity makes the experience more enjoyable and memorable, and it encourages customers to return to the machine.
Touchless Machines
Both smart device integrations and biometric features help create touchless machines. Following the height of COVID-19, people are more cautious about what they touch in public. Traditional vending machines are hotbeds for bacteria, but touchless machines are safer.
Customers can use touchless machines via their smart devices, with voice commands, and/or with vending machines’ facial recognition technology.
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2. Improving Payments and Prices
Smart device integrations make paying easier for customers. However, there are other advancements in payments and pricing worth mentioning.
Dynamic Pricing
Dynamic pricing is possible through AI and data collection. This means the machine can adjust product costs based on supply, demand, and other factors. This new vending machine technology can drastically increase revenue and benefit customers.
For example, a machine can raise the price of coffee and orange juice in the mornings, and then lower them as the day goes on. This aligns with the demand for coffee and orange juice. But if someone wants OJ at 4 p.m., a nice discount will be waiting!
This way, you can make more money off popular products while selling unpopular products for less.
Personalized Discounts
Discounts are a brilliant way to encourage people to buy products. However, offering a health enthusiast a discount on Skittles isn’t effective. The better you can gear discounts toward your target consumer, the more you’ll sell.
New vending machine technology uses data and the Internet to give customers personalized discounts.
If you use your smartphone to connect to a vending machine to buy coffee every Monday, the machine can track this. Eventually, it will determine that you buy coffee every Monday morning, and start offering coffee discounts on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and so on.
These discounts benefit customers and vendors. Customers can save money, while vendors can move products quickly.
3. Fresh Marketing Strategies
Vending machine marketing can be tricky. For decades, the machine’s placement and appearance were the two main ways to grab customers’ attention. But with the latest vending machine technology, we can take marketing to the next level.
Dynamic Displays
As humans, we like things that are bright and colorful. We can’t help it! The only way to make it more captivating is to make it move. So, that’s one of the latest vending machine technology advancements.
Rather than static pictures, vending machines now have screens that can play videos and showcase products. You can run advertisements and commercials, enticing people to buy the products inside your machine.
While a Lay’s commercial on the front of your machine is a great way to sell more chips, any dynamic display can boost sales. Some dynamic displays might just have pleasant graphics, like fish swimming in the ocean or a tree experiencing all four seasons.
These dynamic images may not directly promote your products, but they draw people to the machine, where your offerings can speak for themselves.
Gaming Integrations
This technology vending machines use can go even further. The most advanced vending machine screens allow customers to play games and interact with videos.
Once people walk up to the machine, they’re more likely to buy something. These games can do wonders to increase revenue and make your machine stand out. You can even implement a prize system, giving customers small rewards for playing and winning.
For example, you could give someone a $1-off-any-item coupon or a BOGO deal after they win a game. That leads us to the next vending machine technology advancement!
Reward and Loyalty Programs
You don’t need games to give customers rewards. Since vending machines can now track customers, you can implement loyalty programs to keep people coming back.
These programs can be point systems, so customers can accumulate points to buy products. Conversely, they can be immediate, offering small discounts for every next purchase.
Interestingly, the rewards associated with these programs do not need to be substantial to keep customers engaged. Even small rewards that barely impact your bottom line can foster a sense of loyalty.
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4. Newest in Machine Design and Care
Of course, all these technologies improve the machines. However, these advancements are primarily about the machine’s technical performance and secureness. Other technologies help protect and maintain the machines.
Energy Conservation Mode
The vending machine industry, like so many others, is turning toward more sustainable and eco-friendly practices. Machines are made more sustainably, using recycled materials and environmentally conscious processes.
However, energy conservation mode is one of the most sustainable kinds of technology vending machines can now use. It means the machines “power down” to some extent when not in use or during low-traffic times.
Energy conservation modes can save you money on utilities, help machines last longer, and gain favor with customers who are passionate about sustainability.
Predictive Maintenance
Rather than have workers routinely visit machines to inspect them, machines can now inspect themselves. Modern vending machines can use AI and other internal technologies to track maintenance, flag repairs, and recommend replacements.
For example, a machine can send an alert that its touchscreen malfunctioned. Or, it can ping a maintenance technician that it’s time for a tune-up. When the machine does these things, it frees up time for human workers to focus on machines that need attention.
Sensors and Cameras
Vending machines fitted with RFID readers, weight sensors, and cameras can collect even more data on customers and keep the machine secure. These new features improve inventory management and add another layer of security to the machine itself.
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5. Inventory and Stocking Features
Lastly, the latest vending machine technologies also improve inventory management and stocking practices. These advancements improve product selection and quality while reducing waste.
Demand Predictions
Knowing how to stock your vending machines requires plenty of data analysis. Thanks to the AI in new vending machines, analytics are readily available. You can improve your inventory by buying products based on AI demand predictions.
One machine may record that strawberry milk is bought more frequently than chocolate milk. Another could notice that people buy organic snacks more than processed ones. The AI can even tell what products are more popular during different seasons.
With all this information, you can make better inventory decisions, stocking your machine with the items most likely to sell.
Expiration Preparation and Waste Reduction
Along with helping you stock the best products, the latest vending machine technology can also prevent expired products and reduce waste.
Things like discounting products nearing expiration, moving old products in front of new ones, and promoting almost-expired products can prevent waste. You won’t have to throw as many products away, increasing revenue and savings.
Delivery Optimization
Along with telling you what to stock, the latest vending machine technology can also tell you when to stock. Machines can communicate with a server and create an optimized delivery route for drivers.
This means products can get to machines faster, avoiding drastic temperature changes and lowered quality, and drivers can save gas and time by delivering in a strategic order.
The Future of Vending
The vending machine industry is always evolving to give customers better products and experiences. With the implementation of artificial intelligence and internet connectivity, a whole new world of vending possibilities has opened.
From managing inventory to entertaining customers to tracking trends, the new technologies offer insight into machine performance and consumer behavior. These insights are precisely what you need to elevate your vending machine business and increase profits.
If you’re interested in vending machine technology, contact us to learn more about our latest vending equipment and technologies!
