Vanyu-Fuji Vending Machine

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  • Vending Machine in Japan

    The first vending machine in Japan sold cigarettes, and was introduced in 1888. The inventor of this vending machine was a furniture artisan by the name Tawaraya Koshichi.

    Why Japan loves vending machines? Three main reasons are usually attributed:

    1. Japan’s low crime rate – vending machines, whether inside or outside, are seldom broken into.
    2. Japan’s love for convenience – the ability to purchase whatever you want wherever you want is culturally appealing.
    3. Japan’s knack for quirky cool and the quest for the latest trend – who wouldn’t queue up to be one of the first to buy something not available anywhere else?

    Fun Fact about vending machine in Japan

    • Japan has over 5 million vending machines nationwide.
    • Japan has approximately 1 vending machine for every 23 people.
    • Annual sales from vending machines total more than $60 million USD.
    • If all Japanese vending machines were placed side by side, it would extend from Tokyo all the way to Hawaii.
    • Japanese vending machines can accept many forms of payment.
    • Employees who restock Coca-Cola system vending machines in Japan also engage in crime prevention initiatives to keep neighborhoods safe. If they notice any suspicious activity or see someone who may need help these Coke employees alert local police or fire stations, or provide assistance themselves.

    Items from Vending Machine in Japan

    • Drinks (2,423,800)
    • Food (72,000)
    • Self-Service (1,297,300)
    • Ticket machines (58,400)
    • Cigarettes (153,300)
    • Daily Essentials (230,300)

    2018 Data from Japan Vending Services Manufacturers Association (JVMA)

    Getting a vending machine in Japan

    An interested person can apply for a vending machine. Once the management approves the application, they need to pay an installation charge of about 10,000 Yen. The vending machine is then set up for them at the chosen spot from the available ones. If you get a good spot, the vending machine can be a very lucrative business.

    Source

    Other Vending Machine Applications

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    Hong Kong library books vending machine
    The 2 Euro T-shirt Vending Machine
    Swimsuit Vending Machine

  • Pizza Vending Machine – Claudio Torghele

    Over the last decade, Mr. Torghele developed a vending machine that cooks pizza. The machine does not just slip a frozen pizza into a microwave. It actually whips up flour, water, tomato sauce and fresh ingredients to produce a piping hot pizza in about three minutes.

    The Let’s Pizza vending machine at a shopping mall in Trentino, Italy. It can turn flour, water, tomato sauce and fresh ingredients into hot pizza in a few minutes for a price as low as $4.50.

    The machine, which Mr. Torghele calls Let’s Pizza, is only the spearhead of a trend.

    Unlike the old automats, which were staffed with workers who refilled the machines with creamed spinach and baked beans as fast as customers pulled them out, these restaurants consist entirely of vending machines.

    In Milan, a two-hour drive west of Rovereto, a franchise chain called Brekky has opened the first three of what is planned to be a large chain of restaurants in which customers can buy cold dishes like salads and sandwiches, and warm dishes like pasta, from vending machines.

    North of the Alps, the automat never really died out. In the Netherlands, Febo, a chain started in 1941 by a Dutch baker, now has about 60 restaurants. In France, bright green and yellow Yatoo Partoo machines — the name loosely translates as “You can get everything, everywhere” — sell milk, juice, snacks and sandwiches 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

    Europeans are looking for less expensive ways to eat out, and the automat is far less expensive than a white-tablecloth restaurant.

    The idea for a pizza robot came to Mr. Torghele after he worked in California in the mid-1990s creating a fresh pasta manufacturer. “At food courts I saw a trend toward vending machines,” he said at his office. “In fast food, I saw pizza everywhere.”

    The machine Mr. Torghele and his engineers produced is outfitted with little windows so the customer can watch the pizza being made. As in the Charlie Chaplin film “Modern Times” (in miniature and without Chaplin) wheels turn and gears grind. The customer presses a button to choose one of four varieties — margherita (plain cheese and tomato sauce), bacon, ham or fresh greens. A plastic container dumps flour into a drum resembling a tiny washing machine; a squirt of water follows, and the drum goes into a spin cycle, forming a blob of dough that is then pressed flat to form a 12-inch disk.

    Tomato paste is squirted onto the dough and cheese is added before it is lifted into a small infrared oven. The baked pizza then slips onto a cardboard tray and out into the customer’s waiting hands. Mr. Torghele says the pizza will cost as little $4.50, depending on the variety.

    Other Vending Machine Applications

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    DNA Vending Machine
    Pop-Up Nikefuel points Vending Machine
    Office Supplies Vending Machine

  • Milk Carton Vending Machine

    History of Milk Carton

    Paper containers for milk are now so commonplace that it is hard to imagine that it took over twenty patient years of persistence to get the public to accept them. But it did, and the man who is responsible is named John Van Wormer.

    Van Wormer owned a toy factory in Toledo, Ohio. He got the idea for paper milk cartons after dropping a milk bottle one morning. The bottle broke, the milk went everywhere, and it was an annoying way to start the day.

    Van Wormer took out a patent in 1915 for his new product. He called it “Pure-Pak,” because the container could be thrown away after one use. Then the difficulties began. It took ten years for Van Wormer to perfect a machine capable of making the containers.

    Even then the struggle was not over, most Americans were very attached to milk in bottles. But time, and a steady increase in the cost of glass, worked in Van Wormer’s favor. Soon many other companies were making their own paper milk cartons, and by 1950, Van Wormer’s company was producing them at the rate of 20,000,000 a day.

    Milk Carton Vending Machine

    Fun facts about Milk

    Milk is white because of its fat content. Although milk is composed of approximately 87% water, which is colorless, the fat and protein molecules floating inside it reflect all light wavelengths, making it appear white.

    On average, a cow produces 6.3 gallons of milk each day. That’s nearly 2,300 gallons per year. The most milk produced by a single cow in one year was 59,298 pounds. The record is held by a Holstein cow by the name of Robtham Suzette Paddy of The family-run Robthom Farm near Springfield, Missouri. At her peak, Sue produced more than 200 lbs. per day.

    In Uganda, the title for king’ is ‘Omukama’ which means ‘superior milk man’. The Bantu title refers to the king’s role as feeder of his people. Moreover, rulers in the ancient Ugandan kingdoms were of Hema descent—a minority group known for being cattle holders.

    Milk will stay fresher if you add salt. Adding a pinch of salt or baking soda to each carton as soon as you open it will keep milk fresh for over a week past its expiration date. The active ingredients preserve the milk, keeping it from spoiling so quickly. You can also pop it in the freezer! 

    Milk is the only food that you can survive wholly on.  No single vegetable, legume, or type of carbohydrate contains all nine essential amino acids that human require to build proteins, and a meat-only diet lacks the necessary Vitamin C. Milk, however, contains every nutrient we need—even as adults.

    According to Greek mythology, our galaxy is formed out of the Queen of the Gods’ spilt milk.  In the myth, Zeus’s wife, Hera, was pushing baby Hercules away when several drops of milk dropped from her breast and into the night sky. The name “Milky Way” is actually a translation of the Greek term for “milky circle,” the name ancient peoples gave to our corner of the universe.

    Source

    Other Vending Machine Applications

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    Baguette Vending Machine
    Sweat Activate Vending Machine
    Moet Vending Machine

  • Lazy Vending Machine

    Fair enough. Save cost, show all the necessary information and will definitely be remembered after walked passed this lazy vending machine.

    Lazy Vending Machine

    The Lazy Engine of Progress:

    Microwave Oven: One classic example is the invention of the microwave oven. It came about when an engineer named Percy Spencer noticed that a candy bar in his pocket had melted while he was working near radar equipment during World War II. This led to the discovery that microwaves could quickly heat food, ultimately saving time and effort in meal preparation.

    Other Vending Machine Applications

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    Umbrella Vending Machine
    Reese’s vending machine
    Trainers Vending Machine, Onitsuka Tiger

  • Vending Machine in other countries

    India

    Vending Machine are not very common in India and are usually found only in major cities or along some national highways. Seaga India, a 100% subsidiary of the Seaga Group of USA, is the pioneer for bringing the concept of vending machines to India.

    Vending machines are used to sell snacks, beverages, condoms, public transit tickets, Jewellery, and change for currency notes.

    Several reasons have been attributed to the lack of success of vending machines in India. The availability of cheap labour makes operating stores or kiosks economical; customers lack of technical knowledge and feel uneasy using vending machines; a lack of machines that accept a wide variety of payment methods; vandalism, rough use, and poor maintenance of the machines. However, vending machines are relatively new in India and analysts believe that usage will rise.

    Netherlands

    A common feature of snack bars in the Netherlands is a wall lined with coin-operated machines. Each has a vertical row of little windows, with a (usually hot) snack behind each, e.g., a croquette, a frikandel or a hamburger.

    Behind the machine is the kitchen where the snacks are prepared, with the little windows being re-supplied from the back.

    Automatieks may provide chairs for customers, but it is also common to have seating only for customers buying food at the counter. Sometimes the vending machines are in an outside wall, and no shelter is provided.

    These vending machines are often located at railway stations or in busy shopping streets.

    Russia

    In the USSR, vending machines became more common after Nikita Khruschev visited the USA. On his order, many types of vending machines were designed. Soft drink machines were popular in all Soviet cities. They were designed to dispense into a glass and equipped with a washing device

    South Africa

    In 2012 South African beverage company BOS Ice Tea installed a Twitter-activated vending machine in Cape Town.

    Other Vending Machine Applications

    Product & Solution
    Printer Ink Cartridge Vending Machine
    Vegetable Vending Machine
    Boyfriend Vending Machine

  • Ultraman Vending Machine

    The first episode of “Ultraman” debuted on television at 7 p.m. on July 17, 1966. When the dust cleared at 7:30 p.m., Japanese entertainment would never be the same.

    Ultraman Vending Machine

    As the show opens, audiences are treated to the spectacle of a high-speed alien chase that results in the inadvertent death of ace “Science Patrol” pilot Shin Hayata, his resurrection at the hands of a mysterious being and the sudden appearance of a gargantuan, laser-breathing sea creature.

    All this in just the first 10 minutes. Then things really ramp up.

    Lakes boil! Forests burn! Death rays sizzle! Submarines submerge! Fighter jets attack! Missiles launch! Buildings crumble!

    Finally, just when things seem hopeless for the outmatched Science Patrol, Hayata transforms into a titan clad in space-age silver and red: Ultraman! — human enough to fight on our side, huge enough to give rampaging monsters a taste of their own medicine. What’s more, he can fly and shoot death rays from his forearms. Only for three minutes, however, until the solar energy powering his chest-mounted “color timer” runs out. This was hands down the coolest thing a kid had ever seen in 1966. It’s still pretty cool even now.

    It’s all about the kaijū

    “One of the secrets to the popularity of the “Ultra” series is that the kaijū and aliens, who you’d think would be the enemies, are actually the stars,” Ooka says. “Developing the stories of the kaijū and aliens actually serves to make the hero look better. If they weren’t (developed), it wouldn’t matter how strong the hero was — there wouldn’t be any catharsis to the battles.”

    The English word “monster” is, almost by definition, an epithet. Not so “kaijū,” which is written with the characters for “strange” and “beast,” making it a far broader term.

    They certainly aren’t all ‘bad’

    Ooka

    “Some of them are actually quite tragic, such as Jamila” he adds, referring to a fan-favorite episode involving a kaijū born from a brave astronaut mutated by extraterrestrial contact.

    After Ultraman defeats the rampaging creature, the Science Patrol begs Jamila’s forgiveness, solemnly unveiling a plaque in the astronaut’s memory.

    “Children often don’t notice the subtext when they first watch the shows. But then as they get older, and see them again as high school students or even as parents watching alongside their own children, they pick up on the messages we put in. And it rekindles their love for the series, which they can then watch in its latest incarnation with their kids.”

    Other Vending Machine Applications

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    Pop-Up Nikefuel points Vending Machine
    Curry Rice Vending Machine
    Vote Vending Machine

  • Mount Fuji’s Summit Vending Machine

    Even at the summit, convenience rules. This photo might just be showing the world’s highest placed vending machine.

    Vending Machine on the top of Mount Fuji

    Mount Fuji is the highest mountain peak in Japan at 3,776.24 m (12,389 ft). An active volcano that last erupted in 1707–08, Mount Fuji lies about 100 kilometres south-west of Tokyo, and can be seen from there on a clear day. Mount Fuji’s exceptionally symmetrical cone, which is snow-capped several months a year, is a well-known symbol of Japan and it is frequently depicted in art and photographs, as well as visited by sightseers and climbers.

    Mount Fuji is one of Japan’s “Three Holy Mountains” along with Mount Tate and Mount Haku. It is also a Special Place of Scenic Beauty and one of Japan’s historic sites. It was added to the World Heritage List as a Cultural Site on June 22, 2013. 

    Fun Facts about Mount Fuji

    • It is three volcanoes in one.
    • Women were forbidden to climb it until The Meiji Restoration in 1868. The first western woman to reach the summit was Lady Fanny Parkes in 1869.
    • It is one of Japan’s three holy mountains, along with Mount Tate and Mount Haku.
    • It was first climbed by a monk. Sir Rutherford Alcok was the first known Westerner to reach the summit in 1860.
    • It is a symbol of Japan.
    • It is an active volcano.
    • It last erupted in 1707, when it erupted for two weeks.
    • It is surrounded by five beautiful lakes.
    • There are four trails to the top. It takes an average of around six hours to reach the summit of the mountain. There are ten rest stations await along each route, offering food, drink, and rest spots. For novice climber, it is recommended you to take the popular Yoshidaguchi Trail to the mountain top.
    • It is the most climbed mountain in the world. It is visited by around 300,000 climbers every year which is only accessed for just over two months.

    Other Vending Machine Applications

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    Ecological Research Vending Machine
    Dirty Water Vending Machine
    Bra Vending Machine
  • Peak Shift Vending Machine

    Peak Shift Vending Machine

    Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry has presented ‘Peak Shift’ vending machines with the Energy Conservation Grand Prize. The innovation saves energy by shifting power used to cool beverages from day (when energy demand is highest) to night. 

    Thinking behind the innovative ‘Peak Shift’ vending machines was the desire to contribute to the energy situation in Japan. There is shortage following the Great East Japan Earthquake that struck in 2011.

    Since demand for electricity generally peaks in the daytime, this new peak-shift type of vending machine uses electricity for refrigeration during the night time. During the time when most people are sleeping, electricity demand is comparatively low, thereby significantly reducing power consumption during the day.

    Refrigeration is performed entirely during the night, and then maintained through a highly advanced insulation technology that employs vacuum insulation materials, as well as a thermal-storage technology that enables efficient electricity usage in the daytime.

    This allows the vending machine to provide cold beverages for an entire day. Less electricity is consumed for refrigeration during that peak energy-demand time.

    Other Vending Machine Applications

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    Egg Vending Machine
    Facebook vending machine, coke or tool
    Printer Ink Cartridge Vending Machine

  • Ecological Research Vending Machine

    In the north of the Okinawa mainland, a number of vending machines participate in ecological research for the Okinawa Rail, an endangered species of bird and Japanese natural monument.

    Existing vending machines were fitted with IC recorders and recorded the calls of the rails, providing data for surveying and analyzing.

    As a result, through the vending machine recordings, scientists discovered that the Okinawan rails have a special call that can only be heard within this specific frequency. Because no other animals use the frequency, it is now thought that this unique trait of the rails evolved in the Yanbaru forests for protective reasons.

    This project had a unique approach to studying birds’ biology, and that was to use environmental sounds. From those sounds, the distinct traits of both the Okinawan rail and the Yanbaru forests were understood for the first time.

    Yukihiko Nakamura

    There has never been a large number of Okinawan rails, but their numbers are decreasing as traffic in the region increases, and they’re being hit by cars. The Ministry of the Environment declared a state of emergency in 2007 and 2010.

    The biological survey revealed that Okinawan rails might have a harder time sensing approaching cars during rainy weather. As a result, conservationists are hoping that in the future, specific measures to prevent the birds’ traffic deaths will be taken under consideration.

    Nakamura explained the details of this undertaking, saying

    In the future, we hope that by researching man-made noise’s effect on the Okinawan rail, we will be able to help to prevent their extinction.

    About Okinawa Rail

    Throughout the world, this wild bird only lives in the Yanbaru area of northern Okinawa and is unlikely to show itself to humans due to its cautious personality. It is because of this that it was only in 1981 that it was officially certified as a new species.

    ts biggest feature is that, unlike other birds, it cannot fly and so it has to jump up into the trees to sleep.

    The population of the Okinawa rail is currently about 1500, and the area it is found in gets smaller each year.

    It is hard to find in the wild and so those who would like to see the bird up close should stop by Kuina Forest, the Okinawa Rail Habitat Display Learning Facility in Kunigami village.

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    Vending machine facial recognition
    Twitter Game Vending Machine
    Peak Shift Vending Machine

  • Criticism of Vending Machines

    Some say the convenience of vending machines itself is a problem in that anyone of any age can buy things from them. Since 2008, the majority of tobacco vending machines have featured a “Taspo” age verification unit with an IC card system. Until then, however, anyone could buy cigarettes without any verification.

    As for the situation regarding alcohol vending machines, the alcoholic beverages industry has started to replace old machines with ones that require purchasers to present either a driver’s license or an ID magnetic card as well as their self-imposed restraint. However, because it has not been legislated by law, a small number of the old vending machines – without age verification systems – still remain in the streets.

    There is another growing concern over the electricity consumption of the machines. Particularly, drink vending machines, which run 24 hours a day in order to keep drinks hot and cold, have come in for harsh criticism.

    The vending machine industry has already developed a technology called “zone cooling,” which can quickly and intensively cool down the products to be sold. There has also been a drive to try to cut energy by using automatic lighting systems with sensors, and by reducing the brightness of the lighting. Thanks to such initiatives, in 2005 the industry finally succeeded in cutting the annual electricity usage per vending machine by half, compared with the energy use statistics in 1990.

    Other Vending Machine Applications

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    Telephone Sim Card Vending Machine
    Facebook vending machine, coke or tool
    The 2 Euro T-shirt Vending Machine