Volume 6:
Discrimination against Vending Operators Promoted by B.C. Government

“In November 2006, Premier Gordon Campbell announced an initiative to replace junk food with healthier food and beverages in vending machines in B.C. public buildings, including hospitals, universities, colleges and provincial institutions.”(1) On the surface, this announcement seems reasonable and understandable when you consider the responsibility the provincial government has to the individual health of its citizens. According to our premier Gordon Campbell, “Health care costs are growing at two or three times the rate of our ability to pay and we are going to act now to encourage British Columbians to lead healthier lives.”(2) So with health costs escalating out of control, taking preventive measures is the first step to rectifying this problem. We at Ryan Vending understand and are supportive of the initiative, but we are concerned. Our concern stems from the fact that this new initiative targets only products that are sold out of vending machines. Our question is why is vending being discriminated against?

In the venues the government has identified as public buildings, numerous food service and retail outlets exist. For example, in hospitals such as Victoria General the presence of Tim Horton’s selling chocolate covered donuts and large double-double coffees are undeniable. In universities, convenience stores on campus offer soft drinks, candy bars and potato chips to their patrons daily. The cafeterias in both hospitals and post-secondary environments also sell these items, which are prominently displayed at the cash register yet these are the very products that are being forced from the vending machine. If the government is determined to eliminate the sale of items such as chips, chocolate bars and soft drinks then why does it allow the sales of these items through other avenues? Having provided vending services in public buildings for years has taught us that the overwhelming majority of unhealthy product sales are being sold in these government buildings from sources other than vending machines.

Why would a government interested in curbing the availability of these unhealthy items think that by governing the smallest retail provider they could achieve their identified goal which is “to lead the way in North America in healthy living and physical fitness”?(3)

Ryan Vending stressed to the government that we wanted to be part of the solution, and that as vendors; we could accept the product categorization laid down in the policy but only if all retail food outlets within the confines of the venues were required to do so as well. Without this addition to the policy, that hospital patient who wants a chocolate bar only has to go to the lobby’s convenience store or to the cafeteria to get his/her craving satisfied.

We had numerous opportunities to sit with government officials subsequent to the creation of their new policy on Healthy Choices in Vending Machines to discuss its implementation. From high-ranking civil servants to elected government officials all agreed the policy, as written, did not make sense. They recognized that it singled-out the vending machine in a particular building and made it perform to a different standard of performance then the other retail food outlets.

The definition of Discrimination is, “to make a distinction in favor of or against a person or thing on the basis of the group, class, or category to which the person or thing belongs rather than according to actual merit.”(4) We feel the government’s new initiative discriminates against the vending industry. All those we spoke to indicated that the parameters of this policy were established at the ‘top’. They kept saying, ‘our hands are tied.’

To reiterate our position, we object to discrimination and ask that the government expand its policy to include all food retail outlets in public buildings. Vending is just another retail channel able to compete only if the playing field is level. This new policy, created by our business friendly government, has effectively sloped the pitch of the playing field.

(1) Government of British Columbia, “Ministry of Labour and Citizens’ Services,” Government of British Columbia Web site, http://www.lcs.gov.bc.ca/HealthierChoices/pdf/CompletePolicy.pdf, accessed July 4, 2007.

(2) Government of British Columbia, “Office of the Premier – New Releases” Government of British Columbia Web site, http://www2.news.gov.bc.ca/news_releases_2005-2009/2006OTP0161-001330.htm, accessed July 4, 2007

(3) Government of British Columbia, “Healthy Living – ‘Act Now BC Launches Province Wide Healthy Living Tour,” Government of British Columbia Web site, http://www.gov.bc.ca/bvprd/bc/channel.do?action=theme&channelID=-8411&navId=NAV_ID_province&crumb=B.C.+Home&crumburl=%2Fhome.do, accessed July 4, 2007.

(4) Dictionary.com “Discrminating”, http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/discriminating, accessed July 4, 2007.

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Volume 5:
So What Should We Expect From Dex! (Part 1)

We have heard all the promises that the various vending machine sales representatives have made about the capabilities of "dex" (short for "data exchange"). Various vending machine software providers also make claims about the information available and presented from "dex" through their extraction programs. It may be too early to state an opinion on this subject, but if they can clean up a few anomalies, its very likely that both the machine sales representatives and the software providers will not only be blowing their respective horns more loudly they should also be blowing them in unison.

The information available is tremendous and very useful to vending operators interested in improving their presentation and knowledge about what is happening at each point of sale. Conveniently organized and reported, this information can drive business decisions that up to the point of receiving this information were made in conjunction with a certain amount of guesswork. Housekeeping functions such a price checking and product complement can be reviewed easily. Inventory tracking becomes much easier and depending on the accuracy of the individuals touching each machine, a daily perpetual inventory total is available to management. Curbside polling and WAN based systems add efficiencies our vending forefathers could only achieve in their dreams.

Not to diminish the positives, the incorporation of a vending software program based on the features of dex is an intricate undertaking, a process that highlights some shortcomings in the inter-relationships between technical vending programmers and machine manufactures/distributors.

Each machine model is different from one another, an obvious statement. But did you know that machines of the same model could be vastly different from one another? To illustrate this lets use the API 113 snack as an example. From the outside these machines look identical to one another. However depending on the "eprom version" contained within the control board this machine will determine if the chosen vending software program reads and displays the correct information or any information at all. Extrapolate this situation over the magnitude of machine models and manufacturers and the task gathering the information becomes much bigger than originally foreseen. The software developer must have the machine model interface written and contained within the data retrieval program version you purchase in order for all the advantages of dex technology to flow. If they do not have all of these interfaces accomplished, dex will not be read on some machines and all the "dex" advantages remain within the machine, unseen and unused.

This topic is vast and requires dedication on the operators' behalf to receive the efficiencies and information promised. Conversion to a full dex based data retrieval system is an expensive undertaking in terms of setup cost but a system that is operating properly and completely will provide a payback of initial outlay many times over. As operators we must always strive to improve and this improvement will be based on better information. A large step towards the accomplishment of this improvement is presented to us through the advantages dex, its up to us to embrace and capitalize on this improved technology.

To be continued...

Dave Ranger
Corporate Operational Team Leader

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Volume 4:
Just Another Upgrade

Once again, it's time to upgrade. Thanks to our government's constant need to change the look of our currency, we are now faced with another cost to make the acceptance of the latest $5 bill work in bill validators and changers.

While we operate a wide variety of validators and changers, the Standard SCT 5 has been our workhorse over the past 10 years. The System 200, as it is called, originally required constant calibration. Before long, with all the different bills our mint was dishing out, the System 200 ran out of memory and could no longer accept any additional bill variations. At that point, about 1999, Standard was forced to replace the current CPU with a new updated version called Auto-Cal. Although Auto-Cal was produced to accept the new $10 bill of the time, the main feature was that it would no longer require the conventional calibration.

When the first Auto-Cal kits hit the market, we were warned that a new $5 bill would be coming out soon, and that the new kit would need to have an update from its original EPROM. As it could not be avoided, Standard Bill Changers promised they would exchange this EPROM free of charge when it became available. Of course, the Vendor would have to absorb the labor costs to make this upgrade. This new version '3.41' upgrade has been out for a couple of years, and for the cost of about $500 per unit we should have been able to stand the onslaught of Canadian bills.

However, the mint had other ideas - introducing the Twoonie! Up until now, all Vendors were capable of accepting the Loonie, but - with the advent of the Twoonie - Standard Bill Changers felt this would be a good opportunity to offer a new Coin Kit for a meager price of $500. This new Coin Kit would allow the same bill changer to take the Twoonie and give back two Loonies. Both Mars and Coinco produced Kits for this application.

Today, the government has come up with yet another $5 bill, and once again thrown the System 200 into a tailspin. This newest $5 bill has different ink, different paper, and even a different cut. So once again, we are facing another upgrade - this time to a '4.73' version. Since the '4.73' involves retooling, it can cost the operator $100 per unit for the Intel version.

The problem of our currency, of course, affects more than just the bill changers. The various models of validators used in vending machines and parking meters have all had their share of EPROM swapping as well. It would certainly be nice if we could go through a year or two where profits weren't eaten up by having to reach into our pockets to keep up with all the necessary updates.

Dave Ranger
Corporate Operational Team Leader

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Volume 3:
Communication Rules

Have you ever bought what you have been lead to believe is a new piece of equipment only to find out later that it doesn't contain the features and advancements you thought you purchased. This seems to be a regular occurrence with vending equipment these days.

This is a double-edged sword. Kudo's to the manufacturers of vending equipment for continually upgrading the equipment they produce through EPROM changes but these changes are blind to the purchaser. Buying equipment you are lead to believe is capable of accomplishing certain functions may not be capable of such functions if the new EPROM version is not contained in the control board. Given the length of time that passes from the machine production date through the distribution channel to the date of purchases, it has been noted that three or four EPROM revisions could have occurred.

We feel it is the responsibility of the manufacturer to educate the distributors of these changes, supply the distributor with upgraded EPROM's for replacement at no cost to be included with each machine sold to ensure the ultimate consumer is not buying dated technology. We also believe the distributor should produce "Update Announcements" that are forwarded to their customers accurately describing the features of the upgrade.This passes the responsibility to the consumer to either pay for the upgrade or determine that there is not enough value in the upgrade.

This transfer of information can easily be communicated over the manufacturers or distributors websites again leaving the responsibility with the vending machine consumer for periodically viewing these websites creating another economic justification for their existence.

The worst situation that that exists today when upgrade information is passed to only those who pursue it, leaving those who do not with dated equipment.

Dave Ranger
Corporate Operational Team Leader

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Volume 2:
Sometimes Newer Technology Isn't Always Better Technology

For a while our company has been trying to find a way to stimulate the Coffee Vending segment of our business. We operate all of the popular models including the popular AP 213 but even with these "Steady Eddies" the coffee sales portion of our business has never really reached its potential.

Recently it has been pointed out to us with the new advances in technology in that field we should re-evaluate our perspective towards coffee vending.
AP is now producing the new model 223 "Café Diem" The so-called state of the art coffee machine. This machine has all the bells and whistles one could ask for.

The biggest feature however is the new gourmet coffee with their specially applied whipped toppings. Another great feature of this machine is the download ability. Now, by downloading the recipe information on to a chip, we can store and transfer all menus from one machine to another. With so many flavor combinations this chip will save countless hours of adjusting.

After two sessions with the AP reps we were confident these machines were going to be a hit! Our office staff gave it their taste test and in fact lined up to try some of the new drinks before we took it out to its first location.

Supported by good references we were convinced to give these machines the real test exposing them to our largest volume customer.

Excited, we proceeded to put the first one on the BCFC fleet. After all, if it could perform out there it would be a certain winner anywhere. That is when we ran into our first real problem. You see the ferry fleet operates with a very pure water source. The new 223's have a new water valve shut off system. Unlike the old system found in the 213's the newer breed depends on the water's mineral content to conduct enough current to activate two cathodes, which in turn activates the water flow switch on the tank. Because of the water purity or lack of mineral content this machine had trouble shutting off! It was discovered that by simply dumping table salt into the tank the problem could be solved.

Of course that was not the answer. The answer appears to be to add an additional filter to the system. This is called a "Scale Stick." This simply adds minerals to the pure water while keeping it within the safe guidelines.

There have been a few other wrinkles such as a spout adjustments and door alignment concerns but all in all we are very pleased and optimistic about this machine. For now we will sit back and look forward to the upcoming winter months to reap the benefits of increased sales! Have a cup, you'll be impressed.

Dave Ranger
Corporate Operational Team Leader

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Volume 1:
Validators

The future of the old traditional bill changer could become a thing of the past with costs continually climbing and available space shrinking. Installing a validator mated with the proper 4-tube coin-mech seems like a suitable solution for the future. The main benefit is that in a vending bank you will usually find a snack machine, so adding a validator allows you to provide change to the customer without taking up valuable room in the area. Of course there are drawbacks, the most obvious being that a coin-mach cannot carry as much change as a bill changer. This means the coin inventory in the coin-mech must be monitored regularly.

When we first entered the validator age the only one available was a Mars GL4. This unit had previously been used on bottle vendors in the USA, and has to be modified to work with the popular AP 113 snack. As time went by this unit was proven dependable, however Mars was in no hurry to update the software in this unit, which is necessary from a security perspective. The more likely reason Mars neglected the upgrade was because they were planning to discontinue the GL4 in Canada.

More recently a company originating in Russia has come out with a validator called the Cashcode, which is now manufactured in Canada. So far, our experience with this unit has been limited. On the surface, having a Canadian manufacturer of a validator entering the quickly developing market can only be viewed as positive. However, clearing hurdles such as the insistence of returning the validator to the manufacturer for repairs have to be cleared. Downtime in service offered and machine disfigurement are the immediate concerns with Cascode's present repair policy. Naturally vending revenue will suffers accordingly. Cashcode's solution to this problem is for us to carry spare units as backup. This becomes impractical since this product sells for about $725.00 plus taxes and in our case numerous backup units would be required.

We were given a little hope when Coinco came to the rescue with a nice unit acquired from the Ardac Company. It priced out at about $500.00. Similar to the Cashcode, this unit could be used only with the newer MDB control and not the Logic system used by the AP 113's. Although it had promise, this lasted only a few months before the company realized that this product had bill acceptance issues. Indication at this time is that corrections to these problems could take up to a year, leaving vendors hanging.

In conclusion, it is my suggestion that if you are planning to use validator technology in your snack machines, then it should probably be a Cashcode. A reminder that this tentative recommendation comes attached to the service problem mentioned above.

Dave Ranger
Corporate Operational Team Leader

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