Vending Machine

Action Hunger has launched a vending machine to give folks who sleep rough on city streets round-the-clock access to essentials such as food and clothing. The free-to-use service has been 2 years in the making and will run as a month-long trial at a shopping center in Nottingham, UK.

Customers looking to buy a new ride through Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba will soon be able to take it for a test drive first, right after it's spat out of a gigantic cat-themed vending machine.

Online used car dealership Carvana wanted to encourage buyers to come in and pick up their cars instead of having them delivered, so it built a five story-high vending machine for cars. Complete with big fake coin tokens.

Coca-Cola South Africa has partnered with bottler Coca-Cola Fortune and communications company BT Global Services to provide underserved South African communities with free Wi-Fi ... which will be built into Coke vending machines.

Chicago entrepreneur Luka Sanders has launched a vending machine that dispenses healthy, organic food. Called Farmer's Fridge, each kiosk is wrapped in rustic reclaimed wood. It contains salads and snacks for the health-conscious and features bar code scanners and a credit card terminal.

Bike-sharing programs are a good idea, particularly for people who occasionally find themselves in need of some last-mile transportation. It’s pretty doubtful, however, that such people are always going to be packing a bike helmet. That’s why the HelmetHub helmet vending machine was invented.

The Like Machine is an effort by Pepsi and TBWA to change people's perceptions of promotional activity, with a Facebook Like being rewarded with a can of pop.

The first Dreambox 3D printing vending machine will be installed at U.C. Berkeley later this month.

Hot Wheels, Chevrolet Canada and TrojanOne have unveiled a Twitter-activated promotional vending machine.

Beverly Hills Caviar has installed vending machines in several Los Angeles malls that dispense caviar, escargot, and other gourmet foods.

Virginia Tech students can turn their ides into a physical reality thanks to the DreamVendor 3D printing machine.

Biblio-Mat is a vending machine, designed by Craig Small for a Toronto book shop, which dispenses a random used tome for $2 each.