Speciality Food January 2024

that the business created an entire vending locker farm shop. “I went on a rural leadership course a few years ago, and at the time we were planning this massive farm shop, looking at planning permission,” says Jessica Squires. “I met someone there whose family have Thorneybank Farm Shop, where there is locker vending. I’d never heard of it before. At the time Covid happened we thought, ‘why would you want to open a shop and café at the moment with all the rules?’. Using lockers instead could work.” The family haven’t looked back, and since their initial installation, have extended and expanded their locker vending system to offer a wide range of products – from their own 19 cons. “I like that they don’t have to be staffed, and they are very flexible in what they allow you to sell. For us, this is about creating an experience. We’ve always had to think about giving people a reason to come here, because we’re not in a convenient location for anyone apart from our local village. Everyone who visits us has had to go out of their way to get here. But they have the experience of seeing the animals that produce their milk, and going next door to buy it and I think they love that. It was definitely the right move for us.” While many readers will be familiar withmilk vending machines, have you heard of food lockers? Upper Dysart Larder in Scotland was so blown away by the technology mashed potato, to cheeseboards – with each itemhoused in its own individually accessed, secure glass- fronted box. “It’s like an iPad on a screen. Customers look around in the lockers, go through the categories on the screen, can flick through all the products and find out more, including allergy information and the price, and pick what they want,” Jessica explains. “Then they pay by cash or card. A new update is that all the lockers go dark after that, and the lockers you’ve picked light up. You go around, pick up the bits you’ve bought and away you go.” A huge benefit of this system is that it’s pretty much shoplifting- safe. As just a single item is placed specialityfoodmagazine.com in each locker, customers can only take what they have paid for. And the doors won’t open unless a payment has beenmade. “We do have cameras in there,” says Jessica, “but they’re purely to see if anyone is trying to break in, or also to see if someone needs help.” For Jessica, the outlay has been more than worth it. “If you make some form of your own produce and want to sell to the public, this is a great way to do it. It was a lot, in terms of investment, but it has definitely benefitted us in getting our name out there with the mash, and it’s also been nice to communicate with the public in a different way.” ‘Be cautious and vending works well’ Collett’s Farm in Essex is a prime example of vending working hand- in-hand with traditional farming, alleviating the burden on a small family-led workforce. Tim and wife Sophie are tenants on 120 acres of, predominantly, dairy farm, with the business having expanded with the growing popularity of rawmilk. “Sophie was getting fed up of bottling milk,” says Tim, who reveals they were faced with either spending money on a mechanical bottling process, or a vending machine. They went with the latter, selling glass and plastic bottles for customers to top up themselves, or allowing them to fill up with their own clean bottles fromhome. Unlike some others, Collett’s Farm continues to operate on an honesty system, with visitors taking what they need, and leaving cash, or paying via a tablet. This system is, Tim admits, open to abuse. “We do have a bit of an issue. When we started, we found people were buying two 1lt bottles of milk. The trouble is, the 2lt bottle costs us more and we were losing out by them using a lot of 1lt bottles. We increased the price of a 1lt bottle to stop that and most people have a 2lt bottle now. But we do find people taking two 1lts and trying to charge themselves for 2lts. Another unexpected downside is that, while Tim and Sophie expected to see most milk purchased in glass bottles, or customers bringing their own, what actually happened is sales of plastic bottles took off. This, he says, is likely due to the fact many customers travel some distance to visit the farm, buying large quantities, which can be frozen in plastic. “We recently had someone drive an hour and a half to get here. There are people buying 50lts at a time. It’s because there isn’t anyone else selling rawmilk locally.” Despite the challenges, Tim says introducing milk vending machines has been a wholly positive experience, saving them time. “It’s definitely been worthwhile. The novelty factor has driven sales. They’ve been growing every year. Often we can sell 150lts in a day. Having the machine has, I think, driven people to actually make the effort to come and see us a bit more. And while they’re here they might buy a pack of sausages or a joint of beef at the same time, which is good.” I was quite hesitant about vending machines to beginwith...but actually the machines are quite sophisticated. It’s minimal maintenance for us