The purpose of a machine is to improve or replace. Some machines we use because they\u2019re more efficient than using our hands: a toothbrush, a hammer. In the case of a vending machine, the purpose is to do what a person can\u2019t or won\u2019t \u00a0\u2014 \u00a0or what someone else doesn\u2019t want to pay them to do.<\/p>\n
The allure of a vending machine is that unlike a person, a vending machine won\u2019t complain about doing hard and dirty work in the forlorn places vending machines are generally found. In bus stops, airport terminals, hotel lobbies at 4 a.m., hospital cafeterias after visiting hours and anywhere with fluorescent lighting, linoleum floors and plastic seating, the vending machine rules supreme.<\/p>\n
Berkeley Patients Group<\/a>, where I find myself staring a marijuana vending machine in its \u201cface\u201d on a recent February evening, is none of those places. I\u2019m standing just inside the dispensary\u2019s front door, doing a regular dance \u2014 one step forward, two back \u2014 so as to not obstruct the people coming and going to the well-staffed counter a few steps to my left. Some of the customers coming and going give the machine a half-interested glance while dodging me before going to the counter to make their purchase.<\/p>\n I want to join them, but I cannot. Today, I must avoid human interaction. Today, it is me, the machine and the question of whether punching at a touch-screen before feeding a locked box a stack of $20 bills is the future of cannabis retail.<\/p>\n An ancient concept, vending machines are still new to cannabis. Several times, several companies have arrived with the promise to bring machine-like convenience and reliability to marijuana \u2014 one, Medbox, was briefly the marijuana industry\u2019s first billion-dollar company, before an SEC investigation revealed it to be the flash in a penny-stock fraud \u2014 but none have quite stuck, says Sean Luse, BPG\u2019s chief operating officer.<\/p>\n The device at BPG is from Grasshopper Kiosks<\/a>, an Oakland, California-based company \u2014 which, according to Luse and based upon a few web searches, appears to be the only firm currently inhabiting the weed vending-machine space, a minor miracle considering the depth and breadth (but mostly the breadth) of cannabusinesses one encounters. Luse says Grasshopper\u2019s machine is \u201csignificantly more sophisticated\u201d than first-generation machines BPG experimented with a decade ago.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re always looking at our operation and trying to make it more effective, to give people what they want and to do more of it quicker,\u201d he says. So when the company approached BPG<\/a> with this model in the months leading up to the January 1 launch of recreational sales<\/a>, Luse decided to \u201cgive it a whirl.\u201d<\/p>\n Taller and maybe a tiny bit more narrow than the soda-dispensers from high school, Grasshopper machines have a touch-screen menu that also plays a helpful tutorial video, should you be unsure how to operate a touch screen with helpful pictorial and giant font-sized instructions. (The video, it turns out, is shot here at BPG, on this very device, so there\u2019s no room for confusion.)<\/p>\n According to the company,<\/u> the machine recorded 70 transactions on January 1, the first day in business. It\u2019s unclear what the transactions earned or what this model cost BPG. Luse declined to provide details, describing the arrangement as similar to a store obtaining a cash register or another piece of hardware.<\/p>\n Grasshopper themselves proved unwilling or unable to discuss the situation. A fellow by the name of Jeff Doerr, who answers the phone when I call the company\u2019s 877 number, says he\u2019ll have the company\u2019s VP of marketing give me a call. She doesn\u2019t. I email Doerr a few times and get no response. I wonder if I\u2019d have fared better with a machine.<\/p>\n No matter. Here I am, the machine and me. When I visit, BPG\u2019s machine has just 18 products, all there for me to see on the screen: a few eighths, a couple grams, some hash, two prerolls, some CO2 vape cartridges and a battery. Nothing like the five-milligram edibles<\/a> I was banking on for a relaxed bicycle ride home. No concentrates, and no way to see for myself if the flower\u2019s still fresh.<\/p>\n I glance wistfully over at the other patrons, chatting with the budtenders. I ponder what I want. I ponder too slowly for the machine\u2019s liking. The words \u201cARE YOU STILL THERE?\u201d flash across the screen, like a teenager seeing if her boo on the other end of a four-hour-long phone call hasn\u2019t fallen asleep.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n I finally settle on a $12.75 preroll. I put in a $20. Grasshopper responds with just the faintest mechanical whirr. Out comes my change, and at the bottom, in a padded tray, is a plastic tube with a joint in it, as promised. (The receipt I get via email.)<\/p>\n The rest of the work is up to me. At eye-level, there\u2019s a stack of plastic childproof bags. Written in label-maker are instructions for customers to please grab one, so I put my preroll inside before leaving the store, so as to comply with state law. I fumble for a minute trying to get it open before giving up, wrapping my preroll in the unopened bag, and shoving the joint-rollup into a pocket. Nobody seems to notice.<\/p>\n The machines\u2019 value-adds are advertised as inventory control, sales data and reliability. Luse tells me they\u2019re popular mostly during the dispensary\u2019s busy hours, when someone doesn\u2019t want to bother with a line. From a consumer\u2019s standpoint, I can see the potential value, but it\u2019s still potential.<\/p>\n A machine like this would be a welcome addition to a bar, a hospital lobby or an airport terminal, I think after I leave the store. Airports have vending machines that sell iPads and Beats headphones, so why not a few dollars\u2019 worth of cannabis?\u00a0The second syllable of \u201ccannabis\u201d isn\u2019t yet formed in my head when I realize the answer. Duh: it\u2019s weed, where nothing is ever easy and the simplest transactions are made complicated.<\/p>\n Look at the lengths I had to go just to get in this store. Security guards, surveillance, an ID check. All of those functions would have to somehow be included into a machine \u2014which would then have to be approved by the state for placement in a place that\u2019s not a dispensary.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a vending machine inside a pot store?\u201d a friend asks when I tell them what I\u2019m doing. \u201cWhat\u2019s inside the vending machine, a littler pot store?\u201d Well, yes, technically, now that you mention it. In a present where you can have cannabis delivered to you via smartphone, and where you have to pass a (human) security screening just to get to the controls, marijuana vending machines feel like an era-bridging anachronism, both past and ahead of its time.<\/p>\n Originally published in Issue 31 of Cannabis Now.\u00a0<\/em>LEARN MORE<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n TELL US<\/strong>, would you by marijuana from a vending machine?<\/p>\n The post Coin-Op Pot<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
The purpose of a machine is to improve or replace. Some machines we use because they\u2019re more efficient than using our hands: a toothbrush, a hammer. In the case of a vending machine, the purpose is to do what a person can\u2019t or won\u2019t \u00a0\u2014 \u00a0or what someone else doesn\u2019tContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1840,148,50,170,85,4622,4803],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27475"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27475"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27475\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27476,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27475\/revisions\/27476"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27475"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27475"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27475"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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\nRead More: Coin-Op Pot<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"