Mobile Payments, Vending Machines Key in Farmer’s Fridge

Oh, sure, we’ve all stopped at a vending machine for a quick snack at one point or another, usually something that makes the food scolds all leap to their feet with cries of sugar, fat, salt, or sometimes all of the above. What if, instead, you could get a full meal, and a pretty good one too, right at that vending machine level? That’s a point that Farmer’s Fridge is actively working to tackle.

Farmer’s Fridge takes the concept of the vending machine to its absolute limit, making fresh food from scratch daily and routing it to a series of automated vending machines using refrigerated trucks. Touchscreens on the fridges allow for purchases, and the food is delivered in much the same way as a standard vending machine might. Farmer’s Fridge can even allow for loyalty programs, and the entire process is said to take around 30 seconds total, making it one of the fastest meal alternatives around.

Better yet, Farmer’s Fridge recently ramped things up with a new mobile app that effectively allows customers to order and pay for food ahead of time, which helps determine what to add to the fridge vending machines. The food runs the gamut from salads—which seem to be contained in either glass or plastic jars—to sandwiches, bowls, and protein add-ons like roasted garlic and lemon shrimp.

That’s definitely versatile, and the offerings at Farmer’s Fridge outlets are likewise healthy. When the choice comes down to a tiny bag of chips or a Thai salad, the obvious winner on the health scale is the Thai salad. Being able to put these just about anywhere is certainly a plus, and by connecting to a mobile app, the system only gets better. It’s a wonder these aren’t in more places, or at least variants on the theme, because it’s easy to see where they’d prove useful in a host of operations.

If Farmer’s Fridge can ramp up its available locations, then it stands to be a major competitor in the vending machine / fast food stakes. Its use of mobile payments as a form of partial inventory control, meanwhile, is especially noteworthy.