PopCom vending machine installations are on the rise

PopCom's smart vending machines are finding new homes in high-profile retail venues across the country. Called the PopShop, the vender is a contactless machine can sell a variety of non-food items. 

New PopShop clients include Brew and Feed at Concord Mills Charlotte, NC, and Teas with Meaning at the Metreon in San Francisco. Brew and Feed will vend its line spice blends at the location while Teas with Meaning will use its PopShop to promote new tea boxes (with two small loose leaf teas, biodegradable brew bags and a wooden teaspoon) to customers each month. The latter will also promote new products from other minority-owned businesses.

In addition, PopShop Local Columbus will deploy machines at the Polaris Mall with two Ohio-founded businesses, the Brow Dr. and Flat Out Heels. Columbus is PopCom's hometown. Another PopShop Local Columbus was unveiled at the Fairfield Inn Hotel, vending Ohio-based brands Black Owned and Red Velvet. 

And in Hawaii, Flat Out Heels is operating a PopShop to automate sales for its rollable ballet-style flats.

The PopShop machine uses facial recognition to help retailers capture demographic information, machine learning to help deliver targeted content, and the blockchain technology to verify identification when vending regulated products. 

"Now, anybody can sell anything in these machines," said PopCom founder Dawn Dickson-Akpoghene. "We have 20 customers selling anything from food to jewelry to t-shirts to alcohol."