National Automatic Merchandising Association Announces 2012 ‘ISpot’ Innovation Award Winners
The vending, coffee and onsite foodservice industry’s most cutting edge advances are being recognized as the National Automatic Merchandising Association (NAMA) unveils the names of the companies that will receive the association’s 2012 iSpot Awards, LyNae Schleyer, NCE, CMP, senior director of the NAMA OneShowSM and education announced.
“This year’s iSpot innovation award contest winners are truly creating our industry’s leading edge technology. We applaud each winner for their groundbreaking work developing advances that will lead our industry into the future and we congratulate them on their success,” said Schleyer in a prepared statement.
For this year’s contest the organization’s panel of judges recognized the innovative successes of all the entries by dividing them into three recognition categories: gold, silver and bronze. Judging criteria was based directly on the six categories from the entry form: features, benefits, creativity, image, productivity and profitability.
“We applaud all the companies for leading the industry forward through technology, image and creativity, and thank Paul Schlossberg, Jerry McVety and Mike Tompkins for their time and effort as the 2012 Innovation Award Judging Panel,” said Schleyer.
Each entry will receive an iSpot symbol to place in their booth along with a gold, silver or bronze ribbon. Gold level recipients will also receive an engraved award. Winners will be recognized during the NAMA annual meeting at 8:30 a.m. Thursday, April 26, in the Venetian Theatre.
During the awards ceremony lead judge Paul Schlossberg will share a PowerPoint presentation that showcases the winning aspects of each Gold Innovation Award recipient. Awards, iSpot symbols and ribbons will be delivered to the booth of each company.
Below are listed the categories and the winners:
- Category - Vending Machines
Gold: Crane Merchandising Systems – Merchant and BevMax media platform; Wittern Group – open screen platform; SandenVendo America - pouchlink beverage vending system; VendScreen – VendScreen Realize
Silver: ShelfX - Shelfx
Bronze: Vendors Exchange International Inc. – VE Connect; Vendors Exchange International Inc. – VE – VisiDoor module
- Category - Kiosks
Gold: 365 Retail Markets – Smart Hub Gen II; Microtronic - Microtronic Market Place; Avanti Markets – Smart-N-Go Micro-Markets
Silver: IntuiSense North America – ISNA K3 Touchless Kiosk; IDS – One Stop Kiosk
- Category - OCS and water equipment
Gold: Ubest Packaging Solutions – Terra Cup; Follett Corp. – 7 Series undercounter ice and water dispenser; Keurig – Vue V1200
Silver: Pentair filtration systems – chloramines reduction system; Utilimaster – reach delivery van
Bronze: Newco – Bistro-10 series
- Category - Foodservice Equipment
Gold: Coca-Cola – Coca-Cola Freestyle
Silver: Vendors Exchange – VE C-Store module
Bronze: FilterQuik - FilterQuik; AdvancePierre – Fast Fixin’ Sandwich Bar
- Category - Payment systems and devices
Gold: VendScreen – VendScreen Redeem; MEI Conlux -MCM5 – audio cassette programming; VendScreen - VendScreen Revolution
Silver: USA Technologies – JumpStart program; MEI – Easitrax Advance 5000 telemeter
- Category – Operating Systems
Gold: VendScreen – VendScreen React
Silver: Distributed Trading Group – Vagabond mobile vending operations software; Vendors Exchange International Inc. – interactive vending platform; Cantaloupe Systems – Seed Enterprise
- Category – Accounting and control systems
Gold: VendScreen – VendScreen Realm
Operators: Special Recognition
Gold: Unique – Store Design; CNC Vending, Houston, Texas – merchandising/promotion
“We thank all the companies who submitted an entry to the NAMA Innovation Awards program, and look forward to recognizing them at the OneShow,” concluded Schleyer. For further information, visit the NAMA OneShow site at www.namaoneshow.org or call NAMA at 312-346-0370.
