A customer types the code to get the food she ordered (above), and a sample set meal (below). (Photo : The Nanfang)
Bottled and canned refreshments and an assortment of junk foods are only but some of the typical items vending machines offer--but frozen lunch meals? Well, why not?
Sanquan Fresh Food operates Fun Box, a vending machine dispensing frozen set meals and comes with a built-in microwave oven.
Sanquan introduced the one-of-a-kind vending machines among workers at the business district of Shanghai in 2014 and brought them in Beijing in June this year, reported China Daily.
In Shanghai, 700 Fun Box are placed, and 300 are in Beijing. People in Shenzhen and Guangzhou may likely get to see Fun Box in their area in 2016, according to The Nanfang.
Sanquan offers 40 different set meals. Each Fun Box vending machine can store up to 64 food packages priced between 12 and 20 yuan.
To avail of the set meals, one has to first download an app. Through the app, people can place orders, and the meals will be delivered the next day in their preferred location of Fun Box.
A code will be sent to customers, and they will enter that code into the vending machine to get their order.
Customers pay online.
China Daily said that “all the meals are freshly prepared.”
Sanquan Fresh Food is a division of Sanquan Food in charge of the operations of the Fun Box.
Headquartered in Zhengzhou in Henan Province and listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, Sanquan Food calls itself a “frozen food industry pioneer” on its official website.
Chongqing native Chen Zemin, who founded the frozen food production company in 1993, can “be regarded as the genuine pioneer of frozen food in China,” said Hong Kong Trade Development Council (HKTDC) in its article published on Dec. 10, 2009.
