Industrial robots are fairly common for welding parts together in car assembly, but consumers don’t typically see stationary robots at work in everyday life.
Turns out robotic food service provider Blendid is working with Jamba of smoothie fame on installing Jamba by Blendid autonomous robotic kiosks in various locales, after having already done so at a few college campuses and retailers.
This summer, one of the robotic kiosks will open at a Love’s Travel Shop in Williams, California, near Sacramento. Truckers at the stop and other travelers will be able to walk up to the kiosk to order a favorite veggie or fruit smoothie and watch the robot arm in action. Love’s has 590 locations in 41 states, so the prospects for Jamba by Blendid kiosks could be promising.
Robots can offer a bit of relief to food managers who must scramble to hire and keep staff.
The kiosks rely on a patented AI/ML robotics platform known as foodOS. Noting the presence of the kiosks in college campuses already, Blended CEO Vipin Jain predicted an expansion across retail properties and along highways and major thoroughfares in the years ahead.
“Our robotic smoothie kiosks are helping leaders across hospitality meet the rising demand for fresh food options,” he said in a statement.
Food robotics is already a thriving business, estimated at $2 billion in 2020, a number expected to double by 2026, according to estimates by analysts. In a sense, Covid has helped the industry, as consumers seek out touchless products.
The kiosks have appeared in some locations, including shopping malls and Walmarts in California and on Georgia college campuses. One of the first kiosks opened in March 2019. Jamba has seen the benefit of using the kiosks with its franchise model of operations, according to Geoff Henry, president of Jamba, in a statement.
To use the kiosk, consumers can usually download an app or use a kiosk-based tablet that takes them through steps to choose a smoothie blend, customize it and then order it and pay for it, including via a prepaid connection. A robotic arm lifts pitchers full of ice and other ingredients to create various concoctions made to order using an articulated arm that pours out the liquid and then slides a finished cup forward to a customer. One customer posted a video of the process at kiosk in Fremont, California. It includes a wave from the robot arm at the end:
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