Vending

Florida college offers touchless payment with vīv

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July 15, 2021

Students and staff at Bethune-Cookman University in Daytona Beach, Florida now have remote visibility of products in the machines, remote access to nutritional information, a touchless purchase experience and access to product discounts through vīv, a touchless payment platform from Vagabond, a vending software provider, according to a press release.

Manuel Barrios, of CVM Services Inc. based in Daytona Beach, replaced existing card readers and telemetry devices with Vagabond vīv Insight devices and removed bill validators and coin mechanisms to make the machines completely touchless.

These changes reduce the cost of managing cash and also provides Barrios the ability to engage directly with consumers with marketing campaigns. Doing so results in more frequent consumption, according to Vagabond. On average, vīv users make around nine purchases per month, approximately 80% more often than those who choose swipe cashless, according to an internal study by Vagabond comparing frequency of purchases by consumers at traditional swipe credit card readers versus vīv touchless-enabled machines.

Barrios utilized Vagabond's first vīv purchase free program to incentivize the B-CU community to download vīv. He worked with B-CU staff to email communication about the program to all staff and students. He created a video that was included in the message to staff and students that shows how easy it is to use vīv. He also posted local signage at the machines educating consumers on it.