Ding-dong!
Anyone who has been in Thailand might be familiar with this
sound when entering some 24/7 store. As an ex-pat in France, a 24/7 store is
one of the things I miss the most.
Anyway, when I was in Yenne, a small commune in Savoie
Department, I had bumped into a 24/7 service… of a vending machine. I know that
there is nothing special about a vending machine that works 24/7, but the
products themselves interested me, because it’s a cheese vending machine!
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| Dairy Cooperative Society of Yenne |
At the Dairy Cooperative Society of Yenne, the cheese fans
were waiting in the line to get the best part of local cheeses. Talking about
cheese, you may know that there are more than 1,500 kinds of cheese in
France, but I won’t go into deeper details, not before I could make my own
cheese. Just for your information, the most famous Savoyard cheeses are ‘Tomme
de Savoie’, ‘Beaufort’ and ‘Dent du Chat’ and you can also add ‘Tomme de Yenne’
on the list when you visit the town.
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Bustling ambience inside the store
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You need to be muscular enough to work here
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Plenty of awards are the best proof of their cheeses' quality
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2nd rank trophy in Tomme de Savoie cheese competition
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While waiting in the line, I caught a glimpse of a big
metallic machine in front of the shop with a sign “Vos fromage 24/24h !” (Your
cheese 24 hours!). With strong curiosity, I stepped out of the shop to have a
closer look at the machine. It’s almost the same moment when an elderly couple
approached the machine doing their cheese grocery shopping; I then asked them a
permission to take photos and to make an observation.
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Here's how the cheese vending machine looks like, tah-dah!
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A customer checking the cheese list provided by the store
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List of the cheese packages with the containers' numbers
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The machine is quite simple to use. After we had chosen our
‘cheese package’, we just had to press the number(s) of the cheese container(s)
that contains the product(s) we need. I use the term ‘cheese package’ because
most of the products in each container always come with other products, e.g. a
chunk of butter + shredded cheese, goat’s milk cheese + cow’s milk cheese, a
chunk of cheese for cooking + another for snacking, etc. to fulfill the best
the consumers’ demands. Once we pressed the ‘confirm’ button, the machine would
sum up the price that we need to pay. And then we could proceed with the
payment with our credit/debit/visa card like we normally do in a store. After
so, the machine would give us a receipt. So now we could pick up the product(s)
in the container(s) we have chosen and oh! Don’t forget to close the
container’s door after for not spoiling other products in the vending machine
since it works like a refrigerator.
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Butter with cheese package
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Cheese package containing La Dent du Chat
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The customers gathering up the products they have paid
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Despite its simplicity, I have the feeling that the machine
was still new and complicated for some customers who are mostly elderly people;
the machine was written on with a felt tip pen, with numbers of each step of
usage.
Most of you may wonder how those cheeses got inside the
machine. Is there any automatic function managing this? Does the machine make
the cheese by itself? I, by chance, saw a lady who works in the store came
checking on the vending machine once she was informed by customers that there
was no more cheese (that they wanted) left in the machine. The lady went to the
back of the store and came back with piles of cheese; she put them in different
containers before locking their doors.
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Filling up the machine
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Well… there is no magic here. Anyway, I’d say that it’s
better this way for the community, for the people who work in this industry. At
least we know that they won’t be entirely replaced by some huge, intelligent
machines, yet… Plus, I think I prefer eating food made by human than machine.
However, this cheese vending machine is helpful enough for us on the day that
the store closes. Next time that I’m in Yenne, I think I’ll try using this
machine…if the store closes or the queue is too long of course!
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| Peaceful view on the way to Dairy Cooperative Society of Yenne |
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