Automatic Merchandiser - 14

OCS UPDATE

Coffee in
the Time
of COVID

How operators can drive
revenue with safe office
coffee service
By Abby White, Editor

AS EMPLOYERS ACROSS THE

country are cautiously bringing their
employees back into the workplace,
operators have an opportunity to
recapture lost revenue due to the
COVID-19 pandemic. However, operators will need to safely manage their
office coffee service (OCS) accounts
to keep the confidence of their clients
and their clients' employees. This
starts with the
proper training
of employees,
especially those
who have clientfacing roles.
"We trained
all of our
employees in our
own office break
room on what
we expect out in
the field, and we
Cafection | Evoca's
are constantly
Sophia Touchless
checking in with
Solutions
Cafection | Evoca
them," explained
Blake Jones,
who oversees sales and marketing
at Pot O' Gold Coffee Service in the
greater Seattle area. "When servicing our customers, we make sure that
our employees are equipped with and
wearing the necessary PPE products

14

Automatic Merchandiser * August 2020

such as gloves, face
masks and sanitizer. While
at the accounts, our employees make
sure they are practicing social distancing while cleaning the equipment and
restocking the products."
Operators can further ease any discomfort their OCS accounts may have
by collaborating with their clients to
prominently post safety messages in the
break room so employees understand
how to responsibly enjoy coffee service.
"We have been telling our
accounts to make sure they are practicing social distancing in the office
and break rooms, and make sure that
only one person is using our equipment at a time," Jones said. "We offer
a wide range of cleaning materials,
hand sanitizer and PPE products,
which we advise that our accounts use
throughout their office. Individually
wrapped products, such as stir sticks
and utensils, are also products that we
suggest our customers start to use in
their break rooms."
The coronavirus pandemic has
temporarily halted, if not reversed,
the trend toward eliminating singleuse plastics from the break room.
While it may not be the most sustainable choice, single-packaged goods
wrapped in plastic give customers a
sense of safety.

"For the purpose of safety,
people want less bulk and more
single-use, so you're not going to see
cream and sugar canisters, you're
going to see single-packaged goods,"
explained Mike Coffey, chief strategy
and innovation officer at Canteen.
"People want wrapped cups and
stir sticks. Before COVID, the focus
was on sustainability and everybody
wanted single-use plastics to go away.
But now, because of the unknowns
and fears of the virus, everybody
wants everything wrapped in plastic."
However, bulk products can be used
safely with some minor adjustments.
"If you do have a bulk program,
there are safe solutions out there,
including an automatic sensor that
detects your cup and dispenses the
product," Coffey explained. "And a
lot of manufacturers, even for air
pots and coffee dispensing systems,
now have push handles that are retrofitted on the canisters in the office
coffee spaces."
While K-cups require that consumers touch the packaging and physically
put them in the machine, technology
updates on bean-to-cup machines
allow for contactless experiences.
"Basically, you scan a QR code
and it takes you to a URL through the
back end for that machine to let you
make the selection on your mobile
phone," Coffey said.
Cafection | Evoca's Sophia Touchless Solutions uses IoT technology to
Mask: 157210123 | Konstantinos Moraitis | Dreamstime.com
Coffee cup:172444963 | Chernetskaya | Dreamstime.com
Water: 639728158 | robertsre | Getty Images
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