We are delighted to announce that Apple Vending, based in Featherstone Yorkshire, have signed up with SB Software to supply their vending management system. 

Apple provides "a vending solution for every need," and now their extensive range of machines including hot and cold drinks, plus food and snacks, will be supported by Vendmanager, enhancing visibility, efficiency, profitability and customer service. 

Diane Hunter, Director of Operations and Sales, explains: “Since starting in 2007, Apple Vending has grown to become the North of England’s premier vending company. Now this investment in technology will help us both to maintain that position and to go further still - always to the advantage of our own customers and the end-users."

For more information, check: www.applevending.co.uk

Photos are stored in the Cloud and accessed/managed/deployed
from within Vendmanager itself: the best of all worlds. 

Why "guess" when you can know?

We are delighted to announce that we are introducing the ability to capture and store photos within Vendmanager for the first time!

Photos can be taken by anyone using our mobile app, and can then be seen instantaneously within Vendmanager itself.

The potential benefits for our clients are too many to list in full, but include:

• Ensuring machines are being well maintained and cleaned.
• Guaranteeing planogram and product compliance for your customers (including CQUIN).
• Reviewing (and recording) the condition/cleanliness of machines at the frequency that is right for you, without leaving your desk.

And we take pride in the feature-rich functionality that’s built in:

• Take up to 4 pictures per task or service call, with full integration into the Vendmanager eco system for ease of access and management.
• Cloud storage is fully overseen and maintained by us, for ease and reassurance.
• Photos can be accessed for up to 12 months within Vendmanager (or easily downloaded if needed for longer).

We believe that this is a game-changing new feature, opening up even more opportunities within Vendmanager. And we look forward to the benefits that it will bring to our clients.

For more information, check our latest blog post.

Tom Hitchen - our newest recruit.

Meet Tom Hitchen - who has already started work on the help desk.

You may recall that we have a policy at SB Software to continue to keep growing our support team in proportion to the number of software licences. Tom is the latest example of that principle in practice and joins us from a background combining both first and second line support.

It feels positive after all the challenges of the lockdown to be back in this position of team growth.

And we are not “just” adding resource. We are also continuing apace with our ongoing plans to improve the ways that we work. Always.

Increasingly, customers are telling us that they are now seeing the tangible benefits of:

• our client success initiative, co-ordinated by Dan Varney
• account management with customised progression plans per customer
• on site visitation schedules, operated by our technical managers Phil and Martin
• the online help centre that is now available to all users on tap 24/7.

In due course, Tom will also be playing his part in this ongoing improvement - with the remit to help address the ways in which we refine and integrate first and second line support. To make things ever better for our clients.

But meanwhile, he is himself a beneficiary - Tom is the first recruit to join us with the help centre already in place. This means that in addition to his face-to-face induction and training, he has been able to call upon this reservoir of validated resources and information, whenever it is most effective.

He says himself that this has been “most useful”. We say that no-one has ever picked up the system so fast before. So, everyone’s happy … 

Tom Howarth: our Head of Support is now on the run.

On 17 October, our very own Tom Howarth, Head of Customer Support, is going to be running the Yorkshire Marathon, to raise money for the Alzheimer’s Society.

There’s a link below for any who would like to sponsor him.

Tom has a reputation for “always going the distance,” so it’s a full marathon (over 42 kilometres or 26 miles in old money), based around York. 

All money raised will go to the Alzheimer’s Society, in the fight against dementia, as Tom explains: “Both my wife Rachel and I have family members suffering from the disease, so it means a lot to us. If anyone fancies popping a few pounds in, it would be very much appreciated.”