These photos capture Vendo Company in its earliest days. The Vendo Company was founded by two brothers, Elmer and John Pierson, who invented the first efficient coin-operated vending lid for chest coolers, known as the “Red Top”. They quickly became leaders in the vending machine marketplace.

Two views of the Vendo Company Building.

The Vendo Company Christmas Party 1939

Executives of the Vendo Company, January 5, 1940

Offices at Vendo Company outfitted with a Vendo Red Top Chest

Stages of Vendo cooler design, from concept to manufacture.

The Vendo 39 and 59 machines were actually made by Westinghouse. Vendo purchased the Westinghouse Standard machines from them and then added their own coin-operated lids and inner mechanisms.

The V-39 was manufactured from the late 1930s to the early 1940s. Dimensions are 34” high x 34 ½” wide x 27 ¼” deep and it held 39 bottles. The V-59 was manufactured from 1948 through 1951. Dimensions are 37” high x 34 ½” wide x 27” deep and it had a 59 bottle capacity. A drawback of these machines is that they were only able to vend a single flavor at a time. Also the V-39 could fit only 8-ounce bottles and the V-59 could only accommodate 6 1/2-ounce bottles.

This is a photo of a repairman that is servicing the V-59. He is holding what appears to be the refrigeration unit. The next photo shows a full bottle drum inside the V-59.

This item is not for sale. We show restored items in this blog to encourage discussion, prompt questions and further the hobby of collecting and restoration. We also enjoy sharing the photos of the many items we have restored over the years.

We have some great vintage photos of Vendos that we wanted to share with you. The photos vary in subject from production lines to staged publicity shots, but we thought they were interesting and that you might enjoy them. The following two photos were taken in a Vendo soda machine factory.

And then we have the assorted “chatting around the Vendo 83” photos. These illustrate the Vendo 83 in different environments such as the workplace and a grocery store.

The next two photos are of models posing with a bottle of Coca-Cola and a Vendo 83. Those are followed by a man dressed as a Vendo soda machine serviceman beside and open Vendo 83. He is pointing to the loading instructions inside the door of the machine.

This last photo is interesting in that it shows a Vendo 83 embossed in Spanish. Rather than “Drink Coca-Cola”, it says “Tome Coca-Cola” and instead of “Ice Cold”, it says “Bien Helada”. Vendo evidently built this machine for the booming Coca-Cola market in Mexico. We hope you enjoy all of these vintage Vendo 83 photos and we will continue to post more like these in the future.

Dimensions: 63”H x 32 1/2”W x 18”D
Vending capacity: 83
Precools: 75
Weight: 450 lbs.
Manufactured: 1946 to 1957

Manufactured by:
The Vendo Company

These two photos are of the lunchroom inside a Vendo vending machine factory lunchroom sometime in the 1950s. As you can see in the first photo, the lunchroom was fully stocked with Vendo vending machines of all kinds. These were soda, fresh food, ice cream, milk, juice and coffee machines.

The second photo shows a more humorous take on the assortment of food and drink vendors available to the employees. This room has been set up to look like a town in the old West. Instead of the words “Coca-Cola” over the vending machine, a rustic –looking sign with “The Cold Bottle” is displayed overhead, making it look more like an old saloon. Old storefronts have been painted on the walls. What a fun place to have lunch—“How ‘bout a nice cold Coke, Pardner?”

We know that this is a Vendo V-240 case vending machine, but have not seen any more information on this machine. It looks like a model designed specifically for factories and other large places and was probably produced in very small numbers. It was a very large machine, capable of dispensing 10 cases of soda, or 240 bottles.

The way this machine dispensed soft drinks is unique too. Rather than starting out with bottles being loaded into a drum or onto shelves, the entire case of soda was loaded into the machine. As you can see in this diagram, the conveyor transported the whole case around the interior of the machine as each case was emptied. The motion resembles that of a Ferris wheel. Once a bottle was released, gravity would take over and the bottle would drop into the chute.

As clever as this design is, it obviously didn’t catch on, as this is the only machine like this that I have seen. Please let us know if you’ve seen one of these.

Vendo was founded in 1937 in Kansas City, Missouri. Their initial product line consisted of chest coolers, but after WWII they became known for their upright vending machines, which were made exclusively for the Coca-Cola Company. This chest cooler is one of the earliest—if not one of the first chest coolers made by Vendo.

This cooler is embossed for Cleo Cola, a soft drink that was introduced in 1935 by the Whistle soda company. Cleo Cola was named after the cigar favored by the company’s owner (presumably Antonio y Cleopatra cigars, manufactured since 1879). Advertising for the soda featured Queen Cleopatra of Egypt, which may explain the use of what then was considered an “oriental” typeface.

In addition to the photo of the Cleo Cola chest cooler, there are also photos of artist renditions of the Vendo chest and an additional cooler embossed with the Coca-Cola logo, in what appears to be an office. Perhaps this gentleman is a Vendo Company executive. In this last picture, it is possible to see the top of the machine with the rotating vending mechanism. This chest cooler represents an early version of the soda vending machines that Vendo continued to develop and became famous for.

Manufactured by:

The Vendo Company
Kansas City, Missouri

Here is a photo of a Vendo Ark Pie ice cream vendor. I really do not know much about this machine or what an Ark Pie is, but I thought it was a neat picture. If anyone is familiar with this machine or what an Ark Pie is, please blog-in and let us know.

Manufactured by:

The Vendo Company
Kansas City, Missouri

This is a Vendo Model 123, or Junior. The cabinets were manufactured by Westinghouse and purchased by Vendo, who added the coin-operated top. They are referred to as “spin top” vendors because of how the coin-operated top vends. After the coin is inserted, the top is turned to access the next available bottle of Coca-Cola. This machine can vend 23 bottles and precool 9. They were produced from the late 1930s into the early 1940s. The earlier coolers were ice cooled, but later versions were refrigerated with electricity.

The brochure illustrates the other spin top models available in the Vendo series. They range in size from the 23-bottle Junior to a 59-bottle Master.

Dimensions: 42 5/8”H x 28”W x 17 1/8”D

Manufactured by:

The Vendo Company
Kansas City, Missouri

This item is not for sale. We show restored items in this blog to encourage discussion, prompt questions and further the hobby of collecting and restoration. We also enjoy sharing the photos of the many items we have restored over the years.

We have already written a blog on the very rare Vendo Decapper soda machine, but I came across this photo and wanted to post it. It shows a production line full of Decapper soda machines. This is a rare photo, given that very few of these machines were manufactured and very few survived.

To learn more about this machine check out our previous blog: http://www.vintagevending.com/vendo-coca-cola-bottle-decapper

Here is a Vendo coin changer painted in Pepsi colors and fastened to a custom-made stand with custom graphics. Vendo put out the coin changer so you could get nickels in place of a quarter or a dime, primarily so you could buy a Coke from one of their soda machines. You would find them mostly painted in Coca-Cola red, but they could also be found in a generic color scheme. Not sure they were available in Pepsi colors, we just decided to paint one Pepsi blue for a change.

This Vendo ice cream vending machine was a very challenging restoration. The exterior was pretty straightforward but the vending component was difficult to get right. If you attempt this restoration, make sure you document the process of taking the machine apart with photos and notes. Also, the machine should be complete, as parts cannot be found for it unless you buy another machine for spares.

I wish I could give you some more specific tips, but this restoration was done many years ago and our notes have been lost. Besides, we only restored one of these and we would have never done another.

All the graphics on the finished machine were custom, this machine was not originally painted like this. They were usually found painted light blue like the Vendo milk machine and the upright Vendo ice cream vendor.

Dimensions: 34 ¾”W x 29 ½”D x 36 ¼” H
Produced: 1950s

Manufactured by:
The Vendo Company
Kansas City, Missouri

Here is an interesting brochure we came across featuring the V-17 “Office Vendo Top”.

I have never seen one of these and I doubt it was ever manufactured, given this is just a drawing. What’s interesting is that the Vend Top is on what is clearly a Cavalier Office Cooler, but the top appears to be from Vendo given it’s name of “V-17 Office Vendo Top”. Vendo always named its models by how many bottles they would vend, preceded by a “V”. For example, Vendo-81, Vendo 110, Vendo 39 and so on.

If anyone has any information on this, please blog-in and let us know. If it does exist, some photos would be great.

Also known as the “Spin Top”, the Vendo 23 vended 23 bottles and pre-cooled 7. Introduced in 1949, it was a smaller cooler, made specifically to fit into smaller spaces. It was intended as an alternative to the bulkier upright vendors available at the time.

Behind the large pullout door there was storage for empties or additional bottles of Coca-Cola. It had an all-steel construction with a baked enamel finish and featured automatic defrost.

This machine was designed to accept 5 cents, 6 cents, or 10 cents and was unable to make change. The vending was done manually, by rotating the handle and lifting the lid to remove a soda.

Dimensions: 20”D x 24”W x 36”H
Weight: 156 lbs.

Manufactured by:
The Vendo Company
Kansas City, Missouri

The Vendo 81D may be one of the most sought-after soda machines, also called “drink boxes”, among collectors. It was introduced in 1955 and was made exclusively for the Coca-Cola Company by Vendo. If you find a similar machine embossed with another soda brand such as Royal Crown, Pepsi or 7-Up, then it is not a Vendo 81-D, but rather a VMC-81 made by the Vendorlator Company. They are very similar machines, but made by different companies.

The V-81D pop machine is very similar to its predecessors; both the 81A and 81B, but has a much larger coin door. The V-81D is a “white-top” model, like the V-81B, whereas the V-81A is solid red with a white Coca-Cola logo. And the embossing is larger and positioned more to the right than on the V-81A. The V-81D was manufactured from 1955 to 1958.

The internal workings of the V-81D are still very much like those in the earlier models. It vends 6 to 12 ounce bottles of soda. It has nine shelves and dispenses 81 bottles. There’s space to pre-cool 17 bottles. A fluorescent light illuminates the bottle door allowing you to view the various selections. The larger coin door on the V-81D accommodated a coin mechanism with a coin changer, unlike the small door machines. One feature that makes this machine so popular is the gravity-fed slant-shelf design. This allows you to vend a variety of flavors and sizes of bottles.

We have restored many of these over the years. Follow this link to Retroplanet.com and our Blog About the Vendo 81, 44 and 39 Service Manuals in the PDF Library. There you can download a copy of a Vendo 81 Soda Machine Manual.

Dimensions: 58”H x 27”W x 16”D
Weight: 286 lbs.

View the video of this Coca-Cola Vendo 81D Soda Machine

This item is not for sale. We show restored items in this blog to encourage discussion, prompt questions and further the hobby of collecting and restoration. We also enjoy sharing the photos of the many items we have restored over the years.

The VMC 27 was made for Coca-Cola from 1948 to 1951. This tabletop vending machine had a unique mailbox-type shape that attracted customers, so these were very popular among storeowners. There was an optional stand made by Kay Products for this machine that had additional storage space below. The VMC 27 was capable of vending 27 cold soft drinks, and pre-cooled 10. This machine was a friendlier size for use in Mom and Pop establishments where space was at a premium. These places wouldn’t have had any use for the gargantuan Vendorlator Master and Jumbo models that were made during the war for use in factories. (The Master could vend 84 bottles and pre-cool 80 and the Jumbo could vend 124 bottles and cool 104!) Unfortunately for the 27, the Coca-Cola Company wanted something that could vend more drinks than these were able. In the early 1950’s Vendorlator made the upright Dual 27 for Coca-Cola that was an improvement with the capacity to vend 27 and pre-cool 27 more. As the competition between the soft drink manufacturers grew, Coke felt the 27 still wasn’t big enough. The answer was the VMC 33 that could vend 33 bottles and cool 27. These replaced the model 27 product line and were manufactured from the early to mid-1950’s. And the vendors got larger still, with very popular models like the VMC 81 that was made for dispensing Royal Crown, Pepsi-Cola, 7Up and Dr. Pepper. These classic machines were produced from the mid- to late-1950’s and are very collectible today.

In 1956, Vendorlator merged with its former rival, the Vendo Company of Kansas City, Missouri. Prior to the merger, Vendo worked almost exclusively with the Coca-Cola Company, so the combination of the two companies made them the primary supplier of vendors to the soft drink market. Within two years, the companies were completely consolidated and operating out of the Fresno location. In 1988 Vendo became a subsidiary of the Sanden Corporation of Japan. Vendo moved its headquarters to Dallas, Texas in 2005 and the name changed to SandenVendo America Inc. They still operate today as a manufacturer of vending machines, in addition to commercial freezers, and automotive air-conditioning systems.

The Vendorlator Manufacturing Company
4000 Railroad Avenue
Fresno, California

Vendo Milk Vendor

The Vendo Milk Vendor was manufactured by The Vendo Co. in the 1950’s. It uses a lot of the same parts as the V-80 and 81 soda machines as well as having the same shape. This machine was not intended for large volume, but rather was classified as a small to mid-size machine for “’in-between’ volume needs”. As with other machines of the 50s, this is an upright with rounded corners. The upright design was intended to save floor space and this model requires only three square feet. The design includes the addition of an illuminated display case on top of the machine for the customer to view the different drink options. The drinks were available in cardboard cartons and the selection could include up to four different choices. There was a 52 to 80 drink total capacity and the machine operated with a push-button selection.

The Vendo Milk Vendor was one of a group of three very similar machines produced by Vendo at the time. In addition to the Milk Vendor were the Hot Food Vendor and the Ice Cream Machine. The Milk Vender is a rare machine, but of the three, the Ice Cream Machine is the most rare.

The standard color for the Vendo Milk Vendor was blue, as seen in the brochure. But we had a machine that we decided to do a little differently. See our earlier blog about the Cow Motif Vendo Milk Machine.

Dimensions: 58”H x 27”W x 16”D
Manufactured by:
The Vendo Company
Kansas City, Missouri

The Vendo V-83 Coca-Cola Vending Machine

The V-83 has the distinction of being Vendo’s first coin-operated, upright soda vending machine to be mass-produced. Like all other Vendos, it was made exclusively for the Coca-Cola Company and was produced from 1946 to 1955. There were more of this model machine made among upright Vendos, than any other machine up until 1960.

The vending couldn’t have been simpler; just insert a nickel and lift the dispenser door to lift out your Coke. It is a single-selection machine that vends 83 bottles and has space to pre-cool 75. The 6.5-ounce bottles were loaded into individual compartments in a honeycomb-shaped drum. By lifting the door to remove a Coke, the drum was rotated to the next available bottle.
This Vendo 1947 V-83 brochure states that demand is so high for this machine, that they may have difficulty filling orders for them in the following year—so you had better put your order in early! Not so true anymore, as this is such a heavy machine, that it’s not all that popular with collectors. In addition, it can only hold the original 6.5-ounce bottles.

Dimensions: 63”H x 32 1/2”W x 18”D
Weight: 450 lbs.

Manufactured by:
The Vendo Company
Kansas City, Missouri

Are you looking for some cool 1950’s atmosphere to add to your home, and a soda vending machine that you can use today? How about the Coca-Cola Vendo 39? This machine is not only one of the most recognized Vendo models, but it’s also able to dispense the 8-ounce bottles the Coca-Cola Company is distributing today.

The Vendo 39 was made for the Coca-Cola Company from 1949 to the mid-1950’s. There were some 80,000 of these made, so they are still fairly common today. They graced the fronts of filling stations and storefronts all over 1950’s America. This single-selection machine is equipped with a honeycomb-shaped wheel that turns to dispense a nice, cold Coca-Cola. It is capable of vending 39 8-ounce bottles and pre-cools 20. And with its characteristic rounded corners and sleek design, this is a classic, and highly collectible model.

It is important to note that the Vendo 39 that was made from 1949 to the mid-1950’s, like the one we have here, was always painted a solid red. The later 39s, made from the mid- to late-1950’s were painted red and white.

Every soda machine we restored at Vintage Vending followed the same process. First the machine was completely disassembled and all painted parts were sandblasted. All other parts were re-chromed, powder-coated, repainted or cleaned. The coin mechanism was re-plated and rebuilt. Automotive bodywork was performed on all of the sandblasted parts. The machine was painted with PPG automotive paint. Then the machine was reassembled with a new refrigeration compressor and all electrical was replaced.

Dimensions: 58” high x 27” wide x 16” deep

Weight: 285 lbs.
Manufactured by:

The Vendo Company

Kansas City, Missouri

View the video of this restored Vendo 39



This item is not for sale. We show restored items in this blog to encourage discussion, prompt questions and further the hobby.

To view more pictures of the completed restoration visit the RetroPlanet.com Museum.

Coca-Cola Vendo 44 Soda Vending Machine

The most desirable Coca-Cola soda machine ever made, the Vendo 44 was produced exclusively for the Coca-Cola Company from 1956 to 1959. The very narrow width of this machine has made it a highly collectible machine for both the veteran collector as well as newcomers to the hobby. These machines, when new, were very popular with storeowners because they didn’t take up a lot of floor space. They were always painted what has become the classic Coca-Cola red and white. It can vend 44 8-ounce bottles, and pre-cools 9. The Vendo 44 that appears here is a machine that we restored at Vintage Vending.

Every soda machine we restored at Vintage Vending followed the same process. First the machine was completely disassembled and all painted parts were sandblasted. All other parts were re-chromed, powder-coated, repainted or cleaned. The coin mechanism was re-plated and rebuilt. Automotive bodywork was performed on all of the sandblasted parts. The machine was painted with PPG automotive paint. Then the machine was reassembled with a new refrigeration compressor and all electrical was replaced. Also, this machine has been modified to vend 12-ounce cans in addition to bottles.

Dimensions:
57 1/2” high x 16” wide x 15 1/2” deep

Weight: 225 lbs.

Manufactured by:

The Vendo Company

Kansas City, Missouri

This item is not for sale. We show restored items in this blog to encourage discussion, prompt questions and further the hobby.

To view more pictures of the completed restoration visit the RetroPlanet.com Museum.

What do you do when you have a couple of undesirable, enormous and basically worthless Vendo 144 soda machines? You turn them into restroom doors. These are photos of the restrooms that were in our retail store in Salem, NH. We took two Vendo 144 doors and restored them to like new condition and bolted them to a couple of solid doors. If you try this, keep in mind that they are heavy and you may have to reinforce the doorjamb and hinges. But the extra work is worth it; the doors always received great compliments and a second look from everyone who saw them.

1960 Coca-Cola Vendo Soda Machines

This is a Vendo Company brochure announcing their available soda vending machine line for the year in 1960. Note the Vendo 44, which was introduced in 1956, was still being manufactured. This was a very popular model, and tens of thousands of these were manufactured.

As the Vendo soda machines were modernized and improved, they were also getting larger, as you can see in this photo of a Vendo V-304-4 Multi-Drink model. This machine was capable of vending 304 regular or king (10 oz.) bottles, as well as cooling an additional 36 bottles. It could vend up to 4 different beverages. With its large capacity, this vendor was designed for high-traffic areas.

Blog-in with any comments you may have.

Coca-Cola Vending Machine Conversion Kits

Beginning in the 1950’s, the trend among soda machines was to offer vendors with multiple flavor selections. What was to be done with all of the single-selection soda dispensing machines already in use? The Selectivend Corporation came up with a solution. They introduced conversion kits for the more popular Coca-Cola Vendo machines. The conversion kits could be installed, changing a single-selection machine to a multivendor, able to dispense up to twelve different flavors.

Some of the models that kits were available for include the Vendo V39, V144, V216 and the V83. This idea may have been innovative, but it never really caught on, as the conversions were pretty involved, and once done, the machines were most likely very troublesome.

Maybe you have some feedback about this blog. We’d love to hear from you.

Service Manuals for Coca-Cola Vendo 81, 44 & 39 Soda Machines

At the Retroplanet.com site we are offering free downloads of PDFs of service manuals for three models of Coca-Cola soda machines from the 1950’s. They are the Vendo 81, 44 and 39. These PDFs can be found at the Retroplanet PDF Library.

It is important to note that in the beginning of the manual you will see photos of vending machines that were restored by us at Vintage Vending. They may have been restored to look different from the machine you may have. The rest of the manual PDFs are of the actual manual and schematics. There are also photos and parts lists. Our hope is that these photos are of help to you.

The soda machines we have restored are not for sale. We show restored items in this blog to encourage discussion, prompt questions and further the hobby.

The Vendo V-81’s and VMC-81 Soda Machines, Similarities & Differences

The Vendo Company eventually merged with its rival, the Vendorlator Manufacturing Company in 1956, but originally they were two separate entities building some very similar soda machines. In the mid 1950’s the Vendo Company was manufacturing the Vendo 81 exclusively for The Coca-Cola Company, and the Vendorlator Manufacturing Co. was making VMC-81’s for competing brands like Pepsi, 7-Up, Dr. Pepper and Royal Crown. Once the two companies merged, they continued to make machines under the two product names as before, making The Vendo Company the primary supplier to of the soft drink market.

There were three V-81 models manufactured by the Vendo Company from the mid to the late 1950’s. There was the Vendo V-81A, V-81B and V-81D. Up until 1956, Coca-Cola machines were painted a solid red, like the Vendo V-81A. Beginning in 1956 with the V-81B, The Coca-Cola company painted their machines red and white to emphasize Coke’s “clean and refreshing” image. The “Coca-Cola” logo that had been smaller and positioned closer to the bottle door was repositioned to be centered on the space to the right of the bottle door and the logo was enlarged. The logo was also made more prominent by being embossed in red on a white background, instead of in white on a red background.

The Vendorlator Manufacturing Company’s competing soda machine was the VMC 81. The Vendo 81 and the VMC-81 both held a total of 81 bottles for vending. Space inside the machine allowed for the pre-cooling of 17 additional bottles. Both machines had nine interior shelves, allowing them to vend up to nine different soda flavors. They used “slant shelves” that could be adjusted to accommodate different bottle sizes ranging from 6 ½ to 12 ounces. That flexibility makes these machines very popular today, since you are able to fill them with almost any soda, beer or wine coolers. These soda machines have the classic upright, “round-cornered” cabinet design of the 1950’s. Both the V-81A and V-81B are referred to as “small door” models, and the V-81D is called the “large door” model. This came about because the V-81D had a different coin mechanism that necessitated a larger door. The coin mechanism was redesigned to give change back, where previously the coin boxes only took nickels. The bottle doors in both the Vendo and VMC-81’s had lights placed within them to illuminate the bottles.

1958 was the last year of production for round-cornered soda machines made by The Vendo Company, with the exception of the Vendo 44. All of the Coca-Cola Company Vendo 81’s and the various brands of VMC-81’s are very collectible today. The Vendo 81’s are the most desirable of all the different models of Coke machines manufactured throughout the 1950’s. Fewer VMC-81’s were produced than Vendo 81’s, and of all the brands embossed on the VMC-81’s, Royal Crown soda machines are the most rare and collectible with the 7-Up machines close behind. Any of these soda machines would be quite a statement in any gameroom, den or office.

Dimensions: 53.75 in. high x 25 in. wide x 17.5 in. deep
Weight: 286 lbs.

Please blog in and tell us about your soda machine collection. We’d love to hear about your acquisition and restoration stories. If you have questions about your restoration, blog in and ask us as we’ve done many ourselves and would enjoy being of help to you.

Vendo Bottle Decapper

The Vendo Coca-Cola Bottle Decapper soda machine was manufactured between 1948 and 1949. It was very innovative for the time. A very large vending machine, it automatically opened a bottle of Coke, dispensed it into a cup, and then vended the cup to the customer without them ever coming into contact with the bottle. It could vend 194 bottles of Coke, and dispensed them into 6 oz. cups. These machines predated the “pre-mix” dispensers. Being very expensive models, only 251 of them were sold, making them very rare today.

Manufactured by:
Vendo Company
7209 N. Ingram Ave.
Fresno, CA

Dimensions: 78 in. high x 46 in. wide x 19 in. deep
Weight: 825 lbs.

Are you fortunate enough to own one of these Decapper models? Or perhaps you have something interesting to add. Blog in and let us know.

The Vendo Company History

The Vendo Company is known worldwide as having been a leader in the manufacture of vending machines for more than 50 years. Vendo was founded as a small company in 1937 in Kansas City, Missouri as a manufacturer of bottled soft drink vending machines. Prior to this, early vendors had not been coin operated machines, but rather self-serve coolers packed with ice. This system relied on the customers’ honesty.

The first coin-operated vending machines appeared in the early 1880’s. They were first used to dispense postcards and books. These early models did not work well, often jamming. They also did not have the necessary safeguards and could not distinguish between a coin and a slug.

In the late 1930’s, two brothers named Elmer and John Pierson saw a need for improvement to the earlier designs and took out a patent for a vending lid that could be added to existing coolers. This lid called “The Red Top”, was simple, reliable and inexpensive. The lid was locked on top of the cooler and could be opened after a coin was inserted. The lid rotated to the next available bottle, eliminating the need to dig through the ice. At first the lids were added to Frigidaire and Westinghouse coolers that were already in use. Vendo then began buying coolers from Westinghouse and outfitting them with The Red Top and selling the resulting vending machines under the Vendo name. Early examples of this were the Vendo Junior and the Vendo Master (both from the late 30’s to early 40’s). In the 40’s, a compressor was added to soft drink bottle coolers, eliminating the need for ice altogether.

Red Top lids went to war during WWII, after the US War Department declared that soft drinks were necessary to the morale of military personnel. 5,000 Red Tops were made to be placed in military training camps and wartime factories. Vendo also manufactured radar detection systems which aided in the war effort. After the war, Vendo went back to designing soda vending machines, and produced the V-83 in 1946. The V-83 was Vendo’s first mass-produced upright coin-operated machine. A nickel was inserted, and then you simply had to lift the small door to get your bottle of Coke. This model’s great success was followed in 1949 by another highly successful vendor—the V-39.

In the 1950’s Vendo diversified its product line and produced machines that could vend other items like hot food, ice cream and milk. They also experimented with fully automated restaurants, convenience stores and drive-ins that were served only by vending machines. Vendo merged with its competitor, Vendorlator in 1956. They had, like Vendo, been founded in 1937. But where Vendo worked mainly with Coca-Cola, Vendorlator had been working with both Pepsi-Cola and Royal Crown. The merger of these two companies made Vendo the primary supplier to the soft drink market. Vendo also went public in 1956 and their stock began trading on the New York Stock Exchange in 1961 and continued to for the next 20 years. Vendo also expanded internationally, working with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in Japan starting in 1962, where they manufactured Vendo beverage coolers. They also licensed operations in England and Mexico. In 1964 they opened new facilities and contracted out to Belgium, Australia, Italy, Germany, France and Canada. The 60’s also brought Vendo’s introduction of the canned soft drink dispensers.

In the 1970’s, due to the energy crisis, vending machines were determined to be nonessential and the vending industry began to suffer. Vendo left Kansas City and sold its snack vendor division. In 1988 Vendo was bought by the Sanden Corporation of Japan. This infused new life into the Vendo company, and led to many innovations in vending machine design. These include programmable electronic vending machines, high-capacity vendors that can hold plastic bottles in many shapes and sizes, and machines that will take a debit card. Today Vendo is expanding into territories like Africa, Latin America, the Middle East and Eastern Europe.

Not only has Vendo produced many highly collectible vendors in their past, but they also continue to be a significant presence in the manufacturing marketplace.

Blog in to add to the information presented here. We’d love to hear from Vendo machine collectors or anyone who remembers using them.

The Coca-Cola Vendo 6-Case Vertical Cooler

I like this machine, but this upright cooler never really caught on with collectors. I would guess that’s because of its size. I refer to it as a cooler because there is no coin mechanism. Therefore, it’s not fair to call it a soda machine, even though it looks like a Vendo 81 except for the glass door on the right side. Vendo did make a version of this machine with a coin mechanism and it was called the Vendo 110. But if you have the space and are looking for a machine to restore, this is a good candidate. There are no coin or vending mechanisms to mess with and because they were self-service coolers and not vending machines, they were usually kept indoors so you can still find them in pretty good shape. The shelves inside are adjustable so it will hold different size bottles, including longneck beer bottles. Judging by the name I’d guess it holds 144 bottles; 110 ready to vend and 34 pre-cooled. I don’t recall us ever restoring one at Vintage Vending but we did own quite a few over the years.

Vendorlator also made this machine in Pepsi, Royal Crown, Dr. Pepper and (not 100% sure, but would assume) 7-up.

Size:
63” high
32.5” wide
18” deep

Weight: 200 pounds

Produced from the late 40’s to mid 50’s

Manufactured by:
Vendo Company
7209 N. Ingram Ave.
Fresno, CA

If you have ever restored one of these, please ad to the blog with some restoration tips.

The Vendo Coin Changer

Manufactured between the late 1940’s and the mid 1950’s, the Vendo Coin Changer was originally designed for use in lunchrooms beside the Vendo V-83s. This machine gave the appropriate number of nickels in exchange for a dime or quarter that could then be used in the soda vending machine. Keep in mind that up until 1959 soda vending machines were only able to take nickels.

The coin changer was mounted on the wall beside the soda vendor, or placed on a stand beside it. Sometimes they were mounted right onto the side on the V-83. There were only two styles of the coin changer manufactured. The earlier version was a simpler design that was unable to give an indication to the customer when it was out of nickels. In the later version, a window in the upper left of the machine face would display an “Empty” sign when it was out of change. They were manually operated and did not need electricity to function.

A paper insert was placed under the Plexiglas on the face of the coin changer. The most common signs were those advertising Coca-Cola, but there were other brands also displayed.

Capacity: $20.00 in nickels
Dimensions: 15.5 in. high x 11.5 in. wide x 5 in. deep

Manufactured by:
Vendo Company
7209 N. Ingram Ave.
Fresno, CA

Blog in and tell us if you have one of these and have ever used one. What brands of soda have you seen on these?