JFC and i-Free encourage schoolchildren to order fruit by mobile phone
i-Free, a leading provider of content services in Russia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan, has teamed up with JFC, the largest importer of bananas, in a promotion entitled «Send an SMS; Get a Banana.» From now on, St. Petersburg schoolchildren can order fresh fruit from JFC vending machines right in the school by sending a text message from their mobile phone.
JFC (trading as Bonanza!) has set up vending machines to sell bananas in a few St. Petersburg schools. The project was applauded by City Hall and welcomed by school kids and their parents. As an extra convenience for consumers, each JFC machine comes with an i-Vend GSM module, developed by i-Free to support vending by mobile phone.
To get a banana, a child just needs to send a text message to 4444. The fruit will come with a phone screen pic depicting scenes from the life of Bonanza! fruit characters. A text message costs about 10 rubles, depending on provider.
The Send an SMS; Get a Banana promotion is good for both the kids and their parents. The kid can always have a snack even when he has no cash in his pocket, and the parents can make this happen at a distance, by putting money into their child's mobile phone account.
«Just days after kick-off we saw ample evidence of how great this project is. Kids are used to texting each other, and they totally loved this new way of using their phones,» said Dmitry Gerasimov, who oversees the project from the JFC side. «Mobile vending has a bright future ahead of it: it's clear and comfortable for consumers, and it boosts sales and optimizes machine maintenance. In times of crisis, it's important to get maximum efficiency out of every dollar you invest.»
In addition to mobile vending, the i-Vend GSM module supports remote auditing of vending machines: the operator tracks sales, merchandise stocks, available change, etc. in real time and gets instantly alerted in case of a problem. i-Vend performs a range marketing functions as well, tracking consumer activity, identifying consumers by phone number, automatically identifying and rewarding the most active shoppers. The device is an excellent tool for all kinds of promo campaigns and loyalty schemes targeting any consumer groups. Vendors can use it to gather statistics, conduct consumer surveys, and so on.
In this retail format, every consumer gets a certain amount of content in their mobile phone, which is a great incentive for repeat purchases and consumer loyalty.
«We are pleased to see that our high-tech product is not just a commercial asset for the benefit of vending companies, but is really useful to a great number of people; in this case, to schoolchildren and their parents,» said Andrei Pristinsky, who oversees the Telemetry business at i-Free. «In partnership with JFC, we are planning to bring our vending machines to more schools by the beginning of the new school year, so more kids can order fruit by mobile phone.»
