Before entering into the coffee vending machine business, there is one important thing you need to take into account and that is the coffee vending machine history. The coffee vending machine was created and invented in Pennsylvania, United States by the Rudd-Melikian company in 1947. The coffee vending machine was named the Kwik Kafe. Rudd-Melikian are partners. The name was derived from Cyrus Melikian (1920–2008) and Lloyd Rudd. Cyrus Melikian was an Armenian-American coffee industry pioneer, he credited several inventions that propelled coffee use into the American public. Along with his business partner, Lloyd Rudd, as the inventor of coffee vending machines[ and the first US fresh-brew machine. Furthermore, Cyrus was instrumental in several other inventions, including coffee pods, post-mix vendor icemakers, and in-machine coffee bean grinders.
He initiated the Culinary Institute at Rockland Mansion in Fairmount Park. Melikian also established the Flavor-Maker Culinary Chef’s Training School, and taught there for 10 years. Melikian was awarded with the Person of the Year Award by the Tea & Coffee Trade Journal in 2002.
The machine would drop a paper cup through a chute onto a platform and fill the cup with hot coffee prepared using instant coffee and hot water.The Kwik Kafe took five seconds to prepare a cup of coffee. The Kwik Kafe machines were placed in U.S. locations through the process of franchising. At a 1948 convention in Philadelphia, Lloyd K. Rudd, president of the Rudd-Melikian company, stated that Kwik Kafe machines purveyed 250,000 cups of coffee on a daily basis.
Additional companies that manufactured coffee vending machines in 1947 in the United States include the Manning & Lewis company, Knapway Devices and the Bert Mills Corporation. Some machines in 1947 used a liquid coffee concentrate that was mixed with boiling water, and one such machine charged a nickel for a cup of coffee and dispensed a wooden spoon to mix the cream and sugar. By the year 1955, over 60,000 coffee vending machines existed in the United States.
