The Hands-Off Human Touch

There seems to be a disconnect between the desire to provide “Journalism with a human touch” and the sale of the periodicals via vending machine!

Once the man on the left moved I was able to see this sign:

These vending machines don’t even work.

When a prospective customer idled in front of the machine for a few seconds, an attendant would scurry over from his seat to ask if they wanted to make a purchase. Then the attendant would unlock the machine, open the door, allow the customer to peruse more closely, and transact the sale if it transpired.

Effectively the vending machine was a shelf, nothing more. It did light up the magazines, but at the cost of extra floor space, electricity and complexity of purchase.  It seems an imbalanced trade-off.

Of course, we do not know the full story.

Perhaps there was not a shelf to be had, in which case the vending machines might have been the best option, by virtue of being the only option.  Not good, but perhaps good enough.