The best
and brightest
By Alfonso Flores
Micro markets, nutrition and coffee
round out this year's category winners.
A
utomatic Merchandiser and VendingMarketWatch.com
readers love new products. They showed it again this
year by voting for their top sellers in the 2013 Readers'
Choice New Products of the Year contest through an online
ballot at VendingMarketWatch.com/awards. More than 300
votes were submitted in seven categories.
This year's winners are consistent with the vending industry's
key growth trends of 2013 — micro
market friendly products,
items considered nutritious and America's love
of coffee.
New products
of the year
The cookie category winner, RUGER®, LLC's
RUGER® Strawberry
Wafers, is served in
multi-functional pouches
perfect for traditional vending or
micro markets, as is the diverse
packaging sizes of the candy category
winner Mars Chocolate North
America DOVE® Brand Silky
Smooth Cookies and Crème bar.
The food category winner, AdvancePierre Foods Pierre Drive Thru™
Deluxe sandwich, fts the grow26
Automatic Merchandiser
VendingMarketWatch.com
April 2013
ing micro market trend by offering
restaurant-style food.
Wellness focused, the snack category winner, Kellogg's® Special
K® Cracker Chips is regarded as a
healthy choice snack low in sodium
and calories. In addition, the cold
beverage category winner, Nestlé
Sweet Leaf Tea, is viewed as a
healthy beverage alternative, made
with pure cane sugar and no highfructose corn syrup.
Consistent with the demand
for café-quality offce coffee, the
Barista Prima Coffeehouse®
Vanilla Latte Café Beverage for
the Keurig ® Vue® system, has won
the hot beverage category.
The last category is representative of a consumer favorite — Mrs.
Freshley's® Cinnabon® Honey
Bun which won in this year's pastry category.
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