Imperial Company, a vending, food and coffee service business, officially held a grounds-opening ceremony and grand opening for its new $8 million facility in Rogersville in late June.
Imperial specializes in vending services, micromarkets, catering, corporate dining and coffee service. The company will officially begin its relocation to Rogersville in the summer of 2023, with a grand opening ceremony on June 27, 2024. The 67,000-square-foot facility marks Imperial’s continued investment in its expansion efforts in the Springfield metropolitan area.
Imperial staff say the company is running a hydration program that provides businesses in southwest Missouri with Gatorade, Powerade, ice machines, dispensers and other ways to stay cool. (Photo by Shannon Kaye)
Headquartered in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Imperial started as a one-man coffee service company in 1979 and has grown to become one of the largest companies in the industry. Today, the company boasts annual sales of more than $195 million and more than 850 employees. According to a company press release, the company serves customers in Oklahoma, Arkansas, Texas, Kansas, Iowa, Illinois and Missouri. Imperial serves more than 9,000 customers.
Imperial will have a presence in the Joplin and Springfield areas after acquiring Kinney Bending and Jackson Brothers of South Bending in 2021. The new Rogersville plant is the company’s third-largest after Tulsa and Oklahoma City and is one of 16 branches for the food service company, according to a press release.
“We are committed to investing in growth and are excited about our expansion into the Springfield market with this new facility,” Imperial president Lance Wharton said in a press release.
Technology that will change the vending industry in unexpected ways
Imperial Company was founded in 1979. The company has grown to employ more than 850 people in seven states. (Photo: Shannon Kaye)
Aside from all the technological advancements, including payment options, not much has changed in the industry since Imperial entered the vending machine business in 1993, said operations manager Jason Douglas.
“For years, vending machines have stayed pretty much the same,” Douglas said on the floor of the new facility in Rogersville, “but probably the biggest change over the years has been technology.”
Each vending machine model is equipped with telemetry and radar, “which works like a cell phone signal,” according to Douglas. This technology allows each vending machine to track its inventory, so Imperial knows exactly how much of each product is in every vending machine in its inventory at any given time.
“When we pull an order for each machine, we know exactly how much is in there,” Douglas said, “which allows us to fill the machine completely.”
Technology that captures real-time sales and inventory data allows Imperial route drivers to travel to and from sales outlets more efficiently. (Photo: Shannon Kaye)
When a driver leaves the Rogersville plant, the car is loaded with tote bags that are packed in Imperial’s sorting room. Each tote bag is for a specific vending machine in a specific location, and each tote bag contains only the products that need to restock that vending machine.
The sorting room uses a warehouse picking system called LightSpeed, which uses rows of tote bags and color-changing lights to show employees which tote bags need to be filled with which items. Employees fill each machine’s tote bags with the specific items needed, and those totes are loaded onto trucks for delivery.
Cash is no longer king, and alternative payment options are gaining momentum
Douglas said this is a big difference from how things used to be in the vending machine industry.
Imperial officials say they are looking to invest in the technology in their products, such as upgrading to card readers and digital screens. (Photo: Shannon Kaye)
“In the old days, a driver would go out to the truck, pick up a few items, and toss them into the machine,” Douglas says. “Now, all orders are pre-picked and ready to go.”
“This gives us a very specific view of every product on every machine, which helps us in many ways.”
Douglas said that as technological advancements in vending machine management have come along, the industry has also seen a shift in terms of payment options, which often relied on the latest technological developments. In recent years, options such as credit card readers and Apple Pay have skyrocketed in popularity.
Pre-loaded totes mean less food and beverages stay loaded onto hot trucks, and streamlined procedures help reduce waste. Imperial doesn’t charge for vending equipment, and it bases its machines and products on the size and location of your company.
“We’re slowly but surely moving away from cash,” Douglas said. “The less we have to handle cash and coins, the better for everyone.”
The trucks that deliver cold foods and drinks are packed with the latest technology, including engine-powered refrigeration units and advanced temperature monitoring programs. Imperial is always looking to update its fleet with the latest technology. Imperial has 98 trucks that deliver cold foods to its 16 branches, but the company has about 600 vehicles under its management, said John Slaughter, Imperial’s chief operating officer.
“The next technology will probably be solar panels,” said Michael Dry, vice president of food production and processing. Dry said the new facility in Rogersville cost about $8 million to build.
Imperial’s micro-market concept now accounts for over 50% of revenue.
Imperial’s Micro Market features a variety of food options with a self-checkout kiosk system. (Photo: Shannon Kaye)
Imperial, which began as a coffee service company and later branched out into vending machines, has expanded into a number of new business ventures since its founding. In addition to vending machines and coffee, Imperial also offers hydration services, including vending water and soda, and delivering Powerade and Gatorade by the pallet to customers.
Additionally, Wharton said Imperial is also introducing a new way of selling that it calls “micro-markets.” Essentially, think of unmanned, open markets stocked with fresh food, snacks and drinks, with self-checkout kiosks and cameras to prevent theft. The markets are customized for businesses and their employees, bringing convenience stores to break rooms.
The market concept now accounts for more than 50 percent of Imperial’s total annual revenue, Wharton said. The markets are set up in businesses, college campuses and other locations and are accessible 24 hours a day. Even though the kiosks are unmanned, theft is not as common, Wharton said.
The micro markets are equipped with cameras to prevent theft, but Imperial officials say the loss rate at these markets is low. (Photo: Shannon Kaye)
“If you need any encouragement that humanity hasn’t been completely thrown in the trash yet, out of all the micromarkets that we have, the actual loss number, theft, is about 2% to 3%,” Wharton says, “and in some places it can be even higher.”
Imperial’s market route manager, Stephen Robinson, said: “The market concept is growing at a tremendous pace and Imperial expects revenues in this sector to continue to increase annually in the coming years.”
“This is truly the next wave of vending machines and is poised to grow at an unprecedented pace,” Robinson said.
Freshly baked goods available daily at markets and shops
Imperial sells prepared meals in vending machines in some of its offices, so employees can purchase packaged meals during their lunch break. (Photo by Shannon Kaye)
Imperial’s vending machines and mini-consoles stock hundreds of products that are baked or cooked fresh daily at its headquarters in Tulsa, Okla. The company boasts about 50 different recipes and produces about 7 million products each year, Dry said.
Orders are dispatched from the branches in the morning and baking begins the next day at 4 a.m. in an in-house kitchen at the Tulsa headquarters. The food is then loaded onto trucks for delivery to the company’s 16 branches, including the Rogersville branch.
Dry said Imperial has the fastest turnaround in the vending industry, with products made one morning being in its vending machines and mini-supermarkets within 24 hours.
“No one else can make it as fast or as fresh as we can,” Dry says. “We engineered and fully integrated our manufacturing process.”
This water dispenser, available for hire from Imperial, can make carbonated and flavored water. (Photo: Shannon Kaye)
Given Imperial’s size and history, the food production side of the company and the logistics of delivering those products to seven states daily are impressive, said general manager Emily Kinney.
“For a company our size to be able to produce our own fresh ingredients every day is amazing to me,” Kinney said.
There is a lot of pride in Imperial Company’s food production division, Wharton said.
“If we make one person sick, the whole world knows, so we put a lot of time and energy into this,” Wharton said. “We take a lot of pride and money into owning our own products and making our own food.”
Ryan Collins
Ryan Collins is a business and economic development reporter for the Springfield Daily Citizen. Collins graduated from Glendale High School in 2011 and then studied journalism and economics at the University of Missouri-Columbia. He previously worked for Bloomberg News. He can be reached at (417) 849-2570 or rcollins@sgfcitizen.org. More articles by Ryan Collins
