NZZ discontinues newspaper vending machines

As reported by Schweiz am Sonntag, NZZ is discontinuing its vending machines at the end of the year. This is in response to digitization: While vending machine sales are declining, demand for digital subscriptions is increasing, said spokeswoman Michèle Ramò in response to an inquiry from the newspaper.

In 2012, NZZ am Sonntag was still operating around 130 vending machines. The most successful one in the Rhaeto-Romanic village of Sent, as the NZZ reported at the time in the report "The fan community" wrote. "11:15 a.m.: Nick Golder, a teacher from Horgen, buys the last of the 25 copies. The competitor's vending machine, on the other hand, is still half full." With the disappearance of the vending machines, remote regions lose a welcome opportunity to buy the newspaper on Sunday.

In doing so, the NZZ is following the general trend of moving away from vending machine sales. Tamedia discontinued the last Tages-Anzeiger vending machines back in 2009 and has also dispensed with this sales channel for the Sonntagszeitung since 2015. Sales of Tamedia titles were also "declining sharply" before the discontinuation, according to spokesman Christoph Zimmer.

Switzerland on Sunday blames the declining interest in the once widespread vending machines not only on digitization, but also on the expansion of early delivery, as well as the spread of gas station stores with newspaper assortments.

Only Ringier is holding on to the newspaper vending machines for the time being. An average of 7,000 issues of SonntagsBlick are still being sold today via the approximately 1,500 vending machines, according to Ringier spokesman Edi Estermann. That is still 500 more vending machines than there are Blick-am-Abend boxes today. However, according to Estermann, Blick and SonntagsBlick operated around 3200 vending machines in the best times and filled them daily. (hae)

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