Everything we know about running these, before you decide.
This page is the unglamorous version: what the week actually involves, how the money breaks down, what you'd need in place, and the two dated changes coming in 2027 that anyone selling you a machine ought to mention.
Lease a fridge from us, buy your own through us, or put our back office behind fridges you already run. Hosting is a different thing — if you just have space, that page is here.
Pick how much you want to carry.
All three get the same equipment and the same back office. What changes is who owns the fridge, who takes the risk if a site disappoints, and how much capital is tied up.
Lease
We own the fridge and lease it to you. You trade it, you keep the trade.
- No capital tied up in hardware
- We stay on the hook for the equipment itself
- Easiest way to test whether you like the work
- Convertible to ownership later if you want it
Best if you'd rather risk your time than your savings.
Buy
You own the machines outright, supplied through the manufacturer's UK distributor with our setup and training.
- Every penny of the trade is yours
- The asset sits on your balance sheet
- We configure, install and get you trading
- Sensible once you know the sites work
Best if you're building a fleet and want no ongoing lease.
Software only
You already run fridges on the same platform as ours. Keep everything as it is and put Maimava behind it.
- Sales to the item, costed against your own supplier invoices
- VAT records, host statements, self-billed invoices
- Per-box P&L and offline alerts
- No change to your machines, cards or suppliers
Best if the operation works and the paperwork doesn't.
The terms below are the same for everyone. The prices aren't published, because what makes sense for one box at one site isn't what makes sense for five — but they aren't made up on the spot either. Tell us which route you're after and we'll send you the package for it, with the numbers in writing.
The terms are settled. Only the numbers move.
These are the same terms we've put in front of everyone who has asked so far. Nothing here is a negotiating position — it's what the agreement actually says, so you can decide whether the shape works before anyone talks about price.
| What | Lease | Buy | Software only |
|---|---|---|---|
| How long you're committed | Twelve months minimum, then three months' written notice whenever you want out. | Not at all — it's your machine from the day you pay for it. | Month to month. Stop when you like. |
| Getting it live | One fixed charge, the same either way: site survey, delivery and positioning, the card facility, lane layout, the product catalogue built from your own costings, recognition trained on your actual lines, installation, first fill, training, and 90 days of support. Fixed whatever the work takes. | Nothing to install. We help get your history in. | |
| Ending up owning it | Three quarters of every rental comes off the price of the machine, so you can buy it outright whenever you like — the longer you wait, the smaller the balance. You're never obliged to. | Yours from day one. | Not applicable. |
| If it doesn't work out | After the twelve months: three months' notice, a fixed collection charge, and nothing else. You keep everything the machine took. | Sell it — it's an asset you own. | Cancel. Your data exports with you. |
| Care plan | Free for the first twelve months, including one site visit a year, then an annual fee if you renew. Continuous monitoring, remote diagnosis, price and product changes you ask for, recognition training as you add lines, and warranty claims raised and chased with the factory in Mandarin. | Support by email and WhatsApp, included. | |
| Back office | Maimava is free for six months, then a small percentage of what the machines take, with a low monthly minimum. Optional throughout — the fridge works without it, and you can stop paying for it without giving the machine back. | ||
| What it costs to run | The AI service fee, card payments, electricity and insurance come to roughly £39 a month plus up to 1.6% and about 8p a sale on site Wi-Fi — before anything you pay us, and none of it paid to us. Insurance is the cheap line if you add the machine to cover you already hold, and the dear one if you insure it on its own. | Your existing costs, unchanged. | |
| Anything to sign personally | If you trade through a limited company, a director's guarantee — capped at the rentals to the end of the minimum period plus the collection charge, and we have to ask the company first. As a sole trader there's nothing extra: you already stand behind it. | No. | No. |
| VAT | Every figure we quote excludes VAT, charged at the rate in force. If you're registered you reclaim it. If you're not, say so and we'll redo the sums showing what you'd actually pay. | ||
What's deliberately not on this page is the price. Machine prices, monthly rentals, the commissioning charge and the buy-out figures are all in the package we'll send you — one page, in writing, no call required first. Ask for it here.
What a week actually looks like.
This is the part that decides whether you'll enjoy it, and it's the part most equipment sellers skip. One box, trading steadily, is roughly this much of your life.
The restock run
Pull the restock list off your phone — it already knows what sold and what's low — pick the stock, drive over, refill, rotate the dates to the front, wipe the glass. Half an hour on site once you know the box, plus the driving.
The wholesale run
A cash-and-carry trip, or a delivery if your volumes justify it. You need somewhere dry and cool to keep the stock between runs — a garage or a spare room is enough for one or two boxes.
Watching the box
The system alerts you if a fridge drops offline or stops taking payments, so you're not driving over to find out. Refund requests and product suggestions come through from the machine's QR code.
The paperwork
Photograph or upload your supplier invoices; they get read and costed automatically. Your host's statement and invoice generate themselves. VAT records assemble as you go rather than in a panic at quarter end.
The annoying bits
A card reader sulks. A line sells out on a Friday and sits empty till Monday. Something's dated shorter than you thought and has to come out. A site goes quiet in August. None of it is hard, all of it is real.
It's a round, not an app
The software removes the admin, not the driving. If the idea of a weekly restock run in the rain sounds like a chore rather than a job, the software-only route or hosting is the better fit.
The shape of the money — with your numbers.
We won't publish what a box "makes", because it depends almost entirely on footfall and we'd be making it up. What we can do is show you exactly where the money goes, so you can put your own figures in and see the shape.
Per month, one box
Then take off your lease payment, or what the machine costs you spread over its life. That number comes out of our conversation, not a price list.
This is arithmetic on numbers you typed, not a forecast. We have no idea what your site will sell until we've looked at it, and neither does anyone else who quotes you a figure. The defaults are our own trading pattern at one Bristol site — a gym, where a lot of the range is chilled drinks — and yours will differ. Waste, shrinkage and the odd refund aren't in the sums above; on a sealed smart fridge they're small, but they aren't nil.
What has to be in place — and who it falls to.
This depends on the route and on your own situation, so read the table as a map of the conversation rather than a checklist to complete alone. If you already trade in food, run a company, or hold public liability cover, several rows are already answered. If you're starting from nothing, none of it is hard — it's a morning of forms, and we walk through it with you.
| What | Lease | Buy | Software only |
|---|---|---|---|
| Food business registration | Yours — you're the one selling the food. Free, with your local council. | Yours, same as lease. | Already yours; nothing changes. |
| Public liability insurance | Yours, and it should cover the fridge as equipment in your care. | Yours, covering your own machine. | Unchanged. |
| Transport & storage | A car that fits the stock, and somewhere dry and cool between runs. A garage does for one or two boxes. | Whatever you already use. | |
| VAT | Depends on your turnover and any other trade you run — some operators aren't registered at first. Either way the system keeps the records so the decision isn't forced by your paperwork. It's a question for your accountant, not for us. | ||
| A company | Not required — a sole trader can do this. Whether it suits you is a tax and liability question. | Whatever you trade as now. | |
| The site | You can bring your own, or we can hand you scored leads near you. Getting this right matters more than anything else on this page. | Yours already. | |
| What we do | Supply and install the equipment, set up the range and pricing, introduce the wholesale side, train you on the round, and run the back office. | The back office, and help getting your history into it. | |
One cabinet, no coils to jam.
The manufacturer reports more than 150,000 units in service worldwide with over 13,000 operators. That's their figure, not ours — we mention it because it's why servicing and spares aren't a one-man-band risk. What we can tell you first-hand is that ours has been trading since June 2026 and what has and hasn't gone wrong with it.
Go and press the buttons.
Maimava is the software we built to run our own box, and it comes with every route. Both demos below are the real product on a fictitious operator called FERNWAY, read-only, with anonymised figures. No sign-up, nothing to install.
Already running HaHa cabinets?
Our own boxes are HaHa cabinets, so Maimava reads them as they are: no new hardware, no change to your card terminal or your suppliers. If you have one or ten, the software-only route puts the sales, stock, VAT records and host statements in one place from the next restock. Tell us how many you run, or message us on WhatsApp.
The operator side
What you'd use: sales analytics, restock lists and planogram, catalogue and FIFO costing from your own supplier invoices, filed documents, VAT records, invoicing and monitoring. Role-scoped, so someone who only restocks never sees your margins.
Open the operator demoWhat your hosts see
Every venue hosting one of your boxes gets its own login: near-real-time sales, monthly history with their revenue share, and every invoice you've self-billed them. Month end needs no spreadsheet and no phone call.
See the host portalTwo dated changes you should hear from us first.
Both are public policy, both land after you'd start, and neither is a reason not to do this — but you should hear them before you commit rather than after.
High-caffeine drinks can't be sold to under-16s
England will ban selling energy drinks above 150mg of caffeine per litre to under-16s. The consultation response says vending machines get a blanket restriction with no age-check alternative, and the duty falls partly on whoever controls the premises — so it's a conversation with your sites, not just with your range.
The regulations that define the terms haven't been drafted yet, so exactly which equipment is caught isn't settled. Energy drinks are a meaningful share of takings in a gym; in an office or a warehouse they matter far less. It's one of the things we'd weigh when picking your sites.
Deposit Return Scheme starts
Single-use drinks containers gain a redeemable deposit. It changes the shelf price your customer sees and adds a line to reconcile, and how it reaches vending specifically is still being worked through with the manufacturers.
We're tracking it because it's our problem too. Whatever the handling turns out to be, it'll be built into the software rather than left for you to work out in a spreadsheet.
The site decides it — not the machine.
Almost everyone who loses money at this loses it by putting a good box somewhere quiet. It's the one part we've invested most tooling in.
Footfall that repeats
The same people passing several times a week beat a bigger crowd passing once. Gyms, offices, halls of residence and warehouses all work for that reason.
Can people actually reach it?
A box behind a passcode-controlled door only sells to whoever's inside. We check access before siting, because it's the mistake that's invisible until the numbers arrive.
Scored before you knock
We rank venues near a postcode on footfall, category and how hard they are to get into, so your first approaches go to the ones worth the effort.
Four steps, and you can stop at any of them.
What you've got.
Time, capital, a site, an existing round. We'll say which route fits, including when the answer is "host one instead and keep your evenings".
Your figures, not ours.
We put your actual site or your target area through the same assessment we use for our own boxes, and you see the workings.
A quote and an agreement.
Lease rate or machine price for your situation, what's included, how long, and what happens if you want out. One document, plain English.
Install and first restock.
We install, load the first fill with you, set the range and prices, and stay close through the first few weeks while you find the rhythm.
What people ask at this point.
Is this a franchise?
What does a machine cost, or a lease?
Can I start with a lease and buy later?
How many boxes before this is worth doing?
Do I have to be near Bristol?
What happens when something breaks?
Who owns the sales data?
What if I want to stop?
Tell us where you're starting from.
This goes to the person who stocks the fridges, not a sales team. We'll give you a straight read — including "not yet" or "host one instead" when that's the honest answer.
Rather just ask something?
A question doesn't need a form. WhatsApp reaches the person who'd be answering it anyway.
WooSee Limited · Bristol · Mon–Sat