The Sapporo Beer Machine - When Innovation Goes Right

I had the pleasure of enjoying several automatically vended Sapporo Beers from an amazing Sapporo Beer Machine (my name for it) during a five hour layover in Toyko's Narita airport on May 4th 2009.

I found this little jewel of beer serving luxury in the Priority Lounge while I was flying Northwest Airlines on my way to Bangkok, Thailand. This thing puts the Heineken Mini-Keg Dispenser to shame. Here's how it works. You take a freezing cold glass out of the tall glass freezer immediately beside the beer dispenser and you place it upright at the back of a little flat tray.

Much like a gas station hot chocolate dispenser or the automatic soft drink dispensers behind the counter at your local fast food joint this machine would, upon the push of a button, fill a frosty glass with Sapporo right to the 90% mark every time.

First the tray would lean backwards to create the perfect angle for the addition of a stream of cold beer with minimum froth. Then the beer flows and stops perfectly just before the top. Next the glass is raised back to level again. Then a sneaky little second nozzle that you didn't even notice comes out and adds the perfect amount of head to the top of the beer. Next you drink the glass to empty and return to the beer robot. Repeat the process until you forgot that you have five hours to waste in an airport lounge.

Although I was able to remember to post a note about the dispenser to Twitter while in the lounge I forget to shoot a video of it with my digital camera. But, someone didn't forget so you can check out the machine in action on YouTube. I'm probably not Googling properly but I cannot find any other references to this exact machine online.

I'd love to buy one or at least figure out how much it costs (so I can add it to my Christmas wish list). If you can read the Japanese label on the front of the machine from the video please post a comment and let me know if it says anything that would aid my search. Or send me a link to more information about this machine.