VAR Selects Cash Drawer Designed For 4-Million-Plus Cycle Performance

Fareway Stores is a privately held retailer with 87 grocery stores located throughout Iowa, Illinois, and Nebraska. Even though Fareway, which has been in business since 1938, continues to uphold many of its early traditions such as closing for business on Sundays, it doesn't feel the same way about its POS equipment.

Since 1992, POS VAR Midlands Business Equipment has supplied Fareway Stores with POS equipment such as scanners, terminals, and APG cash drawers. The VAR targets the grocery, hospitality, cafeteria, c-store, liquor store, and general retail markets. In 1998, Midlands Business Equipment upgraded some of Fareway Stores' facilities to APG's Series 100 cash drawers, which provided the grocery retailer with a small footprint, yet ample space for cash, coupons, checks, and other media.

Initially, Midlands Business Equipment had reservations about reselling the heavy-duty Series 100 cash drawers, which use plastic in some parts of the drawer construction. "I called APG directly and told them if Fareway Stores experienced any problems with any of the cash drawers I was going to return them all," says Vern Blasberg, vice president at Midlands Business Equipment. "That was August 1998. Today, I have yet to replace any of the Series 100 cash drawers." Midlands Business Equipment's confidence was boosted further after learning that APG designs its cash drawers to handle more than 4 million cycles. Also, even though some parts of the cash drawer are made with heavy-duty plastic, APG uses steel ball bearings on the Series 100 cash drawer slides to ensure long product life.

Recently, the grocery store retailer opted to update some of its older POS equipment at some of its stores to keep pace with grocery store technology. Because of the past success of the Series 100 cash drawers, Fareway Stores is once again looking to Midlands Business Equipment to upgrade more of its legacy cash drawers with the APG Series 100 cash drawers.