I was also particularly pleased to catch sight of a couple of charging consoles for mobile phones, IPods, games consoles and the like. Called Chargebox they are owned and operated by Photo-Me, and seem simplicity itself to use - simply plug the phone in, pay for your chosen length of charge time (30 minutes for £1, 60 minutes at £1.50 or 90 minutes for £2), confirm various details and the phone is locked securely into the machine.

Going back to the trek from station to LIW, if you weren't fit when you started you sure as hell were by the time you reached the show!

Far be it from me to complain, but during my visit to KioskCom (report appears elsewhere in this issue) I felt the need for a caffeine boost, and was in for a shock. Now the only ‘watering hole' in the exhibition hall at Olympia was a seemingly temporary affair more or less in the centre of things operated by Leith's.

There may have been white table cloths on the (too few) tables, but that's where any similarity to a good service finished. The coffee itself was poor, the service matched, and the overall state of cleanliness maintained the standard.

Can it be that in these days of never-ending comparisons with high street coffee shops - and how other establishments (vending included, of course!) have to match the quality and choice - a front line venue like Olympia can still miss the message and be satisfied with the level of service such as I and other visitors (not to mention exhibitors) had to endure? Unlike AVEX, there was only one stand - GWD Media - with a working coffee machine. Unfortunately, I discovered it too late!

Despite the economic gloom and doom - and particularly as, traditionally, the fortunes of the vending industry have tended to mirror those of the economy in general, for example, with sales falling along with employment levels - there seems to be a really healthy interest in the industry out there right now.

The stands offering vending solutions of one kind or another at the recent Leisure Industry Week exhibition were very well attended, and the same can be said for those at the KioskCom show a week or two later.

To make the point that these were not isolated incidents, I spoke with the organisers of the very recent Vending Paris exhibition, France's re-named national show, as well as those behind our own fast-approaching Nivex North event, and they both said that they had experienced record levels of interest from prospective visitors.

Furthermore, coming from a different angle - and to follow unashamedly the tack started on this page last month - the number of visitors to the VI website in September rocketed again, showing an increase over August (itself a best-yet month) of 48.5 per cent!

This apparent upswing in interest is a great backcloth against which the AVA can promote AVEX.