#Vending Machines

4 items

Video thumbnail — Who Makes The BEST Cheese & Peanut Butter Crackers? Keebler, Austin, Munchies, Lance, Food Lion
Food 1932–present

Austin Crackers

The unnaturally orange cracker sandwiches in the crinkly six-pack — cheese crackers hugging peanut butter, dispensed by every vending machine, gas station, and lunchbox of the 90s. Austin wasn't the fancy option. Austin was the one that was actually there.

Video thumbnail — Combos Snacks Commercial From 1993 - Roll Models
Food 1970s–present

Combos

The pretzel tube injected with cheese — vending-machine royalty and the official fuel of every 90s road trip. A cylinder of salt and neon-orange filling that somehow never existed at home, only at gas stations, rest stops, and the machine outside the pool.

Video thumbnail — Homies: How These Capsule Toys Shaped Chicano Identity
Toys 1998–present

Homies

Two-inch figurines from the supermarket vending machine — Smiley, Droopy, Eight Ball and the rest of the barrio crew, each with a stance and a story. You fed the machine pocket change, cranked the knob, and hoped the capsule held the one Homie you were missing.

Video thumbnail — Stretchable sticky hand
Toys 1990–2005 peak

Sticky Hands

A stretchy rubber hand dangling from a string that you slapped against whatever surface was closest — a table edge, a sibling, a locker. Sticky Hands lasted about three weeks before they accumulated every piece of lint and hair in a three-foot radius and stopped sticking to anything.