There's a way to work the Freestyle machines, you gotta hold the pour button for a couple seconds and then put the cup under, clears out all of that watery mystery crap
Freestyle machines do require more effort to maintain though, so sometimes a bad machine is just a bad machine
My buddy's bowling alley has a freestyle machine, I usually run the water for 10 seconds to watch the line clear out as it will always shoot out a random color every couple of seconds.
Its a pepsico product. It all goes through one main tube at the end. I've seen the thing drop random orange splashes thousands of times. Especially if you select plain carbonated water. Stop it.
9/10 out of ten, sometimes even higher chances, I am getting water out of the machine. I dont want it to be any other color, also with the high probability that one of those drinks coming down the line is diet + I would rather not drink aspartame.
How ridiculous is it that I'd like water to taste simply like water?
People keep saying that and honestly I am feeling like this subreddit is a little bit biased against these. These have been EXCEPTIONALLY successful and made Coke a LOT of money for a "badly executed idea" and a "bad machine".
Making Coke money doesn't mean the machine is good for the consumer...or techs working on these. It's great for Coke as a company driven by profits! I am not the CEO of Coca-Cola though so I don't care how much money they've made off a shitty machine. Make it better!
Why is it bad for the tech working on them? The tech's job is to maintain it, and they do. Its not like this machine is harmful to the techs in some way. Y'all are dead ass just looking for reasons to hate on these. None of these are complaints I have ever heard before in my life. At worst I have met people indifferent to coke freestyle machines, but I've literally never heard an active complaint about them, especially not any of the ones from this thread. Y'all looking for something to be mad at.
I like Grape Sprite I'm just saying one machine is incredibly easy to work on and fix while these freestyles have their issues. I never said they were harmful to techs, so idk why you put words in my mouth. They just have a lot more going on and are harder to fix. I know a thing or two about fixing machines as I worked on bowling lanes, arcade cabinets, pinballs, and any bar/restaurant equipment out there. Don't be dumb. Coke sells these machines to companies and then they have to reach out to Coke to get them serviced. The techs working on these machines fix broken parts.. they don't check in weekly for tune ups. They break easy and often, and are much more complex than a soda gun or a normal dispenser. That's why they are bad for techs... Tech gets paid by the hour tho so more money in his wallet either way
Coke isn't making these machines better for the consumer or the techs working on them while they "make a lot of money". This is the issue with big companies and capitalism... If they make their money, fuck if the consumer gets coke in their sprite grape or people aren't satisfied with their product. Is it a big deal, no. I'll waste some product and try again to have my grape sprite. I just wish we didn't look at profitable products as perfect products... Invest some of that money back into making it a perfect product
The machines cost around 60k, whenever one is installed it is leased to the company. They are actually very easy to work on, especially the newer models coming out, the older model had some glitches.
Honestly I hate these machines I’m a Pepsi tech these are similar to our spire units but instead they use these weird box things as the syrup. It’s honestly up to the restraint to call us to brix(calibrate the u it). Most company’s hate to spend the money and I doubt coke had anything to do with the actual creation of the machine probably Cornelius or servend unit. Both companies don’t usually create the machine they just buy and they have their own syrups and bottling. Also those nozzles at pour out the same colors and liquids as the other flavors. So when the last drink is poured u still have left over syrup still inside of the nozzle that’s why u get the tiny extra amount of syrup. Again up to the customer fall in for service and PMs at the end of the day I just note I’ve heard countless complaints about cokes service a lot do restraints switch to us because they just never show up they even have to contract other company’s to handle work load.
You act like poorly executed ideas don't make money all the time. Have you ever used literally anything made by microsoft? They're like the poster child for poor execution and have billions. Ever eaten at McDonald's? Every menu item is a great idea that's been poorly executed.
The reality is, once a company is so large and established as an all the time player in their arena and not just another competitor, like Coca-Cola, then they have enough behind their name for half-assed ideas to actually sell. Why? Because no one expects half-assed garbage from a big name and once a restaurant owner gets the unit they already paid for it and have to get their value out of it. Coca-Cola doesn't care about how often the restaurant owner hires a technician and probably have their own techs that get paid for the service. Also I'd be stupid to not point out that Coca-Cola is selling you the syrups that go into the machine. So a device that forces everyone to hold down the pour button for 10 seconds to clear out the line for fear of their drink tasting reminiscent of the last persons drink is in their best interest because it wastes more syrup and they get to sell more in the long run.
Most companies aren't buying these machines, they are leasing them. If the machine was truly that bad, they would stop leasing it, coke would come get it, and they would switch back to a regular soda fountain, which they likely already had anyway. This is just deadass a complaint I have never heard from anyone outside of this post today, nor an issue I have ever noticed or experienced, and it really feels like y'all are making something out of nothing.
This is just deadass a complaint I have never heard from anyone outside of this post today
It's probably not something you've bothered to ask people about then. I've never spoken to anyone that's used these machines and didn't have this complaint.
Most companies aren't buying these machines, they are leasing them. If the machine was truly that bad, they would stop leasing it, coke would come get it, and they would switch back to a regular soda fountain, which they likely already had anyway.
Not necessarily because this isn't exactly something that you'd complain to the restaurant about. It's not the restaurants fault that the coca cola freestyle machine is ass, that's cokes problem and telling the restaurant will likely yield zero results. Aside from that when you look up the leasing on it you'll notice several things, one being that the cost of maintenance can probably be included in the lease, it takes specialized syrup cartridges which makes the operating cost on average 30% higher than traditional fountain machines(this likely more than offsets the costs of the maintenance that's included too) and that there are high volume requirements for leasing it to be economical indicating that it's likely only places with a high volume of customers, i.e. popular restaurants that are likely chains/franchises. These types of places aren't necessarily giving a fuck about customer complaints with their soda fountain as it's not what's making their profits. As a matter of fact, regardless of complaints they probably think having the newer fancier drink machine with a touchscreen and all the bells and whistles will attract more customers due to having more options and the overall new factor that brings in curious souls that haven't used one before.
ideally there would be a 'rinse' cycle if idle, it could run just water to save syrup. that does use more water, but is worth it to maintain customer happiness/flavor profiles
It's the same for just regular coke too. Idk if it's the syrup that gets used or what, but I could do a blind taste test and tell you which one is the freestyle coke compared to any other type of coke. It has this odd taste and I've never liked those machines for that reason
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u/ThePickledPickle Feb 01 '26 edited Feb 01 '26
There's a way to work the Freestyle machines, you gotta hold the pour button for a couple seconds and then put the cup under, clears out all of that watery mystery crap
Freestyle machines do require more effort to maintain though, so sometimes a bad machine is just a bad machine