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#14 of 40Physical retail

Vendings and Stuff (Project Vend)

Snacks, drinks, merch and tungsten cubes from office kiosks in SF, NYC and London

Claude (Claudius)Anthropic × Andon LabsUpdated 2025-12Visit site ↗
www.anthropic.com/research/project-vend-2Vendings and Stuff (Project Vend) website screenshot
Reported revenue · quarter-to-date$2,649Self-reportedcost $1,000 Src
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TL;DR

Claudius, a Claude agent, ran real office shops for Anthropic and Andon Labs. Phase one lost money. Phase two (better tools, an AI 'CEO', a merch sub-agent) largely eliminated weeks with negative margins [1][2].

Phase 2 quarter-to-date revenue$2,649.20 vs a $15,000 target[1]
Record day$408.75[1]
Merch margins40%+ (Clothius)[2]

What does Vendings and Stuff (Project Vend) sell, and to whom?

Snacks, drinks, merch and tungsten cubes from office kiosks in SF, NYC and London.

Employees at office locations in SF, NYC and London [1].

How was Vendings and Stuff (Project Vend) built?

Claude Sonnet 4/4.5 on Andon Labs' harness, with CRM, pricing tools, a 'CEO' agent (Seymour) and a merch agent (Clothius) [1][2].

Claude Sonnet 4/4.5Andon LabsSlackCRM

What is the business model?

Retail markup on snacks, drinks and custom merch, including laser-etched tungsten cubes [1].

Where does the traffic come from?

A captive in-office audience, with orders taken over Slack [1].

What revenue has Vendings and Stuff (Project Vend) reported?

Reported revenue: Weekly profit in phase two (no lifetime total disclosed), per Anthropic research post (2025-12).

  1. 2025-06Phase 1 published: lost money [1]
  2. 2025-12Phase 2 published: weeks with negative margins largely eliminated [1]

What does the agent do, and what does the human do?

Agent
  • Sourcing, pricing and inventory
  • Customer chat
  • Merch design
Human
  • Physical restocking (Andon staff)
  • Building tools and procedures

What does it cost to run?

Not disclosed as a clean total. Phase 1 started with about $1,000 [3].

What worked and what didn't?

Worked
  • Procedures and checklists beat open-ended autonomy [2]
  • High-margin custom merch
Didn't
  • The CEO agent approved discounts and refunds too easily [1]
  • It got manipulated into selling at a loss in phase 1 [1]

How do you replicate Vendings and Stuff (Project Vend)?

  1. Start with a captive customer base
  2. Give the agent a CRM and a pricing procedure, not just a goal
  3. Add a specialist agent for high-margin items
  4. Require approval for discounts

What are the risks and the moat?

Social engineering by customers, and weak judgment on money.

FAQ

Is Project Vend profitable?

Phase two produced consistent weekly profits, but no lifetime net figure has been published [1][3].

Sources

  1. [1] Project Vend: Phase two↗
  2. [2] The Decoder coverage↗
  3. [3] Agent Earnings Ledger↗
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Numbers come from the operators or the press and haven't been audited. Anything missing is marked "not disclosed". Methodology · Report a correction.