You find them in odd places — dotted around the city in subway tunnels, hipster cafes and at the back of dusty, antique book stores.

Toronto’s peculiar vending machines stand vigil, displaying their goods to tempt passing consumers 24/7.

They swallow loonies and credit card numbers and spit out everything from poetry to designer cufflinks, doughnuts, Mini Cooper accessories or bizarre second-hand books.

Unlike Japan, which has a vending machine on nearly every street corner, Toronto’s automatic retailers are a bit harder to find. But that could soon change.

Toronto’s vending machine scene is on the cusp of a revolution, says Shamira Jaffer, president of Signifi Solutions.

The Toronto-based automated retail company says the days of vending machines only stocking Snickers bars and soda are long gone.

Globally, the vending machine craze is well established; Canada is just a bit behind the times, Jaffer says.

Japan is known to be the capital of the automated retail world, with one vending machine for every 23 people nationwide, according to the country’s Automatic Vending Association.

The machines sell everything from bread in a can to fresh flowers, live crabs, pornography and umbrellas.

Jaffer says that over the next year Toronto will be home to at least 40 new touch-screen automated retail machines, dispensing delicatessen food, perfume, high-end men’s fashion, toys and designer handbags.

“It’s exciting for us as a company to think what the next 12 months will look like. It’s going to explode,” Jaffer says.

But weird vending machines are already out there, if you look hard enough.

A gumball machine at Artscape Youngplace in the West Queen West neighbourhood dispenses tiny handmade artworks encased in plastic balls. Machines at the Rogers Centre sell old-school baseball cards. And these days you can even get a customized cup of tea from an automatic kiosk called teaBOT.

One of Toronto’s best known vending machines, the Biblio-mat, lives at the back of The Monkey’s Paw, a store that specializes in uncommon books on Dundas St. W. For $2, you can hear the lime green machine rumble and churn as it spits out a random book hand-picked by owner Stephen Fowler, a professional antiquarian.

The Cuffwear machine can be found in Bay Station’s Cumberland Terrace mall. The cufflinks, which bear skulls with diamanté eyes, red-lipstick lips, guitars and other designs, sit side-by-side in their own little jewelry boxes, illuminated by a purple backlight.

Over the Christmas season, Cuffwear had a popular partner, the Bakeryhaus gourmet doughnut dispenser.

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Allan Ng, owner of Bakeryhaus, stocked the machine every day with up to 100 doughnuts, macaroons and sweet treats. “I’d sell out pretty much every day,” he says.

Ng has promised at least five doughnut machines will return to the city this Christmas.

“The vending machine is an old but new concept in Toronto,” he says. “You’re going to see a lot more of these machines around the city soon.”