A robot bubble tea barista has found its first job making drinks at a Richmond city centre tea shop.
Tea Industries has soft opened and features a robotic arm named Toffee, which fills all the bubble tea orders.
This is the first tea shop in B.C. to feature a robot making drinks.
On the menu are various milk teas, such as Thai milk tea and Assam milk tea, hot and cold teas as well as fruit tea options.
Kelvin Chan, store manager at Tea Industries, said the store will only have one or two staff members working to answer questions and troubleshoot any mechanical problems Toffee may have.
"One of the biggest challenges we wanted to tackle is to reduce the labour costs for the store," said Chan.
He added that while there will be minimum front-end staff, Tea Industries has a separate team in the backend for technical problems.
Tea Industries is aiming to hold a grand opening during the second week of April, but for now, the store is taking feedback from the public to improve the drinks that Toffee makes.
Tea Industries is located at 6386 No. 3 Rd., across from Richmond Centre, and is open every day from noon to 10 p.m.
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