In a move that seems to reflect the country's new-found riches and makes Coke machines look almost proletarian in comparison, the dispenser, known locally as an "ikromat" from the Russian word for caviar "ikra", has been set up in a City Hall building on the New Arbat, a street now better known for its casinos than as the home of the House of Books.
True, the goods on offer are not top of the range Beluga, but the highly popular red caviar should be a hit with the local employees in the run-up to New Year's Eve, the country's main holiday.
A representative of the company behind the vending machine said that City Hall employees would be able to buy cans weighing 100, 140, 200 and 300 grams, but as far as the price was concerned only said they would be expensive.
"After all, it [caviar] is not coffee," the representative said.
In fact, the "ikromat" is far more of a technical challenge than your average instant coffee machine. The temperature, for one, has to be maintained at a steady 5 degrees Celsius, otherwise the produce will spoil. And nobody would want the New Year's celebrations to be ruined because of that.
But unlike coffee machines and soft drinks dispensers, caviar is unlikely to appear any time soon at a gymnasium or a movie theater near you. "We would have to put a guard to them," the company representative said.
