I wasn't really exposed to sports or hobbies or anything as a kid, but one memory I do have was trading Premier League football stickers.
A vague memory I have is walking home from school and stopping at the local newspaper agent and buying football stickers. It was a long time ago so I'll stress: vaguely.
The world cup is one of my favourite cultural moments and introducing my kids DD and HH to it via World Cup stickers seemed really fun.
Where to buy the stickers
It begs the question — where do people buy World Cup stickers from in 2026?
Buying them online seems pretty sterile and non-kid-friendly.
Local corner stores do not really exist, and if they did, would they even sell these stickers?
Driving to a store like Target seems pretty unexciting.
Giving the stickers away
I decided that the most kid friendly way of acquiring stickers was to play for them. What if kids could win packs of stickers? And most importantly, what if they could win them in their neighbourhood.
My big idea: Sticker robot machine
I had the idea for a "vending machine meets quiz machine" where kids could walk up to it, answer a question, and if they're right — get a pack of stickers.
How it'd work
There's be a device in your local park that detects when you walk up to it. It asks you if you'd like to play a game. If then asks you a World Cup trivia question — if you get it right, it'll give you a pack of stickers. Et voila!
At the top of the device is a carousel that rotates, and holds packs of stickers. When the user gets a question right it rotates and there is essentially a slot so the stickers fall out the carousel and to the bottom of the device.
Within the device there is also:
- A usb battery — turns out you need to use an internet of things usb battery as otherwise the battery will not turn on to power trickle charging devices
- A small speaker — to play the best football song, Zinedine Zidane (turns out to play music you also need an amp)
- An amp
- An Adafruit Metro ESP32-S3
- A "stepper motor" that rotates the carousel.
Designing this
This was easily my most complex 3D Modeling project, I have 28 revisions of the 3D file since May 9 2026. (and I didn't really know about that feature until pretty recently!)
Key Components
Sticker Carousel
The first quandary I had was how to store and dispense the stickers. I settled on this "carousel" that can hold stickers. On the bottom are slots for the stickers to fall through.
Carousel Body
The carousel slots into the body, and you'll see underneath is a slot for the sticker packs to fall through. The idea is that the carousel rotates when stickers are awarded, and stickers fall through themselves.
Carousel Body with Screen
At the front of the device attaches the touch screen and the motion sensor. Cables can run from the screen below into the lower body.
Lower Body
The lower body is where the battery pack, electronics and cabling fits. As such there is a "slot" where the stickers fall through. On the very bottom of the lower body, is where the stickers fall out for the user to collect.
Full assembly
And you can see here this is what the complete device looks like from roof all the way to floor, with carousel body and carousel and lower body in between.
Connector
On the back of the full assembly you'll see four screws — this is so a modular connector can be attached, which can be used to attach the device to something.
Connector in use
Since the connector is modular the connector can be designed custom — this below example is connecting the machine to a 2" square street sign post.
In the real world
The software
The software works thusly:
The device detects motion and presents on the screen "adult or kid question?"
Depending on what the user selects, it presents a simple question
If the user gets the question right — it plays one of a selection of amazing world cup goals, and then dispenses a sticker pack
If the user gets it wrong — they have 2 more chances.
Whilst all this is happening, the Zidane soundtrack is playing.