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Janiceb

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Greetings All,

Before starting this discussion, I did a search to see if this had been discussed before and didn't find anything. However, if I have overlooked it somehow, please forgive me for the repost.

As I mentioned in my introduction yesterday, I am a new vendor, yesterday marked my 2 week anniversary. Many of you here have many years experience and have been into vending for several years. I am just curious, if you don't mind sharing, about how some of you got into vending, and if you think your journey into vending had a direct result on your success.

I myself work with computers, and my reasons for getting into bulk candy and toys is because I was looking for a somewhat passive way to earn income. I know vending involves work, but the fact that I don't have to stand at the machines for 30 days straight, begging people to put a quarter in, is passive enough for me. I like the idea of having the right setup in the right location, and letting the money accumulate....even if it is on a smaller scale. Also, for the past few years, I have made huge investments in giving elaborate Halloween parties for the kids (young and old) in my life. I realized it is because I love the smiles that the kids and adults display when I give them candy and little prizes.....so I figured, why not make money at it.

I checked on one of my locations after 2 weeks, and though the collection was small, somewhere between $9-10 bucks, it still felt good. Though grateful, I am not very passionate about my computer career. It pays the bills, but I cannot see me retiring from that career, so the drive that I have to succeed in vending is pretty big.

Do you think that those who got here because of a strong desire to make a career change, have seen more success overall than those who may have just gotten into vending because they just wanted to try it out? I know everyone has different stories, I just find it interesting about how everyone reached this part of their journey.

Thanks for reading and sharing,

Janice

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I was looking for a business I could start that would not require a huge capital investment to see if I liked the business or not. So far I love it and can not wait to expand and grow my business.

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First off, good luck with your new business. Your story sounds alot like mine. Right now I am working on getting my vending going. If I can get it ramped up I would love to leave my day job in a few years. I got in because it didn't take very much money and I could do it on the side. I have just started out too. Right now only have 5 machines placed but still working to get more. So far I have enjoyed it. And your right it seems passive enough for me too right now. May the quarters rain heavy on your machines.

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Kind of funny but I also come from a job working with computers and the internet. I have always wanted to try vending but it just never seem to be the right time, until my GF took a job working third shift. I am not happy with her hours and her being gone, yet I don't have all the time necessary to invest in the business, to make it grow at the rate I want. So the plan is for us to work together until we can build the business to the point she can quit her job and work for us full-time.

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Thank you all for sharing your stories. The one thing that we all have in common is the desire, whether is came from hunger, wanting to try something new, and make better lives for ourselves. Feels good to be among a group of people with the same goals. May we all continue to grow.

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Hello,

I'm just getting my vending company up and running myself. I also come from working on computers as a software engineer and deployment manager, I just want something more. My passion and hobby is coin op games. I have 4 pinball machines, 9 video arcade games, and a soda machine in the garage with cold beer. :-)

I too wish you well! I'm hopefully getting my op and running this week!

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the lady that had the spiral in my families pizza shop would give us 10% commission,she would take over $100 and we would get $10.after hinting that we may get our own machines a couple of times and her responding "ok" instead of: here is a higher commission, I decided to get my own machines.from there I started a candy/gum route with the help of vendiscuss.after that toys seemed to be the direction to I wanted to take.now I have about 55 locations mostly toys.I still have some candy locations that do well above average,but I try to stay away from candy unless it is to take up space in a location I want to keep exclusive.I also have 3 soda/snack/ice cream locations.

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I've been interested in vending for years. I got into it as an "experiment" last year on the side of my job at a golf course/ ice cream shop. After raking about triple my initial investment, I followed through with the rest of my business. I started with absolutely no knowledge or experience, and fell into a group of local guys who at one time or another had been vendors. I found the forums here, and the rest is history I suppose. Good luck in the business JaniceB!

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@Tony. I love coin operated games myself, though I never learned to play pinball. You have alot for a person who has just started, may you continue to expand! @Antonio....good decision on your part, to get your own machines after getting only 10%, but the thought of store owners wanting to get their own machines concerns me. I guess that's why it's a good idea to treat them honestly, and more importantly.....not count the money in front of them, lol. Though I am just starting, I think I want to lean more towards mostly toys and some candy. @ Performavending.....that's so cool, to start as an experiment and then triple your investment. That's impressive, and would make me want to expand too! Thanks for wishing me good luck!!!

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Wanted something that would provide passive income while also teaching my 12 year old about business and entrepreneurlism as he is my business partner. Got bit by the bug when I read "How to Start a Vending Business" and this forum has been a priceless guide for me.

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for my it was 2 things

1- I always wanted to work for myself

2- Passive income. I love the fact that my machines are out there makeing money while I'm free to do what ever I want.

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  • 1 month later...

@janice, I'm the same as you and several others here. I've worked as a software engineer for 20yrs now. I am not even remotely passionate about it and I get paid quite well to do it. And I want to work for myself and control my own destiny. Compared to today's college grads I am long in the tooth and despite my considerable skills they could lay me off tommorow and hire two fresh college grads to take my place.

I had the same passive income angle as you is how I found my way to vending. I love it now and wish I could afford more machines of all types.

My dad, who retired from work at his own CPA firm when he was 48, told me this when I got my first job after college: "son, you'll never get rich working for someone else". Of course I was a stupid 20 something yr old and thought $12 an hour was like being a millionaire. Lol.

So, I've got about three months of vending under my belt now and don't know a whole lot more than I did three months ago. I'm thankful to have found this forum and am learning everyday and most of all I'm most certainly enjoying it!

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I've just always been in love with the general idea of running a business. And as others have mentioned, vending is one of the rare options that allows you to dip a toe in and still get the full scope of what you'll be in for long term so that appealed to me. Although I'm blessed with the fact that I love my full-time job, my goal with vending is to one day reach a point of financial freedom where I wake up and go to work for no other reason than I want to.

Also (and I know this sounds really dumb) but I still get a level of anticipation and excitement from cracking open the money box on my honor boxes. It's akin to cracking open the piggy bank when I was a kid. I guess it's just FUN!

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i got started because my wife was always complaining about the vending service at her job . i thought "hey , i will buy a combo type machine and put it in there" .after alot of research , i decided full size vending was not my thing . so in january we bought our first 3 doubles and placed them . then we decided to get 11 triples on location ( which we have learned are overkill for all but a few of our triple spots ) , and most recently 5 singles . it started with the idea of making a few dollars in one spot , but i agree with rick . its exciting to open those cash boxes and see whats in there :-) . also ,ive realized , after looking at the same walls ,in the same factory for almost 14 years , its not how i want to spend my life . i really enjoy getting out and interacting with people , and moving about freely .

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  • 5 weeks later...

when i was twelve years old I was in the garage of one of my dads friends and he was getting out of vending i bought a 6 rack of oaks and a sticker machine. I talked to the owner of the campground that was down the road from my house and he let me put machines in next to his kids who also had a two racks in there. I made on average $100 per week gross through the summer and he kicked me out because i was selling fire wood at my house. he had only owned the camp ground for two years even though i was selling would for a few years before he bought the campground. I then had to find a new location for the machines and have been building since.

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I was in the Audio /Video business for about 20 years as a salesman. Sold some big Home Theaters back in the day. That biz got killed by the recession and those jobs are mostly gone. So I decided to do my own thing. Vending just seemed like a business that made sense. Vending machines will always be around. I thought I would like it and I do. Best of luck, Janice.

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  • 8 months later...

I got lucky. The previous owner of my vending business was an insurance client of ours. He was diagnosed with cancer, fought it, recovered but never could get his energy back to keep up with the business. He asked if we were interested in buying the business. What the heck, why not. Best business decision I have ever made.

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im only 25, im finishing school (business/physial therapist), ive always loved the good life. I love to travel. However i was a car salesman for 3 1/2 years. sometimes working 7am-11pm! M-Sat, comission only. there was one month i mad $0 dollars. i literaly got a check for $0 for a whole month. Some months id make $300 working 80-100 hours a week. then they got in trouble for not paying us and started paying minimum salary $1,200 a month. that was the first year. now i got very good at it, and stopped going to school, or would take 1 class etc. started making more $1,600-$2,500 a month some months even $7,000! not commonly though. so i bought cars, paid them off, toys, quads (7) trailers, poured cash into my vehicles, lifts, turbos, wheels, systems, etc. one boring day at the dealership i saw an oriental couple walk in to service the 8-select u-turn. i see them pour quarters into a sack, looked like $100+ easy. Then i was thinking, wow, if they made $100+ in one machine, what if you have 5 machines? 10 machines? 100 machines!? i called uturn as they were the only lead i had lol, and they wanted $700+ each and minimum of like 20. theyd train me and fly me somewhere. i was like hell no. then i looked on CL. scared of doing this myself i asked my good friend to go halfs on some 5-10 used vendstars. we paid like $400 or so. located them within a week. after a month we noticed some did like $5 BUT there was one location. it made like $90-$100. the machie was empty we thought it was broke, til we popped the back. my eyes turned into $ _ $. we then went a 4 hour trip and bought like 15 other vendstars. placed them, then bought 1800s like 20 for $700. the dude who sold us the 1800s told us his previous locations and we got most of them located that week. after a total investment of about $2,000 our first month we pulled like $700. it was great.

then we both got super busy at work, so we didnt service in 2 months. we got kicked out of like 4 places. he got discouraged and wanted out. i gave him $1000 and he was very happy. i serviced myself and collected $1200+

then recently last MAY the dealership was in trouble for not paying employees full hours since 2005. theyd make us sign a paper saying we only worked 8-4 and took an hour lunch. yet we were there 7-8pm or later. HR calls me in, tells me to sign a waiver, that im getting a check, (thinking it was gonna be a small ammount) she hands it over and $17,500!!! i was like WOAH! after taxes it was like $11,000 or so. then in a meeting that month they said now they are gonna be strict and blah blah. most of us got fired that month. I didnt care much as i was tired of it, but knew ok dude uve wasted 3 years of your life, either A find another job and slack it in school, or make that money make you alot more, work for yourself, AND go fulltime to school.

knew i had to step it up as there were no triples for sale. found a small route for $5,000 bought it (snack/soda). then i bought another 3-4 machines and located them.

and the rest of the check, paid off some debts, went to cancun. lol

waking up in the beach, knowing while your snorkling, YOU ARE MAKING MONEY back at home! it was the best feeling ever. I could never ask for permission to travel as the managers were A holssss and very jealous of me.

and here i am. 40 tripple, 12 soda/snack machines located. im selling the bulk route for $8,500 this month, and will expand to about 30 full line locations.

AND I COULDNT HAVE DONE IT WITHOUT TVF :)

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My family did pool tables, cigarette machines, poker machines and video games. Around 1984 it all went in the toilet with Atari and Nintendo home systems. I thought for sure I would never go into vending after high school, but I end end up getting a job running a locating company and then was a in person locator for a few years. Then I went to work services big routes at walmarts for the big vending companies. We ran selectra/ stiener old sticker machines and the product was crap. then In the early 90's Brand imports came out with some amazing products, mainly realistic tattoos and Hispanic stuff. Then they came out with a great sticker machine that was 10 times better than the rest. The machines were going empty on all 4 columns! I would pull $400 out in a month! I found out they cost less than that new and decided to start my own route. I miss those days! In 1999 I had a friend getting a divorce and needed quick cash and sold me his route with cranes. I set one diner that was amazing. I gave the owner a flat $300 a month for letting my crane in and the first month it grossed $5500! I was was hooked! I still have that spot, it only grosses $1,000 a month for 2 cranes. Did I mention I miss those days?? Needless to say, a lot has changed in the business since then. Vending is still good, but I miss the gold mine that it used to be!

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This is how I got vending fever. When I was 20 years old, I had a small country grocery store. My dad gave me the idea to put coin operated pool table in the side room of the store. So I bought a pool table and the quarters just rolled in. I have loved vending ever since. In my later 20s, and after finishing college, someone introduced me to honor boxes, so I did honor boxes for about a year, then I bought 15 tabletop snack machines from sams club, then just looking around in the classified in the newspaper, I found 20 oak vista 300 doubles for a small amount of money. I knew nothing about bulk vending, so the young lady that I bought them from said to go to sams club , put some m&m peanuts and skittles and you can do it. So it was a progression of vending that led me to bulk, which is my favorite. I bought 100 new 300 and 450 vista from Oak Manufacturing. So , I am 57 and have been vending one thing or the other since age 20, but Bulk Candy Vending is the Best. I really enjoy it.When you get vending fever, it is hard to get out of the business. I have sold out routes and turned around and built a new route. that is my story

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I have always told myself and others my next job won't be for anyone else. After being employed in the tire industry for 17 years I really don't care to have another boss. My wife recently got laid off from one of two part time jobs, so I'm looking to replace her income. We also have two great kids who we are trying to put in private school to get them the best education we can, they are my motivation. I've always thought vending would be a fun way to make some money, and now I really need it. I found a deal on craigslist 20+ doubles for $180 all needing assembly and cleaning. Well I still have my full time job which I'm greatful for, I also have 1 macine placed and 4 set to go in this week, I also am looking to buy a small local route and place my other 15 machines. I am excited about building my confidence with locating, I've defintely found this intimidating at first, and look forward to making this work for our needs.

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Hi well, I decided to get started because I have been interested in vending for many years. The reason I finally decided to start the business this year is because I want a retirement business that I can build slowly. Right now I have four 1800 triple vending machines on location. I did my first pulls this weekend. The pulls were decent ^-^. So, now I am concentrating on building my business. I have a full time job. My goal is long term. Retirement for me is not around the corner; however I am planning ahead. By the time I retire my goal is to have a successful bulk candy vending business that will help to support me in my retirement years.

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I was sitting in the break room at work and watched a couple of people dig around in their wallet for money to get drinks/food from the vending machines. They didn't have any cash, so they walked away. I thought to myself, what if those machines had credit card readers? I looked around on ebay and craigslist to see how much full line machines cost, and how much credit card readers cost, and came to the conclusion that I'm too poor to start a business like that. I mentioned my idea of vending machines with credit card readers to a friend of mine. The next week he called me and said he found a vending machine for me at a garage sale. I was like, "Cool, how much?". He told me he already purchased it for me and I owed him $40. Great. I never told him to buy anything for me.

I went and looked at it. It was a Vendstar 3000. I had never considered bulk vending, and in fact had never heard the term "bulk vending". I paid him for the machine and took it home and wondered to myself, "What am I going to do with this thing?". Not being much of a salesman, I tried locating it with no success for several months. Then I heard about Kickstart and placed an order with them. They got me a location in a Jordanian Falafel restaurant 35 miles away from my home. It made like $6 per month. I was pretty disappointed. It cost me more in gas to service the stupid thing than it actually made in a month. I pulled it after three months. I then asked my employer if I could put it in the factory break room. He was hesitant but eventually gave me permission. The money started flowing in like a river compared to the Falafel place. It was making over $40/month. I was pretty well convinced at that point that this was a viable line of business and that I shouldn't give up on it just yet. A few months later I got my tax refund and decided to set aside a portion of it to buy some more machines.

I kept an eye on Craigslist for used machines for a few months. Then in May there was an ad. A man in an adjacent town was selling some 1800 triple machines. He was moving to another state and was selling off his equipment. Knowing that I'm a terrible salesman and that locating is my biggest deficiency, I asked him if he had any equipment that was already in locations. He said yes. I ended up buying 7 1800 triples on location from him. This led me into my first experience with toys. At first I thought I didn't want to do toys. The big turning point for toys was when I rode along with the seller to service the machines and saw how much the toys made and realized that they never go stale and it's really easy to know how much your cost of goods is. No weighing of product or adjusting metering wheels. I started changing almost all of the machines over to at least one head of toys, most to two heads of toys, and some to three heads of toys.

I stayed in contact with the seller. A few months after he moved, I called him to ask for his advice on how to grow my route and increase cash flow. The conversation turned toward his frustrations in running his route from several hundred miles away. We discussed the possibility of me purchasing what remained of his route. Long story short I ended up buying what was left of his route in January. I ended with several racks, some shooting hoops machines, some spiral gumball machines, a few single heads and doubles, and lots of 1800 triples.

That's the story of how I got started and where it led me up till now. I started out wanting to get into full line and ended up in bulk, and I can't say that I regret any of it.

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