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Route truck / trailer?


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Nice setup Broncho, I always was envious of vendors who used any of the Omnivan products. I like their refrigerated coolers, but their best product was their shelving. I bought one section designed for 20 oz bottles when I got into bottle vending with a couple of accounts way back when. I mounted it at the back of one of my wood shelving units by the rollup door, but I had always wanted a truck actually purpose-built by them. Are you using pre-kitting?

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Nice setup Broncho, I always was envious of vendors who used any of the Omnivan products. I like their refrigerated coolers, but their best product was their shelving. I bought one section designed for 20 oz bottles when I got into bottle vending with a couple of accounts way back when. I mounted it at the back of one of my wood shelving units by the rollup door, but I had always wanted a truck actually purpose-built by them. Are you using pre-kitting?

Yes we are using prekitting on the 3 trucks I showed. I have another omnivan that is setup for traditional route, but we are moving to full telemetry within 3 months. At that point I am going to rework the truck for the new era of our company. Right now we are doing around 120-150 cases a day through the prepick trucks along with 10-15 snack machines a day. They best part about our setup is that with our machines:

Slow moving drink- pulls by 12 or 24 pack

Mid range drink- pulls 6-12 packs

High volume drink-pulls in singles

Snacks are setup the same way but vary by product type:

Chips: 1-4

Candy 3-4

Crackers:pulls 3-4

Pastry:pulls 1-4

We have been able to spread machines an extra day for the accounts that are extremely high volume by pulling by 1's for each product. In fact, one of the drivers was able to do over 100cs + 18 full by himself in a 9 hour day thanks to this system. It allows them to move more product in less machines.

Also, the omni I showed is refrigerated and keeps all product ready to vend. That way we can have some items almost empty, but bring in cold drinks when filling the machines.

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Wow, you are doing a great job with your organizing and time saving methods. This is exactly what the industry recommends for vendors to do. I'm glad to see someone doing it and actually saving time and money. The refrigerated truck is a great idea if only to avoid having a seperate chilled container for candy that you would have to pick through. The telemetry is really the way to go in easing the labor burden. Do you use lower paid people to pack the prekitted snacks? Have you considered the Light Wave system? I really think that warehouse and route efficiency is the only way a guy with 3 or more routes can make it in this economy.

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Wow, you are doing a great job with your organizing and time saving methods. This is exactly what the industry recommends for vendors to do. I'm glad to see someone doing it and actually saving time and money. The refrigerated truck is a great idea if only to avoid having a seperate chilled container for candy that you would have to pick through. The telemetry is really the way to go in easing the labor burden. Do you use lower paid people to pack the prekitted snacks? Have you considered the Light Wave system? I really think that warehouse and route efficiency is the only way a guy with 3 or more routes can make it in this economy.

Lightspeed is ridiculously high priced system, or at least I felt it was. We are using a system using tablets now and when you touch the item it removes it from the list. We looked into making a system light lightspeed with the 7segment displays, but the cost was too high for the amount of verity we carry. Since all of our software is custom made for us, its easier to just develop your own system that fits you the best.

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So I picked this one up for $2800 new tires and all. Says 18.9mpg average and goes up to 25 in econ mode. Love it so far. Taking off the seats tomorrow I should be good for now I hope lol

http://elpaso.en.cra...3720702930.html

There you go - now you can really service those accounts. It'll still look like crap by the end of the day :rolleyes:

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  • 3 months later...

So I currently have 30 machines & am looking to add 3 more very soon.   I currently use a Jeep Grand cherokee by folding the seats down & loading it with product.  I was looking for machines on Craigs list the other day & saw this:

 

http://tulsa.craigslist.org/for/3873598293.html

 

I called the guy about it & he said that he had it up for sale for a while was about to take it off & that he would "make me a good deal".  I am going to look at it this Sunday & was looking to get some comments/thoughts/opinions.

 

I think I could use it at local fairs/festivals/events & such in addition to using it for filling vending machines & would be able to pay it off pretty quickly.

 

It looks like a pretty good deal, should I . . .

 

Get it? Dont get it? Is it too big?

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I'm amazed that you made it this far far with an SUV - I did that for my first ten machines and it was a pure pain in the butt.  I also have thirty machines placed (not to mention the six in my shop) and am currently using a GMC Safari van (Astro) which I think will easily get me to sixty machines.  It's good on gas and easy to park which is a big plus around here.

 

For $6,800 you should be looking for a good used cargo van - that's a nice trailer but I think you'll find that it'll be an annoyance to drag around for servicing your accounts as you can't just park it anywhere.  You may find yourself several hundred feet away from your machines once you get on site.

 

I don't know about fairs and festivals but for full line vending,  the only trailer I would be interested in is one I could move machines with and those don't cost that much.

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Mojorhino,

 

If you're going to spend that much on something that size, you'd be better off with a 14' box truck.  That trailer is for only one purpose and it's not filling vending machines.  I agree with moondog, you should look for a cargo van.  I used a 3/4 ton Chevy cargo van for several years and it worked great when partitioned for soda and shelved for snacks.

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Mojorhino,

If you're going to spend that much on something that size, you'd be better off with a 14' box truck. That trailer is for only one purpose and it's not filling vending machines. I agree with moondog, you should look for a cargo van. I used a 3/4 ton Chevy cargo van for several years and it worked great when partitioned for soda and shelved for snacks.

For a small route a cargo van is the way to go, can also be your rolling warehouse. A good friend of mine ran a 150 K a year route out of one for several years
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That trailer is for like food and festival places. I would never try out for moving our products. Look some posts above I paid under 3k for an astro van and it's the best asset I've gotten. I tried cars suvs etc. I took off the seats and put a plywood in the middle. I have a ton of room. I have a Coleman ice chest which plugs in no ice, a ton of crates with snacks, a 3x4 aluminum cart, and I can easily put maybe 100 cases of coke. I go to Sam's a day before I service and run the route. Fortunately I only service 6 locations once weekly, and every other week the 6 locations plus like 6 lower gross locations. Total is like 20 machines and I have way more room for product. I know I can do like 8000 a month in accounts with this van. So get a van really, trailer for machines only.

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So I currently have 30 machines & am looking to add 3 more very soon.   I currently use a Jeep Grand cherokee by folding the seats down & loading it with product.  I was looking for machines on Craigs list the other day & saw this:

 

http://tulsa.craigslist.org/for/3873598293.html

 

I called the guy about it & he said that he had it up for sale for a while was about to take it off & that he would "make me a good deal".  I am going to look at it this Sunday & was looking to get some comments/thoughts/opinions.

 

I think I could use it at local fairs/festivals/events & such in addition to using it for filling vending machines & would be able to pay it off pretty quickly.

 

It looks like a pretty good deal, should I . . .

 

Get it? Dont get it? Is it too big?

 

What about taking vending machines with you to a fair/festival?

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What about taking vending machines with you to a fair/festival?

I looked into that but the city I live in has some weird rules. . . .  also how would you get around the whole extension cord length compressor limitations? 

 

I was thinking about using the trailer as a real good way to get my name out there.  I havent done advertizing or even tried to get more accounts yet.  People just have found out that I own vending machines & the call me then I just put them in.

 

I think that for now I am going to go with a cargo van of some type then maybe use a pop up canopy & sell 20 oz soda that way out of the van & use coolers.

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I looked into that but the city I live in has some weird rules. . . .  also how would you get around the whole extension cord length compressor limitations? 

 

I was thinking about using the trailer as a real good way to get my name out there.  I havent done advertizing or even tried to get more accounts yet.  People just have found out that I own vending machines & the call me then I just put them in.

 

I think that for now I am going to go with a cargo van of some type then maybe use a pop up canopy & sell 20 oz soda that way out of the van & use coolers.

 

Not sure what limitations you're referring to. In my experience, referral based growth is the most cost effective way to grow - so if people are calling you - go for it! The owner of the company I worked for had a whole business plan to go to festivals and take lots of vending machines with him. I'm not sure of the exact specifics, but essentially he would get to go to festivals for free, write it off as a business expense, and make money. Not a bad gig if it fits your lifestyle.

 

The pop-up canopy thing makes sense - if you want to do both vending with machines and at festivals.

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By limitations im referring to not being able to use extension cords. Most of these things are in parking lots, parks, temoproarily closed off streets etc. . . & there is no power outlet available close by.

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By limitations im referring to not being able to use extension cords. Most of these things are in parking lots, parks, temoproarily closed off streets etc. . . & there is no power outlet available close by.

Its not a cheap fix but getting your own portable generator would be a solution.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Do you guys know how I can beef up my astro? Or maybe I should change my set up as I load all drinks in rear. I was thinking of beefier tires or suspension. I do load about 800-1000 drinks in rear. Snacks in middle. I'll post pics but maybe if I do drinks in mmiddle I'd place more distributed weight?

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Do you guys know how I can beef up my astro? Or maybe I should change my set up as I load all drinks in rear. I was thinking of beefier tires or suspension. I do load about 800-1000 drinks in rear. Snacks in middle. I'll post pics but maybe if I do drinks in mmiddle I'd place more distributed weight?

My Safari is rated at 3/4 ton - maybe the Astro is only 1/2 ton.  The suspension is often the only difference between GMC and Chevy.  I carry 1,000 cans regularly in mine with no problems.

 

It's easier to access the sodas from the rear - maybe some beefier leaf springs is what you're looking for (I doubt you could change much with just tires)

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Keep the heavist part of the load in the middle to distibute the weight to all four wheels. If you don't and have a blowout on the highway you are going to lose control and roll it.

Spend a few hundred bucks and put a extra spring in the leafs.

Get LT rated (light truck) w 10 ply sidwalls, they won't be cheap but with that kind of weight you need it.

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