JLM Vending Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 I remember reading that the national average of singles are $7 per month. A NW super 60 cost about $75 plus the tempo stand and shipping that will run you around $125. If you got a Po89 single from AA with a stand it would be about $115 after shipping. So if those numbers were true, lets take a look at how long it would take to pay back a new NW super 60 single gumball machine. $7 a month is the gross. Now after product cost, you are making a little bit over 6 dollars. Let's not even count the commission or charity. But 6 dollars per month would basically cover the expense of your single machine after about 2 years. 12 dollars in profit would cover your cost after about a year. Based on my numbers Im pretty accurate. So is 7 dollars the true average of a single? If so, how do you expand with your profits when it takes 2 years to break even? Right now Im only averaging 14 a month with my u turns, sales have dropped in half. So Im hoping that my singles dont produce as bad as results. How much do you think is a good realistic expectation to make for a single? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bravo Duck Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 That number comes from here: http://www.nbva.org/Averages.html Everyones goal should be to be better than average. Look around at your competition's machines,its not hard to be much better than average. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dperry Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 I remember reading that the national average of singles are $7 per month. A NW super 60 cost about $75 plus the tempo stand and shipping that will run you around $125. If you got a Po89 single from AA with a stand it would be about $115 after shipping. So if those numbers were true, lets take a look at how long it would take to pay back a new NW super 60 single gumball machine. $7 a month is the gross. Now after product cost, you are making a little bit over 6 dollars. Let's not even count the commission or charity. But 6 dollars per month would basically cover the expense of your single machine after about 2 years. 12 dollars in profit would cover your cost after about a year. Based on my numbers Im pretty accurate. So is 7 dollars the true average of a single? If so, how do you expand with your profits when it takes 2 years to break even? Right now Im only averaging 14 a month with my u turns, sales have dropped in half. So Im hoping that my singles dont produce as bad as results. How much do you think is a good realistic expectation to make for a single? You have to remember that the average is just that... the average. Some do much better, and some do much worse. When I was doing only gumballs, I was averaging about $13/mo per head. I also had some locations that peaked at around $50-$70 month. Many venders do 2 for 1 vends, which helps bring up the average as well because it tends to make people put more quarters in. I also had a few locations where I was selling them for a dime, and did about $20 a month. That might be something to try. Have gumball doubles, one head is 2 for 1 quarter vends, and the other is a 1 for a dime. You might catch a lot more coins that way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Davis Caroline Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 That might be something to try. Have gumball doubles, one head is 2 for 1 quarter vends, and the other is a 1 for a dime. You might catch a lot more coins that way. Let me know where you set that machine up and I'll bring ya two dimes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
treadmill Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 When I had my single gumball route, just as Dperry said some locations did more than $7 per month and some less. The ones that did less I would pull and relocate. I was pretty much happy with $7 per month but I wouldn't go any lower than that. I would service my route every 90 days and would service about 50+ locations per day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLM Vending Posted February 17, 2012 Author Share Posted February 17, 2012 When I had my single gumball route, just as Dperry said some locations did more than $7 per month and some less. The ones that did less I would pull and relocate. I was pretty much happy with $7 per month but I wouldn't go any lower than that. I would service my route every 90 days and would service about 50+ locations per day. But with the ones that did do 7 dollars a month, how would you ever profit from your investment? What Im starting to find in this business is not having enough funds to expand. And when i do have the funds, its taking me too long to get any return. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
treadmill Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 What are you expecting time wise for yor ROI? IMO 12-18 months is a reasonable amount of time to recover your investment. Most start up businesses take 3-5 years to recover their start up cost before they make any profit. This is what I would do in your situation. I would take all of my profits and reinvest them into more equipment until I was where I wanted to be. Over time you would slowly get your investmentment back. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLM Vending Posted February 17, 2012 Author Share Posted February 17, 2012 What are you expecting time wise for yor ROI? IMO 12-18 months is a reasonable amount of time to recover your investment. Most start up businesses take 3-5 years to recover their start up cost before they make any profit. This is what I would do in your situation. I would take all of my profits and reinvest them into more equipment until I was where I wanted to be. Over time you would slowly get your investmentment back. I understand but the problem is when you have invested quite a bit of money and aren't making much of a profit, it's kind of hard to invest profit that is hardly even there. You kind of need legit profit to create more profit. With my profit, i can expect to only be able to get a couple singles a month plus some stands. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
treadmill Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 That is a start of a snowball the size of a pea but over a period of time that pea becomes a golf ball then a baseball then a softball then a basketball and larger and larger. This will take some time to accomplish this but will be worth it in the long run. I started my current vending business different than above. I had a decent amount of money $5000 and I slowly purchased my machines used and for a fraction of the cost of new. As you can by my sig line that most of my machines are not placed yet that is because I drive for a living and am not home long enough to place them. I have used a live locator to place the first set of my machines and will use them again for the next set of machines sometime this spring and then the rest sometime this summer. You have to realize it takes money to make money. Also time is a big part of it. Things just don't happen over night. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLM Vending Posted February 17, 2012 Author Share Posted February 17, 2012 That is a start of a snowball the size of a pea but over a period of time that pea becomes a golf ball then a baseball then a softball then a basketball and larger and larger. This will take some time to accomplish this but will be worth it in the long run. I started my current vending business different than above. I had a decent amount of money $5000 and I slowly purchased my machines used and for a fraction of the cost of new. As you can by my sig line that most of my machines are not placed yet that is because I drive for a living and am not home long enough to place them. I have used a live locator to place the first set of my machines and will use them again for the next set of machines sometime this spring and then the rest sometime this summer. You have to realize it takes money to make money. Also time is a big part of it. Things just don't happen over night. Well based on the 7 dollar average, i calculated it would take about 80 k or so to invest in the business to make it. Im thinking why not just keep the 80 k if i had it. thats 533 machines or so to make it. Basically, im paying for a job with all those machines and money. Maybe im finally realizing this isn't for me. Im waking up and smelling the coffee. But i don't have that kind of money to invest in the biz. 2 machines a month is not gonna get me up to 500 machines. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sherlock Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Maybe im finally realizing this isn't for me. Im waking up and smelling the coffee. You may be on to something there, JLM. You have posted here before that vending is not a "get rich quick" endeavor. You also posted that bulk vending requires hard work. Anyone with vending experience would agree with those comments. Yet, you also want an ROI of less than what most business owners in any industry will experience. As already stated, 12-18 month ROI's are very acceptable. However, 12-18 months does require that you do things properly. Do things improperly and 12-18 month ROI will never happen. And you have already started on the wrong foot: You do not take experienced vendors' advice about avoiding or minimizing the use of high-cost product like PMM. You bought into a biz-op to start with. You are overpaying for single set-ups. You don't like to service or have difficulty with hard-to-service locations and machines. You have little capital and aren't willing to grow slowly (many bulk vendors grow 1 or 2 machines at a time over the course of YEARS). Don't worry about the national average on bulk machines. Worry about those bullet points above. A business makes money on the FRONT END. Bulk vendors who overpay for equipment, buy low-quality machines, overpay for product, and expect an easy road do not succeed. Many of us fail when doing things RIGHT...what chance do you think doing things WRONG will give you? Improve on the issues above or the national average could be $20-a-head and you will still fail. Stop posting questions for a while and spend your TVF time reading through old posts. If you already read through them, read them AGAIN because you missed some important lessons. ALL of the info you need to improve on or eliminate the bullet points above are already here! All of this may make me sound like a JERK. But, I figured I could either sugar-coat the truth and save you some hurt feelings or I could give you the facts and save you some time, money, and heartache. If you are unwilling or unable to address your shortcomings, owning a business of any size may not be for you. Nothing wrong with that....only, it's better you recognize that sooner rather than later. "A good man always knows his limitations" - Clint Eastwood as Harry Callaghan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
treadmill Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 What are the cost associated with the 2 machines? Are you buying new or used equipment? With the 80k price you are talking about you could get a 1000 machine route for that price. Do you have a full time job where you can use some of that money to supplement your route building. Sacrafice of time and money and having patience are really big to have when running your own business. When I had my gumball machines, I bought a 400 machine gumball route for $35,000 with $5000 down and owner financed for 4 years with a $500 month minimum payment. Worked for him and me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLM Vending Posted February 17, 2012 Author Share Posted February 17, 2012 sherlock, what do you mean im overpaying for single set ups? What is considered not overpaying? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLM Vending Posted February 17, 2012 Author Share Posted February 17, 2012 What are the cost associated with the 2 machines? Are you buying new or used equipment? With the 80k price you are talking about you could get a 1000 machine route for that price. Do you have a full time job where you can use some of that money to supplement your route building. Sacrafice of time and money and having patience are really big to have when running your own business. When I had my gumball machines, I bought a 400 machine gumball route for $35,000 with $5000 down and owner financed for 4 years with a $500 month minimum payment. Worked for him and me. Oh really? You can just by routes and finance it with the owner? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
treadmill Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Most won't do it but you won't know unless you try. The guy I bought mine from lived in the area. He sold me a 400 single head gumball route that was advertised for $40,000. I talked him down to $35,000 with $5,000 down and a $500 a month payment at 7% for 72 months. I could pay the principle off at anytime that I wanted to as long as he got the balance of the 35,000. I didn't care about paying the extra money because I had planned on paying off the principle as fast as I could anyways. Also I had my fulltime job to help me compensate to live off of. It all depends on the situation and until don't try it you won't know. Now granted I met this person upfront and he showed me the route. He and I both felt comfortable about the situation and we pulled the trigger. You have to be very careful when doing this. I just didn't do this one day and then decided that night I was going to buy the route and then sign a purchase agreement the next day. This took approx. 2-4 weeks to work this deal out. I was a little leary at first and I bet he was to but all in all things worked out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sherlock Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 This was my advice..... Stop posting questions for a while and spend your TVF time reading through old posts. If you already read through them, read them AGAIN because you missed some important lessons. ALL of the info you need to improve on or eliminate the bullet points above are already here! This is how you've responded... sherlock, what do you mean im overpaying for single set ups? What is considered not overpaying? Oh really? You can just by routes and finance it with the owner? Info about singles you can set-up NEW for less than $100 and buying routes through owner-financing have already been discussed on TVF. All you have to do is READ. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
treadmill Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Thanks Sherlock. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wallstreeterww Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 I have also seen some old ads about 1800 triples on ebay for as low as 60 bucks. If I was in bulk (which im considering), I would ****** those in a heartbeat. Yesterday I saw them at 109 on ebay. From what I have seen in studying these old posts that in bulk vending you need to research it into the ground (forums, googling advice from veterans) and a solid locator that is reasonably priced. Also a persons age and goals seem to be part of the equation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dperry Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 I understand but the problem is when you have invested quite a bit of money and aren't making much of a profit, it's kind of hard to invest profit that is hardly even there. You kind of need legit profit to create more profit. With my profit, i can expect to only be able to get a couple singles a month plus some stands. You are looking at it only in terms of your machine investment, and not your location investment. If your lacation is not doing the job, don't blame your machines, blame the location. When I had locations that did $3 a month, they had the exact same machines that were in locations that did $70 a month. Your investment is in the location, not the machine.If you aren't satisfied with only $7 a month single gumball locations, then get off your butt and take that machine to a $20 location. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dperry Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 But with the ones that did do 7 dollars a month, how would you ever profit from your investment? What Im starting to find in this business is not having enough funds to expand. And when i do have the funds, its taking me too long to get any return. When you only have a handfull of locations, there is no reason on earth where you should only do $7 a month. You should be pulling your poor performers and moving them to better locations. I gave you my averages, and they were nowhere near the averages that you quoted. There are some posts where people have posted their averages, and they are nowhere near your cited average. In fact, many have stated that they would pull those poor performing locations. I'm wondering why you are focusing on the lowest common denominator, instead of following the advice given to you by experienced vendors? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLM Vending Posted February 18, 2012 Author Share Posted February 18, 2012 For some reason I typed in ''Oak'' and there were no results. I wanted to find out about oak, i called the manufacteur and their prices are real cheap. Shipping is almost nothing for the globes. Do you guys find these machines good? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dperry Posted February 18, 2012 Share Posted February 18, 2012 For some reason I typed in ''Oak'' and there were no results. I wanted to find out about oak, i called the manufacteur and their prices are real cheap. Shipping is almost nothing for the globes. Do you guys find these machines good? Really? You can't navigate to the Equipment Reviews and browse to the threads that talk about oaks? http://vendiscuss.ne...-oak-vista-300/ But I will give it to you. The search function on here really seems to suck. I did a search on the forums looking for 'oak' and found nothing also. But I did a search on 'vista' and found a whole bunch. But, I know I've talked about oaks a whole bunch on here in just the past few days. How could you have missed those posts? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
antoniocinisi Posted February 18, 2012 Share Posted February 18, 2012 You are all doing the right thing trying to help but at this point I don't know who's the bigger idiot us for still trying to help or him.no one can be so obtuse and succeed in business. Why won't you just give me that 6000 dollars you have I'll double it in 20 years for ya free Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLM Vending Posted February 18, 2012 Author Share Posted February 18, 2012 You are all doing the right thing trying to help but at this point I don't know who's the bigger idiot us for still trying to help or him.no one can be so obtuse and succeed in business. Why won't you just give me that 6000 dollars you have I'll double it in 20 years for ya free Well, I used to be successful in business from 2005-2009 though. I was selling magnets in magazines and making real easy money. Then the economy took its toll and that's why i looked for vending. I do have a lot of drive, but Im not the sharpest tool in the shed. But im learning. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
antoniocinisi Posted February 18, 2012 Share Posted February 18, 2012 I am not even close to the sharpest tool in the shed but thanks to mostly this site and the advice from its members I am where I am with my vending biz now. listen to these people some of them have been in the vending business since before you were born Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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