A4family Posted February 17, 2013 Share Posted February 17, 2013 When you got started did you have a detailed business plan? Did you track every little thing? What about a business name, and license? Did you grow your business slowly buying 2-5 machines every couple months or buy 20-40 all at once. What's something you did at the start that you credit your success to. What mistakes did you make in the begining? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kandyking Posted February 17, 2013 Share Posted February 17, 2013 This is a great idea for a thread. What helped me grow rapidly is that I did not take a penny out of the business from its inception. Every cent of profit was rolled into new machines, new locations and new candy. At the end of year one (12 months), I was at he point I projected at being at the end of 30 months. Expansion is exponential. The more machines you have out, the more machines you can buy every month and place thus making the profits from next month even more allowing you to buy even more locations and machines. It is a cycle that can easily be charted and projected out. You take the cost of a new machine, the candy to fill it, the cost of a location and any other misc costs you may have (labels, charity, etc.) and then figure out how many machines on route it takes to come up with that number in profits. The cost of a new machine on location for me is roughly $100. Assuming each machine I have on route makes $10 (my average is in fact closer to $26 but I used very pessimistic numbers in my projections), then it would take 10 machines on route every month to make me 1 new machine. If I started with 40 machines, by the end of the first month I would have 44 machines, next month 48 machine and $40, next month 53 machines, next month 58 machine with $30 left over and so on. Now if I am now averaging $26 a machine then it only takes 4 machines on route to get me a new machine. start with the same 40, by the end of the first month I would have 50 machines, next month 62 machine and $52, next month 78 machines, the next month 97 machines with $52 left over and so on. The moral of the story is to keep your cost of a machine on the street low, reinvest your profits and put off the gratifications today for an empire tomorrow. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GagesVending Posted February 17, 2013 Share Posted February 17, 2013 I didn't have much support at all when I started about 2 years ago. Most people thought the whole thing was ridiculous and that I couldn't make any money. I was determined to prove them all wrong...and I did! I started with 3 triple heads and used that revenue to keep buying more machines, and more! Now I've multiplied the business over time. You don't have to start big, you can start small and work your way up. I was absolutely determined to make it work because when someone tells me I can't do something, I will make it happen one way or another. I was very shy in the beginning, so I got the ball rolling by using Kickstart Locations to help me get a few more machines out there. After gaining some experience with talking to people, I don't have a problem with it now. My biggest mistake was I filled my machines up to the top. It was a huge investment in some low traffic locations, so not a good idea, but I didn't know any better. I learned quickly and never did that again! The best thing that I've gained from operating the business is all of the experience and comfort with speaking to people. I don't regret starting up the business, in fact, I'm glad I did because I truly believe it was one of the best decisions I ever made. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Erosenlieb Posted February 17, 2013 Share Posted February 17, 2013 Well lets start out by saying I just started. I started looking online and threw this forum before I bought anything. I then was brousing Craigs List one day and saw a small route for sale. i bought it and learned very fast about a few mistakes. I didn't over pay for the route but i could have done a few things better. Well all that was last month and in the past. This month I still have my small route and it did fine. I went out and bought about 15 machines and plan to place them within the next two weeks. The business license and name will come at the end of this month. So i would say i plan to grow at a rate of 5-15 machines a month. Really depends on how many i can find on the market. I fell with this business faster growth is better. If you don't grow fast you wont see any kind of good return. what comes of that is your machines will be the ones I buy with all the dust on them. Just my opinion Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shepherdsflock Posted February 18, 2013 Share Posted February 18, 2013 My biggest mistake was I filled my machines up to the top. It was a huge investment in some low traffic locations, so not a good idea, but I didn't know any better. I learned quickly and never did that again! The best thing that I've gained from operating the business is all of the experience and comfort with speaking to people. I don't regret starting up the business, in fact, I'm glad I did because I truly believe it was one of the best decisions I ever made. You describe my experience perfectly. I'm very quiet and shy and the business has helped me gain confidence speaking to people I don't know. I also had to learn the "don't fill the heads completely" lesson. I started out with candy and was filling the heads, only to throw a good portion of it away because it would go stale. Same with toys; I would find that product levels wouldn't drop very fast and by accident discovered that switching product always seems to boost sales temporarily. People like variety, and if they get bored with something they stop buying it. I've found that splitting a bag of toys between three or four machines gives just about the right level of product per head. People start getting bored and the sales drop off just about when the heads go empty. Then I introduce a new product and the sales jump back up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shepherdsflock Posted February 18, 2013 Share Posted February 18, 2013 I might add that I started off with a single used Vendstar 3000. I didn't keep buying one machine at a time like some members; I just saved up some money and bought several at once. Then I had a chance to buy part of a route (which reminds me that my signature needs updating) and the seller agreed to finance the sale through machine earnings. There are a lot of different ways to operate and grow a bulk vending business, you just have to make sure you don't lose money. If you can do that, then it won't matter too much how you choose to grow and finance your business. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rdendy Posted February 19, 2013 Share Posted February 19, 2013 No official business plan but I did a LOT of research before investing and outlined a basic business model, and it still wasn't enough to keep some mistakes from happening. I bought 4-6 new machines a month on avg. I returned all profits back into the business till it got to the point that my profits were buying product and machines instead of me pumping more investment into. My mistakes that I learned, as previously stated, too much product in the machine causing waste, I also tried to many different products trying to make my locations happy instead of following my good sense and maximizing my profits with manageable product levels. I also went after anything and everything, I had singles, doubles, 4-way and rack locations, I am doing it a lot different this time around, and I am hoping my first routes valuable lessons will make me even more successful this time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jerry1973 Posted July 16, 2013 Share Posted July 16, 2013 This is a great idea for a thread. What helped me grow rapidly is that I did not take a penny out of the business from its inception. Every cent of profit was rolled into new machines, new locations and new candy. At the end of year one (12 months), I was at he point I projected at being at the end of 30 months. Expansion is exponential. The more machines you have out, the more machines you can buy every month and place thus making the profits from next month even more allowing you to buy even more locations and machines. It is a cycle that can easily be charted and projected out. You take the cost of a new machine, the candy to fill it, the cost of a location and any other misc costs you may have (labels, charity, etc.) and then figure out how many machines on route it takes to come up with that number in profits. The cost of a new machine on location for me is roughly $100. Assuming each machine I have on route makes $10 (my average is in fact closer to $26 but I used very pessimistic numbers in my projections), then it would take 10 machines on route every month to make me 1 new machine. If I started with 40 machines, by the end of the first month I would have 44 machines, next month 48 machine and $40, next month 53 machines, next month 58 machine with $30 left over and so on. Now if I am now averaging $26 a machine then it only takes 4 machines on route to get me a new machine. start with the same 40, by the end of the first month I would have 50 machines, next month 62 machine and $52, next month 78 machines, the next month 97 machines with $52 left over and so on. The moral of the story is to keep your cost of a machine on the street low, reinvest your profits and put off the gratifications today for an empire tomorrow. I actually created a spreadsheet that takes into account how many machines you start with, % cogs, machine cost, and any extra money if any that you want to add in. Then it calculates pretty much exactly what you are saying. It reinvests every penny and keeps the leftover money for the next month to throw in the pot. Eventually it becomes a very large and powerful empire with most any scenario if your patient enough. Let me know if you or anyone would like a copy of it!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
orsd Posted July 17, 2013 Share Posted July 17, 2013 You could place it in the downloads for everyone if you don't mind Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jerry1973 Posted July 17, 2013 Share Posted July 17, 2013 good idea, its now uploaded. Check it out http://vendiscuss.net/index.php?/files/file/74-vending-potential-and-forecaster/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mission vending Posted July 18, 2013 Share Posted July 18, 2013 good idea, its now uploaded. Check it out http://vendiscuss.net/index.php?/files/file/74-vending-potential-and-forecaster/ And a very sincere THANK YOU from the mod team for sharing this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caserri Posted July 18, 2013 Share Posted July 18, 2013 good idea, its now uploaded. Check it out http://vendiscuss.net/index.php?/files/file/74-vending-potential-and-forecaster/ Sorry Jerry, I didn't see this until just now and all submissions require approval. I'll approve it now. Thanks for submitting it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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