Vending Maintenance - For Hire?

[VendingInCali]

Hello All,

I haven't started my business yet, but I'm planning this as a second job until I make enough to quit my primary job (if everything works out ok ).  I'm worried about the time it would take to maintain since I already have a full time job (even 20-30 machines), and wanted to find out if there were any best practices to hiring someone?  I'm figuring I could look to hire almost anyone, but wanted to get everyone's recommendations.  Are there any professional vending maintenace companies (I hear about professional locators, but not maintenance)?  If so, any company recommendations?  What percentage do they usually take,? 

My main worry with hiring someone is that it seems very easy to be taken advantage of (in terms of collecting the money from the machines).  Of course the other negative is my profit would go down, but I'm willing to sacrifice that early on to get my business going. 

I appreciate everyone's help!

 

[West Coast Vend LLC]

Vendingincali,

Are you in California? What part?

Do you have the accounts already?

Please give more information about what you are trying to achieve?

You could go with a flat rate, (salary) only, or commission only. Once you buy your equipment, product to fill them, commission to accounts and commission to a route salesperson you would have to see if there is anything left for you.

If you pay someone commission only, they will have more interest in growing the business for you. The more they build the route, the more they will make. First you have to find the right person. They will be collecting your money. They have to be very honest. I think it could work. I was going to do it with accounts that are to far away from my area.

Gary

[VendingInCali]

Gary,

Thanks for the info. I'm in the planning stages at this point (I haven't done a thing yet - trying to get my facts straight before I do). I'm currently in the bay area.

I don't think I was clear in my previous post, so please let me try again. In terms of my question, I was mainly wondering if there were proven, reliable companies for maintaining a route (not locating - I'm aware of these companies - just maintaing). For example, by maintaining I mean filling up the machines with product, collecting the money, etc on a regular basis. Are you saying that there are vendors that locate and perform the regular maintenance? Are there vendors that just do the maintenance of the route?

[desert_gold_hound]

First I doubt there are many if any companies that do this.

If there are  then, they are more then likly scams (or will be soon). The reason I say this is the fact that the buisness owner would get to know them and if the location was good, they will probaly talk them into letting them place and removing your machine (remember they are the ones they know).

If you have family members that you could trust I would look into this before I would hire a company. Buisness's are out there to make money and they will make it in crule ways if need be.

20 or 30 machines could be done in 1 or 2 days by yourself. If you have weekends off then find locations that are open on Saterdays and service your own machines. Its smarter and will give you better ROI

[grumpy]

Of course continuing on the theme of having someone else do your route you may want to check out smartmech and ezcount. They both provide a counter to help keep that trusted employee honest. This number may have changed but most retail theft is from within I think it was 85%.