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My first mint box


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I placed my first box last Friday and I thought it might be worth someone else's while to know how it did in the first 7 days...

I filled the box with 88 mints.

75 of the mints were gone. My price point was .33 cents. I purchased the mints for .074 cents a piece. 

With 75 mints being gone my potential gross income was $24.75 

The actual amount in the box was $18.35 that is about 74% of what should have been in the box. This means that my shrinkage was 26% The total cost of the mints that were missing from the box was $5.55

$18.35 - $5.55 = $12.80 net before gas and cost of box (gas didn't cost extra this time because the box is in a place I must go to every day anyway) 

Am I missing anything? There are about 10 people daily in the office where I placed the box. Do these numbers seem consistent with the norm? I am excited about getting the rest of my boxes out and will be going out today to place a few more. (I set my goals extremely low, so as not to become disappointed or discouraged) 

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Keep us up to date. I ordered 16 plastic mint boxes and they will be in tomorrow. Thinking of places to locate them now. I'm thinking about ordering 50 or 100 of the Pink Ribbon boxes.

I went with 50 pink ribbons for starters. I'm on a pretty mean budget for now.

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Are you thinking of switching the most promising accounts (in terms of length) to plastic as you go? Or perhaps will you just leave the cardboard ones where they are once you place them, and begin placing plastic ones elsewhere? Also I would think that a place where the box would be getting "handled" more often would benefit from a plastic one obviously. It was the big difference in price and the uncertainty of the locations (that I have yet to get) that steered me toward cardboard to begin with. At least until I get a feel for a location and let it start bringing in a profit. At that point I may feel more confident with the plastic...

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Keep us up to date. I ordered 16 plastic mint boxes and they will be in tomorrow. Thinking of places to locate them now. I'm thinking about ordering 50 or 100 of the Pink Ribbon boxes.

We just placed 3 more in the shopping center where my son goes to Karate. I'll let you know how they go.

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Nice numbers. Over time these numbers may drop and level out but overall they look good. Shrinkage is a little high but not bad as you cannot control this. It doesn't matter what income level the neighborhood your in you will still have shrinkage. Why is your price point at .33, just make it .35 or 3/$1. Makes it a lot easier counting quarters and dimes instead of a lot of pennies. Just my .02.

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On the first one I just used a 3 for $1.00 sticker near the coin slot and a 50 cent sticker in front. On the other 7 I have just the 3 for $1.00 stickers. I didn't find any pennies on the 1st pull. Do you think I should use 2 separate stickers?  Placed a few more today too. Can't wait to see how they do. 

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On the first one I just used a 3 for $1.00 sticker near the coin slot and a 50 cent sticker in front. On the other 7 I have just the 3 for $1.00 stickers. I didn't find any pennies on the 1st pull. Do you think I should use 2 separate stickers?  Placed a few more today too. Can't wait to see how they do.

That's a tough call unless you can place it somehow on the other sticker. Now you don't want to take away from the other sticker as it may look tacky. I guess we will leave that up to you. See what it looks like and if you are not happy with it don't do it otherwise go all out. My stickers were made by Frank at Sweetstop vending a member on here. He maybe able to do something for you.

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On the first one I just used a 3 for $1.00 sticker near the coin slot and a 50 cent sticker in front. On the other 7 I have just the 3 for $1.00 stickers. I didn't find any pennies on the 1st pull. Do you think I should use 2 separate stickers?  Placed a few more today too. Can't wait to see how they do. 

If you have two prices on your box, how do you compute shrinkage? For example, 75 mints at 3 for $1 should yield $25. on the other hand at .50 each, 75 mints should yield $37.50.

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If you have two prices on your box, how do you compute shrinkage? For example, 75 mints at 3 for $1 should yield $25. on the other hand at .50 each, 75 mints should yield $37.50.

What I did was I calculated everything at .33 cents each. I figured anything more than that would just be extra. I didn't consider until now that this method would cause a problem with shrinkage calculations, if I had some boxes with just 3 for $1.00, and some with one of each differently priced sticker. I was just thinking of trying both and seeing how they did. I suppose as long as I calculated shrinkage separately between the single price and double price boxes I would be okay seeing as how the average percent is the only thing that matters.  At the current time though I only have one box with the two differently priced stickers. The rest of the boxes are all 3 for $1.00 sticker price only. I will probably just keep things simple for now and continue with the single priced boxes. Otherwise I would need to keep the calculations separate. I'll worry about it later after I max out on available time.

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Most people I have found usually purchase the 3/$1 instead of .35.

If you have two prices on your box, how do you compute shrinkage? For example, 75 mints at 3 for $1 should yield $25. on the other hand at .50 each, 75 mints should yield $37.50.

Come on now we're only talking . 05 per $1 or .02 per individual piece. Kinda like splitting hairs isn't it?

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That makes sense, they will surely last longer. My thing is budget and I am kind of in a hurry to get started. I may eventually begin switching them out later on. Especially if I find myself needing to replace the cardboard ones more often then I'd like.

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I sold some equipment I'm not using. Looks like I"ll be ordering more mint boxes tomorrow. I guess I will stick with the plastic ones. More money but I think I will like them better in the long run.

When you guys say plastic, do you mean acrylic or the corrugated plastic boxes?

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I have 2 different pricing stickers on my boxes (3/$1 & $.50 cents). This seems to work well for me.

I figure all of my costs on the LOWER priced stickers. So I use .33 cents per unit when calculating all of my numbers.

I use both acrylic and cardboard boxes. I find that like most things, there are positives and negatives to each. For the acrylic boxes, the up-front price is a bit of a negative BUT what's worth than that is when some lowlife decides to scratch the box. It pretty much renders the box useless. My biggest complaint with the cardboard boxes is monetary theft with a close second being when people try to push the money in the cashbox and crush the coin slot.

I think if you are starting out a budget, you should go cardboard since you will be able to get about 4 cardboard for every 1 acrylic.

Good luck with the venture!!

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Thanks for the insight. So far I have only 11 placed and am shooting for a long term goal of 30 per day Monday through Friday. Once I get to 150 I want to see where I'm at time wise, and also see how much I am bringing in. As soon as my first 50 pay themselves off I will begin another 50 and so on. I am thinking after I get to the point of servicing 150 boxes a week I will begin switching the accounts I have held longest to plastic. I may change my plan along the way though it's not set in stone. I may try the second set of 50 with both stickers but I haven't decided as of yet.
 

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Here's a thought, since you are eventually going to replace the cardboard ones with acylic ones, why don't you keep the cardboard ones in the places that might be kind of rough looking and put the acrylic ones in the nicer locations. Also use the cardboard ones for new placements and if location doesn't work out then you've saved the good boxes for the good locations. Hope this makes sense.

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Keep us up to date. I ordered 16 plastic mint boxes and they will be in tomorrow. Thinking of places to locate them now. I'm thinking about ordering 50 or 100 of the Pink Ribbon boxes.

Were you ever able to find locations for your acrylics? My wife and I are servicing our first set of 7 today and we place more this week. We also have 4 we need to service on Thursday. 

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So here is the report for the 7 boxes we serviced today...

Nail salon - On location 7 days - 15% Items Removed - 17% Shrinkage  

Tae Kwon Do - On location 7 days - 14% Items Removed - 25% Over Amount Due

Chicken Restraunt - On location 6 days - 20% Items Removed - 11% Shrinkage

Salad Restraunt - On location 6 days - 34% Items Removed - 11% Shrinkage

Learning Center - On location 6 days - 67% Items Removed - 67% Shrinkage - Lost account on owner request

Karate Studio - On location 6 days - 13% Items Removed - 174% Over Amount Due - Lost account on owner request

Insurance Place - Left On Location - Owner said he "owed 4 bucks" and the box still looked mostly full.

 

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