Sales...

[LimitlessVending]

I just finished entering all my numbers into excel. Since January 2014 I have had $1,241.30 in gross sales. Not too bad in my opinion. This is one soda machine in a blue collar workplace. What are your thoughts? I have a snack machine on location too but hasn't been up and running as long.

[Paveitall]

OK, I will answer.  You have had this machine in service for 9 months and your sales to date are $1,200.00?  Seems pretty light to me, I like to see a minimum of $300-350/month/machine and that is an absolute minimum.  Any less and you run into expiration issues.  Just my opinion. 

[AngryChris]

As Paveitall mentioned, your sales aren't great out of one account, but at least you're learning!  It would totally suck to have ONE snack machine... I started off by buying a small route first as I knew expired product would be a problem if I started off with one machine.

 

Don't be discouraged though.  It's sort of comical that you have a spreadsheet for one account but the truth is that spreadsheets are probably the most economical way to track your sales, especially if you are good at using excel or any other spreadsheet program.

 

You're currently averaging about $30/week out of a soda machine.  I am assuming that you're only selling cans and that's okay.  If you sell them for around 75 cents each, you're selling over 1.5 cases every week.  It's easy to service an account like this because you probably only have to bring a few things with you, stock up the big sellers, and leave the rest until the next time.

 

You are on the right track but you need bigger accounts if you really want to grow.  I am currently servicing about 70 vending machines and 40 honor boxes so I have my hands pretty full with that.  I get pretty frustrated when someone calls needing something stupid (ie. out of chili cheese fritos, need them ASAP or office employees will riot).  I got a call yesterday from a customer who wanted a machine moved so they could remodel the break room.  They were nice enough to let me know THE DAY OF THE REMODEL that they needed the machine moved.  The "boss" acted like he just found out, but his employees mentioned that they knew about it last week.

 

Here's some food for thought.  On average, I make $48/per account every week.  Some are more than that, some are lower, but that's the average income per account.  It's not high at all but I have a different perspective than other people.  I can't simply sell off a few accounts and get a full-time job to supplement my income.  If I have the time to service my accounts and I can do so while still being profitable and not having expiration problems then I am going to do it.  

 

I have a can machine right now that does $25-30/week in canned soda sales.  It's a 6-select Royal machine that I got for about $400 on location.  I service this account every other week and collect $50-$60.  I bring two 36-packs of Mountain Dew, a 32-pack of diet coke, a 32-pack of coke, and I head on in.  I put however much coke/diet coke they need and I put both 36-packs in there.  I also stock Sunkist and A&W root beer if they need any.  The account takes me roughly 10 minutes to service on the way to another account.  Yeah, it's not big money but to collect $50 in 10 minutes is pretty good!  I probably get to keep about $20 of that.  That would be $100/hour in PROFIT if I had 4 more side-by-side.

 

On the other hand, I have an AP 6600 in a municipal building.  I probably collect $45/week out of there on average.  It would be nice to have the soda contract too but Coke has the contract with the whole district.  I got this machine for about $700 on location back when the sales averaged about $35/week.  The account takes me a good 20 minutes to service and I might keep $15 of that $45 collected so yeah I am not making huge money but it's more money than what I would have had if I didn't service the place.

 

I have many accounts where the sales just aren't great, such as a location with an AP 7600 and a CD 7/5 on location.  I got it as part of a package deal (about 7 accounts together) and it the sales have fallen off since I got it.  I can't compete with people who bring in entire bags of chips and put them on the table to share with other employees.  The account probably grosses $20/week in the Summer time.  The problem is that it would cost me more money to pick the AP 7600 up to bring it back to my place than it would to just deal with the expired product problem.  I wouldn't ever install in a location like that but my point is that sometimes you get crappy locations.  Not everyone can have a perfect route.  My best account does about $200/week out of a snack and glassfront.  I probably put a little over an hour every week to service that account.  I would like to have more like these but there just aren't that many $200+/week accounts around here.  Local vendors get pretty competitive over those.

 

That's my 5 cents.

[LimitlessVending]

Paveitall, thanks for the feedback although I have not run into any expiration issues other than once and that was my fault for being a newb and buying too much product (Gatorade). Other than that I don't even have expiration issues on my snack machine. Yes I only have one 10 select can machine that I sell 12 oz. cans for $1.00 and energy drinks for $2.00 and Gatorade in the bottle for $1.50. I also only have one snack machine. My sales do not include the snack machine.

 

AngryChris, Thanks for such a detailed  response. I appreciate the time you took to write it. Yes, I am learning and the education has been valuable. Yeah it may be a little comical that I track only two machines on excel but I like graphs and charts and being able to manipulate numbers. I have a financial background and I figure it is better to be tracking now and adding to it rather than tracking later and trying to figure out what is selling and what is not and playing catch up. The other thing I didn't mention is that these two machines are at my place of employment so the cost to service is really low. The way I look at it is that I am making more money that what I started with and that is good enough for me right now. Again, AngryChris thanks for the input!