Pre-kitting

[PHX1]

Hey guys, im looking at trying out prekitting at a new location I will be moving into tomorrow. It consists of 5 machines and roughly 300 employees, its blue collar. All the machines are equipped with usa tech readers, and all are hooked up to dex jacks.

 

After setting up a map for the specific machine, what do you guys do with the data so that you can see what you need pick, also how do you deal with par levels? Do you simply run the numbers through a excel sheet and then total up all the same items?

 

Any advice from anybody that is allready doing pre-kitting would be greatly appreciated!!!

[AngryChris]

If it is a legitimate location with 300 blue collar people, your par level is going to be the maximum capacity of your equipment.

[PHX1]

Yes Chris, I agree with you, I expect it to be. Canteen was only sending out a driver once every 12 days to service. I was there on 6th day after service and the snack machine was basically empty. The reason I ask about the par is so when I fill the machines, how would I know in the system when my last fill was. If I ran a report that overlapped before my last fill I would take too much with me, which would void the reason I want to pre kit it to begin with.

[AngryChris]

Well.. I guess my point is that you need to bring enough to fill them up so it kind of does void the reason to pre kit. I was only referring to the par level.

I have not used any software for pre kitting so I can't say much.

[PHX1]

I agree Chris, although theoretically you should be able to prekit any size account from what I understand, which isn't much lol. From what I have heard the main reason companies prekit is so they don't have a bunch of warehouses on wheels.

I'm sure AZ will know something about this, as he always does! ;D

[moondog]

Hey guys, im looking at trying out prekitting at a new location I will be moving into tomorrow. It consists of 5 machines and roughly 300 employees, its blue collar. All the machines are equipped with usa tech readers, and all are hooked up to dex jacks.

 

After setting up a map for the specific machine, what do you guys do with the data so that you can see what you need pick, also how do you deal with par levels? Do you simply run the numbers through a excel sheet and then total up all the same items?

 

Any advice from anybody that is allready doing pre-kitting would be greatly appreciated!!!

i agree with Chis.  For an account this large I'd bring in enough to max out all your machines and plan on servicing it once a week.  Clearly every 12 days was not enough or you wouldn't be there.  Limit any prekitting to your less popular items.

[AZVendor]

If you're subscribed to your providers DEX data reports and they include the ability to track sales at the item level then prekitting is easy to calculate. It's predicated on you setting your par levels by selection. Once you do that you ned to not move things around in the machine. You'll assign a flavor/item to each selection, the par level, the beginning date and the beginning inventory level by item. From then on you can view item sales by selection compared to par level for a chosen period of time. The difference in quantities is what sold since the last service and what you want to prekit. For accuracy you need to adjust your pars when you leave a selection short, over, or you change items or par levels. Resetting might be automatic during a service or you might have to log in and reset your pars to reflect your fill.

[PHX1]

Exact answer I was looking for Randy!

 

I spoke with an usa tech help desk employee, they basically told me that I will need to set a custom map for each of my machines because they do not have a map for bevmax 5800's. I can easilly do so, my questions arise with what to do with the data. I am getting the dex data through usa tech, its just a matter of interrupting it some how......

 

This is what they sent me  -

 

"1 – Use a Credit Card, Cash, or a Pass Card to vend from EACH

SELECTION on the vending machine in turn. Make a note of the

SEQUENCE of Items you vend. You must vend just one item at a time, and

the Item must be priced so that a transaction is created. If you hit the wrong

Item at any point, just note that on your list so that you can exclude the

duplicate later. Because you CAN now map to a product name, you should

list the product name and selling price when you test vend.

2 – When your test transactions are available in the USAlive system, you

can either run a manual report to pull the unmapped Item data for each test

vend OR use your emailed report to extract the same information.

3 – Take the original list of Items you vended and match those to the Item

number showing on the USAlive report. Ideally, you should create that list

in Excel, with a column for the MDB # (what the USAlive reports show),

and one for the Item # as labeled on the machine OR the product name. To

upload the mapping, you will also need a column with the MDB # and Item

number/product name separated by an equal sign (like 0000=A1 or

0000=Chips). You can also load these to the Column Mappings page one at

a time, but you’ll save time if you set those up on a spreadsheet.

4 – Once that column on your spreadsheet is created, or you know what

MDB # relates to what Item #/product name, log onto the USAlive site and

go to Column Mappings. First, select one of the default Column Map

templates on the list to “activate” the Column Map Content box on the right,

and click the Add New button at the bottom. Then put the cursor in the

Column Map Content box at the lower right, and either cut and paste in your

column from the spreadsheet OR manually type in your mapping (again,

formatted like 0000=A1 or 0000=Chips). Once those are loaded, name the

mapping and then hit the Save New button to create that map and add it to

the Column Map Templates box on the lower left.

5 – Now that the Template is saved, you can locate any Devices without a

map applied by hitting the Search button in the Unmapped Device Serial box

to the top left. Highlight any Device you need to map, select you Template

from the Column Map Templates box, and then hit the Apply Template box.

The Device will be mapped after it next calls into our servers overnight.

Once this process is complete you will begin to see logical column info on

your reporting."

Also, when you used to use prekitting AZ. Did any problems arise from items being sold between the time you prekitted the account and when a driver arrives to fill it? It seems like over time the you would begin to come up short? unless,when you ran your next report you had it go all the way back to the time you ran the previous report, that way it made up for the sold items in the that gap?

[AZVendor]

You would handle same service day sales as your last thought was.  You will prekit based on sales up to the time you run the report - either first thing on the day you service or on the evening before.  Your next report will then account for anything sold between the time you ran the previous report and the time you actually filled the machine.  There will be empty slots due to those sales but the next prekit report will pick that up.  The only time you'll run into issues with underfilled machines is on items that are very popular.  In order to not have underfilled selections you can add product to the prekit to top off those selections or you can add secondary or tertiary rows of the popular items to ensure those in-between sales don't hurt you later.

[cvending]

I have posted a snapshot of our report for pre-kitting. We are currently using InOne Technologies. With this report, we can see what items are selling out first and double up on them. We can weed out slower movers to extend times between services. We have been able to increase sales and reduce service from twice a week to once a week with less sold outs. The DEX reads are set to report at 11:50PM and one other read that you may select the time. You can check your reports anytime online. You just need to manually push the send button on the telemter after you are done servicing the machine. It then clears the sales and starts over.

[PHX1]

I have posted a snapshot of our report for pre-kitting. We are currently using InOne Technologies. With this report, we can see what items are selling out first and double up on them. We can weed out slower movers to extend times between services. We have been able to increase sales and reduce service from twice a week to once a week with less sold outs. The DEX reads are set to report at 11:50PM and one other read that you may select the time. You can check your reports anytime online. You just need to manually push the send button on the telemter after you are done servicing the machine. It then clears the sales and starts over.

I took a look at your snap shot, this is exactly what im trying to do. Im currently with usa tech. I will need to contact them and discuss my options as far as what I can do with the dex data. Is that snap shot showing your own spread sheet, or is that part of inones program?

[cvending]

That is an actual snapshot of one of our machines. Our own data. Just look at the right hand column and you have your pick list. Beware though, this is not in real time. It is accurate up to the last DEX read. You can select a time for your read to come in. You get 2 per day. By default, one is at 11:50PM, you select the other.

[Rexlex]

This is a very interesting subject to me as I pre-kit.  I track my sales manually and then enter data into an Access db that I have created.  Basically, now I just take the total number sold and divide by number of days an item has been in the machine (gets me the sold/day).  Then I add 50% to allow for variance.    I have also done some mean calculating (take all the individual sold amounts, lop off the top and bottom 10%, then the mean of that) but it doesn't appear to be as accurate. It should be more accurate but will only work if one is consistent on service frequency.  

 

Mostly, I'm happy with my predictive abilities but once-in-awhile you just get a run on product that can't be predicted.  For instance, one place I average 3 Dasani waters every 15 days but then out of the blue I'll sell 15. Once I get a larger delivery vehicle I can stock extra for these occasions.

 

The next thing I'm going to do is automate my ability to know what I need to order. All the data is there and then I just it to  compare what I have in stock, which I don't track right now.