Coke Solutions?

[Shane C]

I'm considering starting a part-time vending business. I'm not going into this with unrealistic expectations. I realize owning/operating a vending business isn't a "get rich quick endeavor." I plan to start part-time and reinvest all profits in growing my route. I currently work nights full-time as a clerk and serve in the National Guard part-time. I've been looking into bulk candy and/or soda vending machines. I plan to start off slow until I learn the in and outs. I plan to start off using a vending machine locator service for my machines.

 

I have a few questions for the seasoned vending machine owner/operators on this site.

 

(1) I know bulk candy machines average $7 gross per head per month. How much money do soda machines make per month? I know this is a broad question contingent upon individual machine variables such as location. But I'm just looking for the average soda machine income.

 

(2) Could I use a vending locator service to secure a location and go through Coke Solutions to for the machine?

 

(3) Would Coke Solutions allow me to fill the machines?

 

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!!! I feel it's better to learn from those who have been there, done that, than to try and reinvent the wheel.

 

Shane

[PHX1]

I'm considering starting a part-time vending business. I'm not going into this with unrealistic expectations. I realize owning/operating a vending business isn't a "get rich quick endeavor." I plan to start part-time and reinvest all profits in growing my route. I currently work nights full-time as a clerk and serve in the National Guard part-time. I've been looking into bulk candy and/or soda vending machines. I plan to start off slow until I learn the in and outs. I plan to start off using a vending machine locator service for my machines.

 

I have a few questions for the seasoned vending machine owner/operators on this site.

 

(1) I know bulk candy machines average $7 gross per head per month. How much money do soda machines make per month? I know this is a broad question contingent upon individual machine variables such as location. But I'm just looking for the average soda machine income.

 

(2) Could I use a vending locator service to secure a location and go through Coke Solutions to for the machine?

 

(3) Would Coke Solutions allow me to fill the machines?

 

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!!! I feel it's better to learn from those who have been there, done that, than to try and reinvent the wheel.

 

Shane

A good machine at a good location should do no less then 150 a week. No, dont use locators. Locate your self and dont use any leased equipment from coke or pepsi. Dont over think it

[AngryChris]

Leased equipment really depends on your region.  Some regions will lease out equipment, some regions won't.  Some regions are really picky.  You have to consult with someone in your region who uses the same coke/pepsi distributor that you'll be using to find out how difficult/easy it will be.  You can also check with 7up as far as that is concerned.

 

As for average income... there isn't one for vending.  It can be anything from $100/month to thousands and thousands of dollars.  Realistically, expect $100-$500/month from JUST a soda machine.  Any less, and you aren't making money.  Any more than that, and the customer will expect a snack machine too.  Once you get into snacks AND soda, simply add 50% to the soda sales.... so an account that makes $100 in a week will do about $150 with a soda and snacks.  Once you get above $250/week in combined soda/snack sales, some vendors will start to offer food machines or other things as an incentive to switch to their service.

 

I'm all for the idea of you starting with soda machines but I believe in the idea of buying a few can soda machines such as a Dixie Narco 501-T for cheap ($400~) and placing at a location with maybe 20 blue-collar employees.  In my area, providing soda AND snacks is the name of the game.  Vending companies will generally either place both a snack and soda machine or they won't place anything at all (unless the location only has space for one machine).  Unless it's a big account where Pepsi or coke has the contract, do not place ONLY a snack machine.  You'll work a lot harder for your money.

 

Here is a simple rule of thumb I use in my area.  It doesn't necessarily apply to you;  $1.00/week PER OFFICE or WHITE-COLLAR employee, $2.00/week PER BLUE-COLLAR employee.  There are other factors when it comes to predicting income such as location (is it close to a lot of food choices?  Is there a convenience store across the street?) but those are very basic predictions.  A factory with 10 office workers and 25 factory workers might do $60/week ($10/week from the office workers, $50/week from the factory workers).  Depending on how busy/hot it is inside, you can expect this number to grow to something in the range of $120+/week.  It really depends, but $60/week would be about the minimum with the blue-collar employees being the volatile part.  They might not buy that much, and they might be hungry/thirsty devils.  There's no telling at first.  What would you want to offer them?  A soda machine and a snack machine, with an emphasis on CANS if that's what they are currently selling from their existing machines.  If they insist on bottles, you might need to pass as a beginner because you won't have the selling power to go through enough bottled soda to turn a profit before it expires.  You'll have problems.

 

Here is a very simple thing that you don't want to do.  Don't get into the mindset of "I am going to offer the BEST machines and the BEST prices to get people's business."  Many people see old machines at their work place and they wish they could have nice new equipment to replace their "junky" old equipment.  A lot of the times, the old equipment works just as good as the new stuff, it just isn't as visually appealing.  However, a lot of places simply don't sell the volume of product to warrant new machines.  When vendors come in promising new equipment off the bat, they find themselves deep in debt quickly and they have to either find better locations fast (and give up their existing customers), deal with it, or sell out.  You are in the business of making money and you need your prices to be in tune with your competitors (not necessarily the same, but within reason) and you need to prevent yourself from going massively into debt just to make a few bucks.  

 

Try to run the business as a cash-only operation for a while and see if you can even turn enough money over to afford more equipment.  If you can do that enough to grow, you're on the right track.  Unfortunately, you don't know what you're doing until you get your feet wet.  Oh, and locations making $60-$100/week are great.  A lot of bigger vendors walk away from these accounts but you can do excellent as far as profitability goes by giving them a big can machine and a decent snack machine.  I have about three locations that do $100/week and I stop in once each week just to top everything off.  It's easy money and the big guys don't feel like wasting their time with them.  One of my locations that does almost $100/week only has about 15 employees, but that situation is very rare.

[Poplady1]

The vendors I am working with in SCA hope for $50 a week per machine.  If they pull that they will keep the location.  Of course there are spots that do better and many that do less.  In the 35 years I have been in this business it is rare to have a drink machine do more then $100 a week with that said we had 19 Tire Discounters and some of those did better than that in the summer and dropped like a rock in the winter.

 

The larger companies I work with (Canteen-Dependable-Premire etc) want higher amounts but their overhead demands it.