candy vs toys

[candykid]

Hi There - what is everyone's mix of candy vs toys? 

We have mostly beaver machines with close to a dozen gumball heads.  Our local source for gumballs has ended which works out fine for us as sales in gumballs have come to a stop; only one location does well with gumballs.   I've gotten 27mm superballs and have changed over 3 heads. 

I have the impression from this forum that most of you do more toys then candy? True? Are we missing the boat here?  Should we be getting into the toy side more?

Thanks for you input.

[nam]

candykid,

My guess is those of us that don't have that many toys are tying to do more toys in the future. I know I am for sure. I'm vending the 1.1" round, not acorn, capsules from Brand. They have the number one best selling in history with their Zoo Mania series. You can vend rings, tattoos and about everything but ice cream in these little capsules the size of an 850 gumball. The nice thing is there is no spoilage, you can fill the cannisters to the top. Probably service the machines less often because they are full. Brand has the Mania series with Zoo and also the Sea mania, little stickies, blobs, and numerous other things in the caps. Check out www.brandvendingproducts.com or call them at 1-480-443-3378 or 1-800-967-3048. Ask for Craig or Diane. Great people to do business with as well. They no longer sell in the acorn caps and you have fewer problems with the round caps.

nam

nam

[caserri]

nam,

I've never done business with Brand. Do they use the round caps by default or do you have to request them? Also, how are their prices on the 1.1 mania products?

Steve

[Faith Vending]

I am moving to toys whenever I can even if only one cannister in my triples. The profit margin is not great but thinking about testing a 50 cent mech to see if people will step up to 50 cents. Since I moved to Ford Gum they have been selling better and unless the people say they flat out don't want gumballs they are going in. The people at Ford say some operators only vend gum:shock: The rest might be toys in their set up however.

Jim

[Jax Snacks]

I vend significantly more toys than I did 3 years ago and am very happy about the results. Candy just doesn't have the volume in most places - not to mention spoilage, ants, competing biz-op machines and rising prices. I really don't see how any vendor can make it selling just candy.

Transition into a few toy products, cut back on the candy selections and always sell gumballs. If you have any restaurants, I would do 2 toys and 1 gumball. Toys are also kinda fun! I remember when I had about 150 candy stops - sooo boring!

Jax

[nam]

Steve,

I'm almost positive they sell all in round caps and no longer do acorns at all. Not sure if they might still have some laying around as I have seen some in their show room but was told everything would be in round caps from now on.

Craig will email a price sheet to you or anyone that wants a price sheet. My bookkeeper sitting beside me here can't tell me off the top of her head what the prices are. The last of our Easter company has just left and she's taking Advil so won't push her anymore this evening. I'll get back with you tomorrow and let you know.

Jim,

We use almost all Ford gum as well and do find it to be better than what we had been getting at Sams.  Here the Ford Carousel is $14.98 at our local Costco Business Center and the Concord at Sam's runs right at $17 for a box of 850's.   It seems the Ford is a bit softer and seems to have a bit more flavor as well. 

nam

[markvend]

On the toy vs candy discussion, I think it really depends on your number of accounts and machines you run. I would hate to do away with many of my candy accounts as my profit margins are pretty decent. Granted, I have cut back my portions to where I can actually make something doing the candy. If there's already a bunch of machines there and it is the business does decent volume, I definitely think toys.

I have taken it a step further and converted some of the charity accounts to profit-sharing accounts with the owner under the requirement of being able to put in small-medium size racks. Be careful about going to 2" as you run into the problem again of low profits unless you're selling at 75c.

I run a lot of machines and have had a good chance to test this out in toys area. I really like doing toys. Some locations have completely surprised me that toys have moved at all. I have salvaged accounts at a few places by moving to toys as other operators don't seem to be interested in them.

I guess my bottom line take is that I will do gumballs first because of profit margins and will follow with either toys or candy as long as I can justify my sales volume. For others, I would say not to be afraid to try different things as long as you're not vending 25 different things (a nightmare).

If you only plan on running a dozen or two machines and that's your goal, then you may not want to do any candy. But, if you want to saturate an area and maximize every account, I think you have to be open to trying all three.

Thanks,

Mark

[nepavend]

I do a lot more toys than I will probably ever do with candy for one big reason (and several other smaller ones):  Spoilage.  Toys never go bad, candy can cause messes, costs more, and are higher maintenance products than toys.

Toy mixes are also a low cost way to generate sales by taking a mystery mix and adding other products that may not have been selling together.  You can also diversify into popular products like Zoo Mania and such but that requires some experience to move from one toy to another.

2" capsules and flat vend stickers and tats are another great way to boost revenue.  Many vendors have these products in their biggest accounts.

[candykid]

Thanks all for your input. When we bought our "route" - I call it that for lack of a better discription, it was really a bunch of abandoned machines- it was strickly candy, no gumballs or toys.

In the few months we have been playing with this we have tried the gumballs - bought from local source, terrible gum - and that went over ok until just recently when we couldn't get the gumballs locally and people got to realize that it was just bad gum. Now I have heads that I want to use and read an article about the superballs and we are giving them a try. I would like to stick with .25 vend so that we don't have to spend on new mechinism and it also seems that 1.00 vends don't move as fast.

I'm going to call Brand and see if they sell in Canada or have a dealer here, perhaps Actionmatic.  Would love to try the Zoo mania - looks like a good toy series.  How about the Glow in Dark sticky Eyeballs - good seller?

[pdavid]

Candykid,

Check out Simon's picks. He's a large vendor in California and he seems to be pretty dead-on.

http://modularvendingsystem.com/Merchandise_top_sellers.html

[nam]

Steve,

I just check to make sure I was correct in making this statement.  All Brand products will automatically come in round capsules by default - no need to special order as they no longer put product in the acorns.

As far as pricing again they will email a price sheet to anyone that wants one.  They pricing is pretty simple and standard on most all their products so whether it's tattoos or capsules you can switch from one product to the next as most all are the same price.  They do run specials so when you call in an order you should ask what their special is?

The Mania series are all either $19 or $19.75 per bag which has 250 in it.  They have the first series and second series in the Zoo Mania as well as I think in the Sea Mania.  The Zoo mania has sold over 32 Million and is the largest selling 1" cap in history.  Unless they have just managed to get caught up you'll have to wait to get them.  The whole thing is the kids love them and collect them so they keep trying to get the aniamal they don't have yet which is great for repeat quarters!

This week is the show in Vegas which is where Craig will be but sure they'll have Diane or someone manning the order desk.

nam

 

[dkochan]

I try to standardize on gumballs, Skittles, toys and stickers in locations where there are kids. I only put candy (peanuts, M&M's and PMMs) in adult establishments.

[Beer980]

I put their show special flyer up in the "All Things New" area the other day.