Buying Product from Bottler

[tismael56]

Hello, I would like to know what is required to start buying Product from a bottler. Do you have to be an LLC and/or have a vending permit? Do the bottlers check for this/ anything else? Also, what types of price should I expect for 20oz cokes and Pepsi? 

[AZVendor]

Call your bottlers and ask.  They won't care if you are in vending or a small mom and pop grocery store.  All bottlers work a little differently in different markets.  You will not get your best pricing from them so if you are using small amounts of bottles and/or cans it will be much more expensive to buy from them.  They usually have 10 case minimums and they don't deliver to homes, only to commercial addresses.  

[tismael56]

Thanks for the reply AZ, I only have 1 account that is asking for 20oz instead of 16.9oz so I would not need too much product only a couple cases. I am going to call them and see how to set up an account.

[tc vending]

From my experience you are better off with 16.9 oz bottles vs. 20 oz bottles. We do 20 oz bottles they are 30 to 40 cents higher than 16.9 oz bottles. With only a small amount of bottles from the bottlers your price will be high you should explain to your customer the price for 20 oz bottle will be probably 50 cents higher at least.

[tismael56]

@tc vending-- I agree with you completely, I can get 16.9 bottles for around 55 cents and sell them well at 1.25. The thing is I bought a route recently and the person selling the account ( not new to vending he has around 700 accounts) was giving the 20oz at $1.25!!! So I went in there and spoke with them that prices have gone up but they could get 16.9 bottles at $1.25. They said they'd much rather the 20oz bottles and I told them I could do $1.50 and I would absorb the cost for a few weeks they said no problem. not a great margin but these people eat through the snack machine pretty fast. And this is my problem☹️

[tc vending]

The problem is 20oz bottles will soon move to $1.75 some vendors $2.00.

[AngryChris]

16.9 oz bottles are great when you can get a lot of them, but if you grow, it may be difficult (or impossible) to make it work.  The ONLY way I know of to make it work is to strike a deal with a grocery store like walmart and order entire skids in advance so, when "your" order comes, you can just load it up and go.  The pricing is great but I am a firm believer that you don't try to reinvent the wheel and 20 oz bottles is what is the norm for vending.  Take advantage of the 16.9 oz bottles while you can if you want.. but you may eventually have to explain to customers that you'll be doing a massive switch (and it will be a pain if you are big enough) to 20 oz bottles.  Or, just start off with 20 oz bottles and keep up with pricing.

[tismael56]

How would you guys deal with this situation I am in. Got an account selling 20oz at $1.25 and only have met the people twice now. They were not happy but not too upset either to receive the news that pricing had to go to $1.50. I can get 20oz for $22 a case from a friend. Any ideas or tips? How long should I wait to up the price again?

[Southeast Treats]

No one will say they like a price increase but you should do them on a regular basis.  If you go up on bottles now I would try to wait a year before doing it again, but after about 6 months you may want to increase on a different category, maybe chips or chocolate.   Taking over an existing account is often a problem as the old operator may have been letting his prices be stagnant for a while and you end up needing to adjust more than one category coming in...

[AngryChris]

I make generic notices that give an explanation of what the notice is for (ie. "dear customers, the costs of various products have increased and we must increase our prices to compensate for the increase costs..." followed by a vertical list of product categories (ie. cans, bottles, candy bars, LSS chips, etc..) where I can hand-write the current price and the new price next to the categories.  Then, it says something along the lines of "the date of the increase will be..." and then I hand-write the date.  That way, hand-writing is minimal but I ALWAYS have price notices in my van whenever I need to raise prices.  Typing a letter for a specific customer is better and looks neater but it can be a pain unless you have a very organized desk and clerical skills, which I don't.  Generic letters can be kept in the van and used whenever you need.

Once I have performed the increase, I take the notice off (it's usually taped to the snack machine to be seen by all) and put it in the bottom of the snack machine.  Whenever I feel like prices are too low at a location, I check the bottom of the machine for the notice with the date of the last increase.  For example, I just checked one the other day and it had only been 1 year but the prices need to go up so...

I get stressed by price increases but I always keep two things in mind and it helps.  Firstly, the companies that keep their pricing way too low usually lack service and go out of business after a while... presumably because they can't afford to pay for nicer equipment, nicer vehicles, or pay their employees well enough... the crappy service means their reputation sucks too.  Secondly, the only time I ever hear someone complain about me raising prices is when they give me the old "Our employees don't get paid much" BS.  Whose fault is it that their employees don't get paid much?  Is that my fault?  Should I lose my hat because their company won't pay their employees well?  Nine times out of ten, the person who brings up low worker salaries is a manager who makes 3x what they make anyway, and he's not donating any of his money to help his workers. 

I worked way too hard and invested too much time and money into my business for someone to tell me that I should waive price increases because "Jim" won't be able to pay his rent if he now has to shell out an extra $0.50 each week in snacks.  I stress over the really good accounts, but not the smaller ones.

I strongly recommend you keep track of price increases somehow though... via my way or any other way.  

[AngryChris]

40 minutes ago, Southeast Treats said:

No one will say they like a price increase but you should do them on a regular basis. 

True story!  Literally today a customer was just chatting me up and said I should raise prices on my grandma's cookies from 85 cents to $1.00.  I asked him why and he said "Because that's what they should be" lol!!  He claimed he was just trying to help me.  He also asked about card readers and I told him I have been trying to switch out machines for a year now (mostly my fault) so I could add card readers.  I told him there is a 10 cent charge for card transactions and he flat out said he didn't care!

These kids don't care!!!!

[tismael56]

Those are good ideas! When I got the account, the guy had small chips bags at 65 cents so I went to Sam's got the LSS bags and put them for a dollar no problem so far. I also asked them for recommendations and got some more of their pastries in there. I knew I had to switch over to LSS but I said I would raise to $1.50 so as to not make the workers unhappy. I'll wait another couple of months before trying to raise prices on the bottles I guess. I don't want to be rash and lose an account over a $0.25 increase.