where can I get vendstar parts? Or.. can I get vendstar parts

[Gibbie]

Hello vendiscuss people! This is my first post. I've been lurking here for a week now and this is indeed a very nice site. I'm interested in starting my own bulk vending route (less than 6 machines to start).

I'm not ready to go out and start buying machines because I don't know a lot about them. I have found many great deals on the vendstar brand some costing only $40 for a three head machine!

But if a flap breaks off, or a coin mech goes bad where can I turn for replacement parts?

I went to vendstar's web site and could not find anything for replacement parts. Where are they hiding them?

I see these things are almost 100% plastic, and plastic+public can't be too good of a combo.

Also how reliable are these things? Break once a year? Once a month? How bad can they be?

I just read a long thread about xyz and they are made of metal and are breaking all the time!

I would like a machine that is cheap, and very rarely breaks. What would you get if you could start over and begin fresh?

Thanks in advance!

[Rustinm]

Hello and welcome Gibbie,

I personally have nothing but vendstars. I own 115 or so of them, not all on location yet. I have heard of this problem before with vendstars and having a hard time getting parts. I have many responses to your post so here goes. 1st the 30 some machines i have on location for over two years now have had almost no problems. The only machines i have had break are from people trying to break into the machines and any machine can be damaged if someone is trying to break into it. As far as getting parts i think this is a two part or three part awnser. 1st i have been told that vendstar wont let you buy parts from them unless you have bought a machine from them. Ok, I just called them myself and they said that they wont sell parts unless you buy machines from them, not very helpfull is it? I asked why and scott from vendstar said that they do that to "protect thier clients". Im a client because i was stupid enough to buy my first machine from them and i can tell you that i would not feel unprotected if they sold parts to other people! My second response is that the nice thing about vendstar is how cheap they are. Although 40$ per machine is not a horrible price they can be gotten for much cheaper. I just bought 65 machines and only paid 1500$ for all of them. That comes out to 23.07$ per machine and i have heard of people getting them for cheaper than that. Now the point to that is if you ever need parts the machines are cheap enough were it would be very easy and inexpensive to buy some extra machines to have on hand just for parts. Also, parts can be bought on ebay. There is a lot of talk on here about weather vendstar is a good machine or not and there is a lot of debate on that. A lot of people dont like them but i really do because of how cheap they are to maintain and work on. Are they the highest quality? NO! But every part on them can be fixed with a phillips head sqrewdriver.

[JPVendCo.]

i have about 100 of these machines. they are not as bad as one would think. you cannot buy parts from vendstar unless you buy a unit from vendstar. you only have to buy one, but I am sure they will try to charge you 300 for it. you would be better off just buying entire spare machines as you find good deals on them.

I like the vendstars for a few reasons.

bought them fairly cheap

dont feel like crying if one does break

they have coin trays so you dont have to deconstruct the whole thing to get the money out

the canisters are interchangeable, so if a product is not selling well, you can pull it out without cleaning out the entire machine.

did i mention you can get them cheap?

jp

[bacho]

Hi Gibbie and welcome to the board.

I have to mimic what Rustinm and JP have already said. I bought my first ten for $25 a piece. I kept one for spare parts and in one years time only had to replace one chute door. This also gave me three extra canisters to switch out product.

Overall, in my opinion, it's a sturdy well built machine. Look on the bright side about plastic...it won't corrode or rust.

You can always pick up spare parts on eBay. There's always someone selling parts. Try to consentrate in locating them in adult environments and you should be fine. Kids are rough on any machine.

[nam]

Hello again Gibbie,

I guess I too will join the chorus of Vendstar owners here. I too have a bunch of them and although they are made of plastic I like them ok and would buy them again if the price were right. I think most of the Vendstar bashing comes from those that don't own them or have enough money to buy better machines. I certainly like my 1800vending machines alot better. My suggestion would be to buy 1800's if you can buy them anywhere near the price of the Vendstars. They are beautiful machines, metal, changeable cannisters and a quality product. I'd just advise buying Vendstars if they were cheap enough or for the next step up go with the 1800vending machines.

nam

[Gibbie]

Thank you all for your replies! I think I can over come my fear of plastic now

[sbishop]

ebay.com you can always find the vendstars. there are people selling parts on ebay, but it would be cheaper to buy a mahine a keep it for parts.

I called vendstar about parts. He tried to make it sound ilegal for me to have bought machines from someone other than them. I told him that they guy was moving out of town and asked him what he should have done with his 110 machines. His answer was and I quote "He could take them with him". He said why are you wanting to buy used machines? Our new ones have a 10 yr waranty.

So, I told him that I was screwed, because I bought an existing route. He said "We did not Screw you". I said give me an option. He said there are none. I said you are screwing me because I did not buy machine direct from you. I then hung up.

That one phone conversation has made sure that I will never buy anthing from them direct. The stupid thing is that he did not even try to sell me a machine to get me in the system. I would have atleast tried to get some info and contact me in 6 months to see if I wanted to expand.

[WillisNYC]

sbiship,

I got the same story from Vendstar about it being illegal to buy their machines 3rd party! And I got the same bs about not being able to buy spare parts unless I bought a machine from them. They seem to have a decent enough product, it just isn't worth anywhere near what they are selling it for! They really pissed me off too because of how they treated me. They told me that I wasted their time when I had decided not to purchase their product! They even had the gall to send me a nasty email in which they sarcastically 'wished me luck' in my ventures!

[chad]

I have had so much trouble with the chutes to my vendstars. I wouldnt even bother replacing them. They will usually get ripped off again. Kids just pop them things right off. So unless the owner complains about the chute not being there, I wouldnt bother replacing it

[alyssamma]

LOL, this is so funny about Vendstar

I agree w/Chad. I have about 80 Vendstars and don't bother replacing the chutes - although I've only had a few break.

Kevin