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Need help identifying a machine


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Hey,

I'm new here and just bought this machine for $100 from the guy that's been servicing our location years, he's looking to offload some other low volume locations to me as well since he's trying to scale back and retire. he has a brand new Dixie 501 he wants to sell me for our location as well for $1200 but that's for another day and thread. Any idea what machine this is and what to watch out for when it comes to issues with it? I was going to take possession of it on tuesday but I came down with Covid ugh.

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Edited by TheMageLives
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That's an A/P 4000 manufactured from 1981-1985. Add in Maka bill acceptor kit, also pre 2K. Very few parts available, but you have the 5 shelf version meaning it can sell LSS snacks, along with 2 candy trays to sell lots of chocolate items. For $100, not bad for a small low volume location.

As for the "new"501", the last new 501E was made circa 2006. The last 501T was made circa 1994. If it's an E, it's workable as a decent machine. If it's a T, it will vend cans only. Did he happen to mention availability of an ocean front condo in Arizona? (asking for a friend)

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7 hours ago, The Mage said:

Wait, Who?

Lol I didn't notice your name until just now. Themagelives is an oxymoron and also my old WOW char when I use to play. What makes the name an Oxymoron is if you know mages back in the day of wow we could pull agro off the tank very easily and we were usually the first to die if we didn't pay attention. 

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2 hours ago, lacanteen said:

That's an A/P 4000 manufactured from 1981-1985. Add in Maka bill acceptor kit, also pre 2K. Very few parts available, but you have the 5 shelf version meaning it can sell LSS snacks, along with 2 candy trays to sell lots of chocolate items. For $100, not bad for a small low volume location.

As for the "new"501", the last new 501E was made circa 2006. The last 501T was made circa 1994. If it's an E, it's workable as a decent machine. If it's a T, it will vend cans only. Did he happen to mention availability of an ocean front condo in Arizona? (asking for a friend)

I just went back and double checked the text and he's checking with someone over at Schaffer? for the price because he "bought it new" he's thinking $1,200 but double checking. Its a Live Display. In other words the A/p 400 is older than I am LMAO... joking aside thanks for all the help. Is there any quarks I need to know about on the ap 4000?

Edited by TheMageLives
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1 hour ago, TheMageLives said:

Lol I didn't notice your name until just now. Themagelives is an oxymoron and also my old WOW char when I use to play. What makes the name an Oxymoron is if you know mages back in the day of wow we could pull agro off the tank very easily and we were usually the first to die if we didn't pay attention. 

Lol.  A lot of vendors won't even be able to understand half of what you said

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1 hour ago, AngryChris said:

Lol.  A lot of vendors won't even be able to understand half of what you said

LOL, I'm not surprised. Noone I know plays world of warcraft anymore, i just login every few months to see what's going on, not enough time to play like I use to back say 15 years ago. Today I'm the Food Safety Manager at a Produce company here locally and trust me its a nightmare especially when your dealing with old school owners and managers that want to skirt the 3rd party requirements (or ignore them altogether cough cough microbiological testing) and FSMA but I'm doing my best and maybe grow a vending business to where I could just leave my main job and do this full time, but time will tell!  https://worldofwarcraft.com/en-us/character/us/shandris/Themagelives

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You can get big enough to supplement your income but the question is... How much vending can you take on before you have to quit your job?  It's very possible that you won't have enough time to do both and you may have to quit before the business can fully supplement your income.  Of course, you'll have plenty of time after, but not enough money.  You really need to save a lot of money and start off right.  Or, buy an existing business.  This depends entirely on how flexible your job is.

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6 minutes ago, AngryChris said:

You can get big enough to supplement your income but the question is... How much vending can you take on before you have to quit your job?  It's very possible that you won't have enough time to do both and you may have to quit before the business can fully supplement your income.  Of course, you'll have plenty of time after, but not enough money.  You really need to save a lot of money and start off right.  Or, buy an existing business.  This depends entirely on how flexible your job is.

Oh my job sucks, i only do food safety 25% of the day the rest of it is Ordering product, or running th emain office, driving a route, unloading trucks etc. they dont want this audit in reality they just want managers that can fill in when slow and so can send the hourly home. Might be a manager in title but we are all grunts.... would need to make 50k/y in pure proft to get me to quit my job.

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2 minutes ago, TheMageLives said:

LOL, I'm not surprised. Noone I know plays world of warcraft anymore, i just login every few months to see what's going on, not enough time to play like I use to back say 15 years ago. Today I'm the Food Safety Manager at a Produce company here locally and trust me its a nightmare especially when your dealing with old school owners and managers that want to skirt the 3rd party requirements (or ignore them altogether cough cough microbiological testing) and FSMA but I'm doing my best and maybe grow a vending business to where I could just leave my main job and do this full time, but time will tell!  https://worldofwarcraft.com/en-us/character/us/shandris/Themagelives

I've been calling myself The Mage online since before Warcraft. When dialup was still a thing. 

I played Warcraft, but I did it wrong. I always refused to join any groups. 

And I'm hoping nobody is getting annoyed that we are discussing Warcraft in the Food and Beverages forum.

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Looks like I have the option to buy a vendo for $400, or a 501 for $1,000-1,200 11 years old. hes double checking the price right now. they both have MDB. What do you all think? looks like the refurb is $1,900

Edited by TheMageLives
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He was going to pull out and retire. I couldn't get anyone to come in and put a machine in due to the low volume around maybe $15/week. The guy I bought it from has spare board, bill validator and coin mech if I need them. Wasn't too much of a risk for me to buy it. I have no plans what so ever of putting any money into this thing to upgrade the board or anything to accept credit cards, would be a waste of money. Just use it until it dies and depending on the part that breaks junk it or fix it. I've found parts online for it but then again it's so old it's not worth fixing 

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The biggest problem here is that, with sales so low, you may end up losing money by constantly throwing out more than you sell.  If you filled the gum up, chances are very high that you'll throw 75% away.  I know none of this is what you want to hear but vending isn't that easy and there's a reason why no vendors were interested in this location.

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I bought it so my guys at work had snacks, I know it won't make much money I was fully aware of that before I bought it. Either that or let the owners of the produce company buy a machine and give up with it after a month. and then my guys wouldn't have anything to eat. Not really going to put any chips in it because they don't sell, Doritos sell like crazy though. We have maybe 10 people in the warehouse at any hour between 12am-3pm. we may have 42 employees, 14 of them are drivers, 5 are sales reps and are never there. just leaves the warehouse staff and us managers and the owners which i saw buy something today. I have one guy that buys min of 1 payday a day. One of the drivers buys iced honey buns every few days so I'm getting some turn over, I just cant put alot of stuff that's either short dated or short shelf life I'd be shooting myself in the foot. Only time will tell with what sells, I have photos of the machine before every refill hes done in the last year, 7 weeks and its usually empty.

 

On a side note if the owners of the company I work for bought a vending machine, I'd be the one stuck filling it up anyways.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Wanted to give you all an update. I just did a clean out and in the last 2 1/2 weeks I've made $35.  This is all pre raising prices. I'm taking all candy bars and pastries to $1.25 and chips to .75. Just need to order the price tags. Around June I'll reassess and see if I need to go to 1.50. The previous owner had crackers and planters nuts priced at $.65 and neither of them 3 items sold in awhile if at all. I have requests from 6 employees for Reese Fast Breaks but I cant find them anywhere in my area. Learned the hard way don't buy hostess coffee cakes at sams club they are tiny af and would be useless in the machine so I've been eating them lol. Several employees have also mentioned that since they are Younger they Don't carry cash and would only buy anything if it had a credit card reader, well that's not going to happen on this old machine lol. 

 

Back to work doing root cause analysis.

TheMageLives

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3 hours ago, TheMageLives said:

Wanted to give you all an update. I just did a clean out and in the last 2 1/2 weeks I've made $35.  .....

 

Now pay quarterly sales tax and federal/state income tax, mark out stales, and hope that the bill validator doesn't quit because if it does, and you can even find a replacement, it will run 100-150.  That's 10 weeks of work (if my math is correct)

Are you sure this location is worth it?  We have a couple slower locations (which are in the back portion of dealerships).  I'm ok with them because I'm already on location restocking the main customer machines up front which make decent revenue.  Both business are ok with older equipment, though none of my stuff is as old as your machine.

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20 hours ago, tblake05 said:

 

Now pay quarterly sales tax and federal/state income tax, mark out stales, and hope that the bill validator doesn't quit because if it does, and you can even find a replacement, it will run 100-150.  That's 10 weeks of work (if my math is correct)

Are you sure this location is worth it?  We have a couple slower locations (which are in the back portion of dealerships).  I'm ok with them because I'm already on location restocking the main customer machines up front which make decent revenue.  Both business are ok with older equipment, though none of my stuff is as old as your machine.

Yea I'm fine with it I'm here everyday since my main job is here. The plan is to make as much from that machine before it dies and hope its enough to buy a referb. Hmm taxes that brings up a question. They guy I bought it from was saying in Ohio you only pay taxes on a soda machine not the snack machine, I have not looked into it yet but anyone else here have experience with Ohio sales tax law? I have not gotten a vending license or resale license yet the guy said to just run it without one (the state would not fine out), My plan it to get those things to be on board legally especially once I get a pop vend. On the note of stales non so far they are actually buying the pastries like hot cakes. Chips on the other hand all that's selling is Doritos but I have noticed when he did 7 week checks/restock everything would pretty much be sold out. I'm not going to do that since i would hear it from my employees about it being empty LOL. What would be your suggestion and restock since I'm on site 6 days a week 8hrs a day. Restock it every 2 weeks or once a row become empty? or let it go longer to sell out more items?

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Until you are truly in "business" just keep it as a private machine and don't worry about taxes.  Keep an eye on it and restock what is selling well to maximize your profits.  Check it once a week to keep on top of it.  Just because something sells out doesn't mean the person is going to buy something else so make sure your best sellers are in the machine all the time.

Edited by AZVendor
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2 hours ago, AZVendor said:

Until you are truly in "business" just keep it as a private machine and don't worry about taxes.  Keep an eye on it and restock what is selling well to maximize your profits.  Check it once a week to keep on top of it.  Just because something sells out doesn't mean the person is going to buy something else so make sure your best sellers are in the machine all the time.

thanks for the advise. I've already made more money in 2 weeks than he claimed to make in 7. He didn't put a lot of stock in the machine. and was always running low. 3 or 4 pastries was his restock and 3-4 of everything else

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