Hi, Newbie from Asia

[tvyoooo]

Hi All, Looking for information before I plunge into the Vending Business.

As the title, I'm based in SEA where most machines are from Japan ($$$) or China ($$). Hope to find new info here in the old old forum posts.

 

ps. you have an interesting download section

[AngryChris]

I think it's difficult for most of us to give advice to people in your region because the vast majority of us on this forum are from north America.  If I was going to model myself after a people in Asia, it would be japanese.  However, people of Japan generally have a much different social-economic situation than people in China for example.  So it might be difficult if not impossible to break into some markets.  The downside to Japan is that they are so full of vending machines that it might be difficult to compete in the market.  The upside of lesser developed countries is that the market is more open but who can afford things out of vending machines?  That's not information most of us know.  

[tvyoooo]

18 hours ago, AngryChris said:

I think it's difficult for most of us to give advice to people in your region because the vast majority of us on this forum are from north America.

Yea, no worries. Some knowedge is universal. I saw some super old links and was reading vending-business-information.com on archive.org for example.  The blue collar vs white collar was interesting.

18 hours ago, AngryChris said:

The upside of lesser developed countries is that the market is more open but who can afford things out of vending machines?  That's not information most of us know.  

Naturally I would have to adjust the info to my own market.

For example, Blue Collar here is 50% foreigners earning low wages and mostly send their money back home to their families. They do this for 3-10+ years.

Margins is thinner as people has less to spend, costs of supplies is higher and most importantly capital/equipment is still in USD (In fact I realized you guys probably pay less for a USA vending machines then I would for one from Japan and equal to a China one) A QRCode + bank note capable refrigerated 6x10(spiral/helix) combo machine is roughly USD4000, made in China. Looking to import it directly as a individual now.

The maths is such... I may not be going down this route. Sigh.

[AngryChris]

I'm just curious but I'm trying to guess where this would be.  China and many other countries don't need to bring in foreign labor so I'm guessing it's a very highly developed country lie Japan, maybe south korea, or Singapore.  And I also wonder about Hong Kong.  Those seem like the only places that might import people.   Maybe Taiwan too.

[tvyoooo]

16 hours ago, AngryChris said:

I'm just curious but I'm trying to guess where this would be.  China and many other countries don't need to bring in foreign labor so I'm guessing it's a very highly developed country lie Japan, maybe south korea, or Singapore.  And I also wonder about Hong Kong.  Those seem like the only places that might import people.   Maybe Taiwan too.

Actually, a lot of asian countries do have a high foreign labor participation. The ones you mention are the more visible countries. One of them is close tho. (no, Im not in north korea)