Frustrated.

[tblake05]

So... tip to anyone who owns machines as a side income of their main job.... or who’s wife runs the vending  machines while you work full time....

DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT install vending machines in your own workplace.

You wouldn’t believe the calls you get while on duty. Besides the standard gripes “why did you increase the can price from .75 to 1.00?” You also get gripes like... “vending machine stole my nickel”, to “the pop tarts are sold out”, and even “the red skittles are in front of the blue ones and I really want the blue ones”.

my experience is the co workers who call me at my desk, only call cause they feel comfortable bitching to me about everything! I treat all my accounts the same. And I do not get hardly any calls from anyone else. Believe me the equipment they have is a little older but working top notch and looks prestine.

so last Friday afternoon at 4:30, I restocked the 4 machines I have at my work. They close at 6 for the weekend.  Unbeknownst to me, I placed fruit snacks in a spot that was formerly .75 cents. I changed the price label to 1.25 but forgot to change it in the control board.

Realizing my mistake about Saturday afternoon, I planned to stop there Monday before I punched in and change it.

yup. Monday morning 6:30am, All 10 packs of fruit snacks sold out. So I bought them for .70 cents and sold them for .75. I know it’s my own damn fault. BUT it just pisses me off that the same people who are quick to golpher when the machine steals their nickel, they won’t even call and tell me when an item is priced wrong. Instead they tell their friends and buy them all out.

my wife and I agreed to leave that spot empty as a reminder to whoever did it until we have a day to spend increasing prices. At which point everything in all the machines will go up at least a quarter. I had the prices lower there since their my workplace people, but not anymore.

sorry for my rant. Anyone deal with this before?

[AZVendor]

I can't speak to owning machines where I work, though I did put them in after I left working there.  While I worked there and before I ever thought about getting into vending, Canteen had an old National 140 snack (yes, I'm dating my working life. They also had a wonderful RMI cup soda machine. There, that's how far back that was.) and one selection of Cheese PNB Crackers had a bad motor follower (I know what that is now) that wouldn't cancel a credit.  After telling the route driver about it several times it became obvious that no one was going to fix it so that selection was always the first to empty each week.  But the buying of all the cheap product will happen anywhere.  It's the account or people there that do tell you about such a problem that is the rarity now.  I had all the CompUSA stores in Phoenix and one of the Rowe snack machines had the old Coinco failure which would not open the gate to accept the coins to the coin box.  So every coin inserted set a credit and came back to the coin return.  In one weekend that store emptied a full snack machine and no one ever called us. I don't even remember the paltry sum of cash in the machine afterwards.  People are selfish pigs.  

[tblake05]

Yup. Just sad. I thought one person might call me after getting .75 cents back. I mean I’ve only worked there for 12 years and know everyone!

compUSA AZ? Being a 90’s kid and nerd for old technology, I miss those old computer stores.

[tblake05]

Plus i remember a failure like that on the snack machine in high school. Kids were lined up from one end of the school to the other. I remember walking by and wondering why the line. Watched as kids put quarters in, they dropped right through, and credit added up. Some kids bought a candy bar and moved on. The real greedy ones racked up some credit and then hit coin return and emptied the mech.

I also remember buying 20oz bottles in high school from the vending machine for 1.00 even. As much as I hated high school at the time, I’d go back in a second.

[AZVendor]

Yeah, we had machines in the 5 CompUSA stores in the late 90s.  They did pretty well due to all the kids working there and with the advent of card readers at that time I was constantly reading in Modern Merchandiser that we should all be using them, but I couldn't justify it since no one asked for them.

[Apple Leisure]

I don't know, I'm fine with someone letting me know the Poptarts are sold out.  And that they'd like to see 2 columns of Skittles instead of one.  Even if they say it took their money it's an opportunity to provide excellent service, i.e. "Sorry about that .... here's your money back.... do you mind telling me what happened so I can fix any problem there might be?".  Anything that's showing interest in my machines is a good thing to me.  And so what, your customers got a few items at your cost for once, your bad and we've all done it.  When they ask why prices went up, again it's just a matter of 'inflation is hitting everything' or whatever.

If I had a job at a worthwhile location I'd totally do the vending there.

 

[tblake05]

Yup. Until somehow they get your personal cell number and call you all hours of the day to tell you about planters honey roasted are in front of the cashews. I don’t have the space to spread out everything. And with the skittles in my area being MIA for months. I had to resort to buying the “fundraiser pack” that is assorted with starburst as well.

[AZVendor]

That's no different than owning a vending company that has your cell phone on the service sticker on all 300 machines.  You get all of the calls, all of the time.  I got used to telling them that no, I didn't mind more than one person had called me because I always wanted to know if a machine was down.  But it would get annoying when you personally know the people and they know your work schedule and know they will see you later in the day.

[Apple Leisure]

If you're having trouble finding Skittles that's an easy thing to explain to your customer:  'I'm still looking, when I can get them I'll put 'em in'.  Gee.

[tblake05]

Yup. And then more phone calls come to my personal phone all hours of the day because “where did the skittles go?”.

im not here to start a pissing match. Just venting some frustrations. Sorry if you took it wrong.

work full time at a dealership on your feet all day in the heat. Then restock one or more of your 30 vending machines after you get off at 5. Get home by 6:30 just in time for dinner with the family for the cell phone to ring. “Why did you replace Funyuns with ritz?”. It’s mainly kids and immature adults who call about anything and everything cause they’re trying to be “helpful” or entitled. I haven’t quite figured it out yet.

Put one at your work and give out your personal number. It’s a blast!

[Apple Leisure]

I'm just saying I like what I do.  Sorry you took it wrong.

[darkinthepark]

I run 7 vending machines at the school where I teach and I don't get many students or staff members contacting me even though I have my phone extension and room number on the machines.  One teacher tells me once the one machine is sold out of water, but I don't mind because he is a regular customer.  I make sure to keep the machines in pristine working condition so that they don't cheat anyone.