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ARTICLES:
NEW! Is Now the Right Time to Buy
Gumball/Candy Machines for Passive Income?
NEW! Economic Downturns and Bulk
Vending
Vending Millionaire? How Much Can I
Make?
8 Ways to Pay For Your Vending Machines
Power Tips I Used to Locate 100 Machines in
the last Year
Will I Need Business
Insurance?
Use your Home as a Bank to Pay for
Machines
How Much Time will it
take?
Optimum Route Size
Figuring Your Cost Per Vend for Higher
Profits
Quick Ways to Increase Sales,
1
Quick Ways to Increase Sales,
2
What Can I Sell in My
Machines?
Hard to Vend Items
5 Things to think about Before Buying
Machines
What Type Machines are Best?
What about Vending Locator
Services?
Investing Your Tax Refund
Talking to Bankers
The Real Costs of Running a Vending
Business
Grow the Person, Grow the
Business
Great Business Reading
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Five Things to Think About Before Buying
Vending Machines
It's easy for people interested in
owning vending machines to have visions of
thousands of dollars pouring in. In fact, that is a reality in my own life in
our vending company. We operate 2,000 machines in a two state area in the
Midwest. I have to admit, it's an adrenaline surge when you go to an
account and pull out nearly $100!
The reality though is that there
is a lot to think about if you are considering vending as a
business. Here are five things for starters before you buy those
first machines:
Am I in this for a few bucks of extra
cash or will I make it a BUSINESS? Vending machines are
like any other money-making endeavor. Treat it as a hobby and it
will pay you as a HOBBY; treat it as a business and serious income stream
and it will pay you legitimate and serious income. REMEMBER
THIS!
How many machines will I need?
This depends on your answer to #1. If you want a serious business
with legitimate money coming in monthly you need to plan for several dozen
to several hundred machines. You don't have to start there, but you
need to examine this possibility first. Again, if you just
want a few bucks to make the electric bill, 10 or 20 machines may be
fine.
Carefully consider who you buy a vending machine
from. There are companies who WILL scam you. I
have a personal friend who bought several snack machines spending over
$10,000 for them with a promise of having some high-volume hospital
locations. In the end, there were no locations and he could not get
his money back from the company much less find anyone to talk to.
The same applies to bulk vending machines (gumballs, candy, and toy
machines). Be very careful about promises relating to money you will
make with the machines and how easy it is to get a location. Most
bulk vending operators get out of the business because they cannot places
the machines they buy.
Consider whether to do
bulk vending or snack and drink vending. Bulk vending
consists of selling product "in bulk" through a single vending
machine. Typically, these are small gumball, candy, and toy
machines. Snack and drink vending is a different market in that
administratively you run your routes differently. The positives and
negatives of each will be considered in future articles, but let me give
you a couple of points here. First, with snack and drink vending you
are more limited in your scope of service area and you have to keep the
machines serviced much more often (probably weekly on
average). For bulk vending, you can often leave gumball and
candy machines for 1-3 months to service. This gives more
flexibility for someone with limited time. Also your cash investment
is less to get started in bulk vending.
Understand that
vending machines are stolen and vandalized. This is a
fact of life and a part of the cost of doing business. Sometimes,
even other owners will steal your machines! Thankfully, stolen
machines are a small percentage of your overall number of machines, but it
is still frustrating and discouraging when thefts occur. It's even
more frustrating if you're not prepared for it.
BONUS
TIP: Start off with a few bulk vending machines and re-invest your
profit for more machines to grow your business.
Mark Evants
(C) Christmark Enterprises,
LLC.
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