15 replies to this topic

[railtrailed]

I am going to put my first 2 honor boxes into operation this week, I did not buy them and to be honest I did not even really build them. I just took some boxes with compartments that were about to be trashed at a local store. I bought product, etc. and will put the first one in tomorrow morning. They are crude but they will do the job. My question is do I just make a compartment with a slot within the box for money deposits? I was going to go with that for this week and then on my 1st collection a couple weeks from now I was going to buy metal money boxes with a lock or suggestion style boxes with locks and just gorilla glue them to the soda machines I have at those locations- Is that a bad idea? Makes the money more secure and it does not leave management at these locations responsible for anything. I just do not want the money walking off into the wilderness. Where the boxes will be located, in main employee areas of course, are sometimes sparsely populated so I do not want someone to be tempted..

[RJT]

Honor boxes can be bought for $5.00 or less so I dont see the need to jerry rig something and have to worry about things like where to put the money. Specific honor boxes have money compartments built it and dividers. Do not start off running a business this way. Start off right, start off professional and you are much more likely to succeed.

In the honor box business it is a 3 strike rule at locations when it comes to loss. Expect a few items to be short each week. If you have three major losses then pull out of the account. Post a notice each time it happens that they could loose the honor box if it keeps having shortages. That may help keep you and them from getting to the third strike.

If you are worried about bolting metal money boxes and such for the money either you don’t need to be in the honor box business at all or you may not be placing these in the right account.

I am sure Dogcow will respond to this thread and he has been working the honor box business for about a year or so. I am sure he can give you some good insight.....

[dogcow]

Honor boxes can be bought for $5.00 or less so I dont see the need to jerry rig something and have to worry about things like where to put the money. Specific honor boxes have money compartments built it and dividers. Do not start off running a business this way. Start off right, start off professional and you are much more likely to succeed. In the honor box business it is a 3 strike rule at locations when it comes to loss. Expect a few items to be short each week. If you have three major losses then pull out of the account. Post a notice each time it happens that they could loose the honor box if it keeps having shortages. That may help keep you and them from getting to the third strike. If you are worried about bolting metal money boxes and such for the money either you don’t need to be in the honor box business at all or you may not be placing these in the right account. I am sure Dogcow will respond to this thread and he has been working the honor box business for about a year or so. I am sure he can give you some good insight.....

i agree with all this, ive never had a big problem with theft of money and i agree use the real boxes they arent that much and you will
get a full ROI after the first service. I have had to replace a box here or there but generally i clean and re-use them.

I also agree if you are worried about the money being stolen dont do that location. I have had 2 problems with money missing. In both cases it was the customers not the employees. How do I know? Because in the first case a location that was previously a solid payer shorted me 100% (box was empty of food AND money). They are one of the locations that has it up on the counter where the customers pay. I decided not to bring it up and just put zip ties on all the money boxes next time. Well sure enough no money missing. If the employees are not paying I wouldnt have collected anything. In the other case, a customer stole the entire box.

Aside from that I never had any problems with theft of money. If people are going to steal they just arent going to pay, but if you are worried poke a hole in the coin door and put a zip tie on it. that is enough to tell if people are stealing and zip ties are cheap

Also I should mention in the locations where I have soda machiens I have very little theft from the honor box
i have had to issue a warning here or there and usually someone will come up to me with the missing $\
or the next week there will be extra money in there

I am a huge proponent of honor box vending I have seen personally you can make a lot of money
in honor box vending for very little investment.

Good luck!

[railtrailed]

Thanks a lot guys for your comprehensive replies. I obviously have no problem shelling out 5 bucks for a box. But the cheapest boxes I could find were on Ebay for 10.50 plus like 11 in shipping or vice versa. Definitely not going to pay that much for a box. I am filling a 660 tomorrow which is the furthest machine on my route so i don't want to go back with an honor box a week from now (I go about every 3 weeks). So I used one of the boxes I talked about in the above post and it looks professional, plus the fact that I think it holds more than one of the honor boxes I saw being sold on the net. I packed it with 67 items about an hour ago (this is an all employee account). I was just a bit gun-shy about having my money in the open but I am warming to the idea. I put a bunch of different chips, doritos, cheetos, 6 pack oreos, handi-snacks(I taped 2 together for 1 vend), and cracker jacks. Everything is priced at 1.00.

[RJT]

i agree with all this, ive never had a big problem with theft of money and i agree use the real boxes they arent that much and you will
get a full ROI after the first service. I have had to replace a box here or there but generally i clean and re-use them.

I also agree if you are worried about the money being stolen dont do that location. I have had 2 problems with money missing. In both cases it was the customers not the employees. How do I know? Because in the first case a location that was previously a solid payer shorted me 100% (box was empty of food AND money). They are one of the locations that has it up on the counter where the customers pay. I decided not to bring it up and just put zip ties on all the money boxes next time. Well sure enough no money missing. If the employees are not paying I wouldnt have collected anything. In the other case, a customer stole the entire box.

Aside from that I never had any problems with theft of money. If people are going to steal they just arent going to pay, but if you are worried poke a hole in the coin door and put a zip tie on it. that is enough to tell if people are stealing and zip ties are cheap

Also I should mention in the locations where I have soda machiens I have very little theft from the honor box
i have had to issue a warning here or there and usually someone will come up to me with the missing $\
or the next week there will be extra money in there

I am a huge proponent of honor box vending I have seen personally you can make a lot of money
in honor box vending for very little investment.

Good luck!

I am glad I suggested it to ya... lol

I agree I think honor box vending is a great way for people on a budget to get into vending and then trasition to full line vending with machines. That is why I included a chapter in my book about it called Getting started on a shoe string budget.

[railtrailed]

I taped the a cardboard box I made into the back corner of the honor box for the money, looks good, there is a 2/3 overhang over the top so this allows me to pack even more items in since they are stacked, again more room than others I saw. I may have to figure out an even bigger box for next time or time after because these guys are going to kill this stuff and it really is not worth it for me to go back more than once every 3 weeks.

[dogcow]

Thanks a lot guys for your comprehensive replies. I obviously have no problem shelling out 5 bucks for a box. But the cheapest boxes I could find were on Ebay for 10.50 plus like 11 in shipping or vice versa. Definitely not going to pay that much for a box. I am filling a 660 tomorrow which is the furthest machine on my route so i don't want to go back with an honor box a week from now (I go about every 3 weeks). So I used one of the boxes I talked about in the above post and it looks professional, plus the fact that I think it holds more than one of the honor boxes I saw being sold on the net. I packed it with 67 items about an hour ago (this is an all employee account). I was just a bit gun-shy about having my money in the open but I am warming to the idea. I put a bunch of different chips, doritos, cheetos, 6 pack oreos, handi-snacks(I taped 2 together for 1 vend), and cracker jacks. Everything is priced at 1.00.

Cameronpackaging.com has the ones use
Sheridansystems.com has bigger nicer ones the website has a minimum order but call them they will sell you a small number.

3 week is the longest you should leave it because u dont get a ton of variety so chips will go fast and the other stuff like pasteries expire fast

[railtrailed]

Picture to come-

[railtrailed]

How does one post a picture on here!?

[dogcow]

upload to http://tinypic.com/ and then copy and paste the link it gives you where it says "for forums" it will be something like
[img] http://.....

[railtrailed]

Picture of my jerry rigged box-

[railtrailed]

Thanks for the tip dogcow-

[dogcow]

the professional boxes are going to give you better merchandising ability, as in you can see the merchandise better because its not all crammed in there.

also is this a warehouse location or somewhere thats not air conditioned? i notice you dont have any premium items like chocolate or pastries. i would at leasdt put some peanut m&ms. also lance crackers sell really well for me. i guess you are selling ritz packs 2 for $1 but honestly i sell lance for $1 each and never had complaints.

myself i put 32-35 items with only repeated items being lays, doritos and choc donuts (Best sellers) everything else i put one of each i find having a big variety is better unless you notice a trend at a place because everyone likes different stuff. also tho i use smaller cameron boxes. the sheridan system boxes you can fit 60-100 items depending on the configuration

[RJT]

Sorry but that looks pretty bad. I would NOT put those on location. It looks awful from a merchandise stand point and it looks awful from a professional stand point. Buy the professional boxes and put them out if not you and your compnay will look "Mickey Mouse" and no one will take you serious. Please dont put those out!!!

The other thing to consider is if you have professional boxes and what looks like a "legit" company doing the honor box I think you are less likley to have as much theft. I think it is preception with people that makes a difference.


DC has been doing this for a while and knows what he is talking about. Follow his free advice and you should do well....

[RJT]

I really like these boxes and they are less than $5.00 each. The guy selling these boxes is also very nice and helpful if you need some advice.

http://www.vending-b...-box-store.html

[dogcow]

heres mine, i clip my business card to the front i just edited to remove my contact details



also this is an older picture. i use the dividers now, the box fits a little less but it looks much nicer.