10 replies to this topic

[C & J Enterprises]

I have a possible location that already has three vending machines there, a drink, snack, and cold food machine all from the same vending company. They are not happy with the current vendors so they called me to place my drink and snack machines there. The problem is that they do not want to pull the other drink and snack machines because they are afraid that the current vendor will also pull their cold food machine (which I don't offer). I don't want the competition with the other drink and snack machines there offering the same products. It's a large location and I want the account but there is only one break room. What would you do?

C&J

[midtenn]

If I were you, I would ask for an exclusive contract if they wanted my service that bad. I don't know all the circumstances or conditions and I understand that you don't want to put a cold food in but maybe you and the account can settle on a frozen food machine, if that is something that you may be willing to do. The drinks and snacks are the main profit makers and I wouldn't want to lose half the sales to a competitor. The account may not give you that option, but that would be the only way I would go in. One other point, if the other vendor is doing such a bad job it will be hard for him to justify price increases and that will also affect you in the future more than likely, the both will be at the same product pricing. This is only my opinion to an alternative proposal.

[coinvestor]

If I were you, I would ask for an exclusive contract if they wanted my service that bad. I don't know all the circumstances or conditions and I understand that you don't want to put a cold food in but maybe you and the account can settle on a frozen food machine, if that is something that you may be willing to do. The drinks and snacks are the main profit makers and I wouldn't want to lose half the sales to a competitor. The account may not give you that option, but that would be the only way I would go in. One other point, if the other vendor is doing such a bad job it will be hard for him to justify price increases and that will also affect you in the future more than likely, the both will be at the same product pricing. This is only my opinion to an alternative proposal.

I was in a simular situation, but I pickup all my equipment next week

I thought that if they saw how great a job I did I would get the whole building. I got lots of complements on my service and everyone would say that we needed to do all the vending, but when it comes down to it they were not willing to get rid of the vendor because he was friends with someone at the top. His service is terrible, and the equipment is old. He has an old Rowe snack machine with wood grain front for the main area thats always empty and never works!

They held on to my proposal to do the whole building for 3 months without calling. One of Coke's machines caught on fire (there equipment was old) and evacuated the building for hours, then Coke replaced it with an even older machine. Still no call!

I am hard headed, but I can take a hint. They want to be left alone with there crappy service from people they know, so that nobody needs to be told they aren't doing there job and get there feelings hurt. Like midtenn said I was stuck at very low prices (candy .60) and had a vendor on sight that could not afford to raise his prices based on his service level.

I realized that this was a bad situation for everyone, me, the other vendor, Coke, and the location. None of us would ever say this is " a good account for us" and the location would never say "we have a great vending service". After lots of thinking I decided to pull my equipment (that is making money) out since I didn't want to be associated with the crappy service there.

JD

[jblvending]

I have a possible location that already has three vending machines there, a drink, snack, and cold food machine all from the same vending company. They are not happy with the current vendors so they called me to place my drink and snack machines there. The problem is that they do not want to pull the other drink and snack machines because they are afraid that the current vendor will also pull their cold food machine (which I don't offer). I don't want the competition with the other drink and snack machines there offering the same products. It's a large location and I want the account but there is only one break room. What would you do?

C&J

Pretty much what JD said, any good service you provide will be overshallowed by the poor service that the other vendor is giving, you have to ask yourself, do you want to be associate yourself on the same level as the other vendor?

[C & J Enterprises]

Thanks for all of the replies. I knew from the beginning that I would tell them to pull the snack machine because they are selling their candy for .70 and I sell my candy for .75 - .80 not to mention there is no way to not have some of the same product with another full size machine next to mine. I have gotten great advice from all of you and I just needed to make sure I was making the right decision.
Their drink machine sells 20oz bottles for $1 and mine would sell 12oz cans for .60, would this be competition to my drink machine? I am not putting the same flavor drinks in my machine so it's not the same flavors except maybe coke or dr pepper. Do I put my foot down on having them take out all of the other machines or am I ok with just having them pull the snack machine?

C&J

[coinvestor]

Thanks for all of the replies. I knew from the beginning that I would tell them to pull the snack machine because they are selling their candy for .70 and I sell my candy for .75 - .80 not to mention there is no way to not have some of the same product with another full size machine next to mine. I have gotten great advice from all of you and I just needed to make sure I was making the right decision.
Their drink machine sells 20oz bottles for $1 and mine would sell 12oz cans for .60, would this be competition to my drink machine? I am not putting the same flavor drinks in my machine so it's not the same flavors except maybe coke or dr pepper. Do I put my foot down on having them take out all of the other machines or am I ok with just having them pull the snack machine?

C&J

How big is the account?

I know that I will never take another account where I am not the only vendor unless they have a drinks from the bottlers and just want snacks.

JD

[C & J Enterprises]

How big is the account?

I know that I will never take another account where I am not the only vendor unless they have a drinks from the bottlers and just want snacks.

JD

It's an oilfield company that is open 24 hrs a day and they have around 40-60 employees. I have another account in the same area that makes around $500 per month on just a drink machine with the same hours and employee numbers. That location also has the same vendor but they only do the snacks there. I would like to recreate the same numbers again with this location. I'm going to call them again and ask if they can call the other vendor and see if they can just keep the cold food machine there. They want that one cold food machine because being open 24 hrs a day they would like a full meal in the morning hours without leaving. I just want to start off right and not have to pull machines the week after I place them. Thanks for the feedback JD, let me know if you would take the account.

C&J

[scottgtt]

Just a thought, why dont you get a refurbished National Shoppertron for $2500.00 ish. you can put a limited amount of cold food in there to see how it sells. Then since it is a carousel machine, you can put altervative drinks like milk, energy drinks, juices etc... in the remaining slots which will sell easily. that way, you provide what they want with little risk to you and you offer more products that can make you an addtional profit you would not have otherwise received. If the cold food sells well, then you have a good problem and you take out some of the alternative drinks and replace with more cold food.

[C & J Enterprises]

Just a thought, why dont you get a refurbished National Shoppertron for $2500.00 ish. you can put a limited amount of cold food in there to see how it sells. Then since it is a carousel machine, you can put altervative drinks like milk, energy drinks, juices etc... in the remaining slots which will sell easily. that way, you provide what they want with little risk to you and you offer more products that can make you an addtional profit you would not have otherwise received. If the cold food sells well, then you have a good problem and you take out some of the alternative drinks and replace with more cold food.

The only problem is that I have a Ford E-250 van that I vend out of. It's already running short of room with just drinks and snacks. I'm glad that you brought that up because when I get a box truck that can handle the room and I start getting cold food machines, that's the way I'll start. I called the location today and they agreed to take all of the other vendors' machines out. When I told them (again) that the cold food machine had items that didn't need to be refrigerated (beef stew, chef boyardee, ect.) he finally agreed that it made sense to have just one vendor. Now I'm putting those items that were in the cold food machine plus my regular snacks. All that they are losing is just hamburger and hotdogs. Thanks for all of the help.

C&J

[coinvestor]

When I told them (again) that the cold food machine had items that didn't need to be refrigerated (beef stew, chef boyardee, ect.) he finally agreed that it made sense to have just one vendor. Now I'm putting those items that were in the cold food machine plus my regular snacks. All that they are losing is just hamburger and hotdogs. Thanks for all of the help.

C&J

Good move C&J! Good luck on the new account!

JD

[BVI]

Just a thought, why dont you get a refurbished National Shoppertron for $2500.00 ish. you can put a limited amount of cold food in there to see how it sells. Then since it is a carousel machine, you can put altervative drinks like milk, energy drinks, juices etc... in the remaining slots which will sell easily. that way, you provide what they want with little risk to you and you offer more products that can make you an addtional profit you would not have otherwise received. If the cold food sells well, then you have a good problem and you take out some of the alternative drinks and replace with more cold food.

I have one of those Shopatrons, and it's a good machine. Bought it refurbished for $2000 from Southern Equipment Sales in Atlanta, and it looked like new when I got it.

I just wish it would get a bit colder than 38 degrees, though. My USI CF1000 food satellites go down to 32 degrees and seldom gets over 35 degrees. This makes a big difference in terms of how long you can leave cold food items in the machine.