Hello folks,

I'm new to the forum.
Been looking into starting up a small vending business for a couple months. I live alone in an apartment. So it would be just me doing all the work. Now, I worked many years ago as a Route Driver for a large Vending operation in my area. So I have a general idea about the physical work involved. Just not the management portion of it. I'm particularly interested in having all my machines accept credit cards, and having telemetry software, so I can track all machines remotely.
Anyhow, finally got around to visiting my local vending machine distributor. Being that I'm new to the scene and don't have untold thousands to invest, they suggested starting out with Leasing machines?

The manufacturer we discussed is USI. They have a 48 month Lease program with option to buy at the end of the Lease term. Similar to buying a car on a Lease. I'm looking at starting with 1 location, with 50-90 employees, so I'd start with a 2 machines (1 snack, 1 soda).

The friendly salesperson filled out a little worksheet giving some hypothetical numbers based on a location with 75 employees. Her numbers seemed a bit inflated to me, as she figured such an account would bring in $2,600 per month.

Anyhow, long story short, she was figuring my lease payment over 48 months would be about $400 per month. If I averaged $100 per week per machine (from what I have read other people average), that's roughly $800 per month, minus 50% COGS. Not much profit there...

Am I missing something?

Is this a reasonable way to go to get started?
Should I buy after the Lease is up? Or trade-in the machine to the latest and greatest, staying on the Lease program?

Regards,

John