8 replies to this topic

[slick225]

I'm just starting my vending machine business and I'm starting with Gumball Machines, is there a popular brand of Gumball Machines? what are some of the better Machines and which should I avoid?

[MaximusVending]

AA and Northwestern I've had the most luck with

[GumballGuru]

Rhino Vending Machines i think have the best combination of quality and price... i get my gumball machines from GMW.

[ronsidney]

Everybody who does this for a living knows there are really only 4 manufacturers of quality gum ball/bulk machines..The rest are just Chinese knockoffs and in a few years you'll never find a part for them,or you'll buy one today and then one in a month and they will be totally different and no parts will interchange..This being explained because the importer bought first container and it had defects and then complained to manufacturer in china and they tried to remedy the problem and changed their tooling and then the 2nd container was basically a different machine..

why bother when there is no price difference anyway really,,buy a old used northwestern,Oak, a&a or Beaver on ebay and it will be just as good as a brand new one..

gumballs is a safe bet to start, look for restaurants only, they will be your best money makers, even if you have to drive a gazillion miles to make sure they are all placed in restaurants..

hope this helps,thanks for letting me into your guys forums!! I used to post all the time on the yahoo groups but they see to have died a bit now.

ronsidney
blazingquarters.com

[GumballGuru]

I could not disagree more with Ronsidney.

[ronsidney]

every major vending operator in the country uses the brands i mentioned,, that represents about 90% of all bulk vendors in operation if i had to guess..

No major operator buys the import machines as there is no need to buy overpriced machines from a biz op.

the only people that purchase the other models are normally people that are new to the business and are sold a "package" or a "business opportunity" and since they don't know any better they normally are disappointed with the results of the collections from bulk machines..

Just ask where it was manufactured,,if they where from any other country than US (or canada as beaver is a good machine) then its probably not a good machine.. and why pay premium price for a chinese made machine?? isn't cheap slave labor in china supposed to bring the consumer cheaper prices?? then why are the american made Oak, A&A, and Northwestern the same or cheaper price..because some biz op guy is raking in the markup..

ron
www.blazingquarters.com

[GumballGuru]

Ron,
i hate to break it to you but many companies and i know A&A for sure are buying their machine parts from china like (machine bodies, mechanisms, etc...) and just assembling them here according to their customer requests. Yes i know they have a big plant in MD and they USED TO make all the parts in MD as well... So if you want USA "assembled" machines i agree :-) i'll still go for the lower price...
The Guru.

[Performa Vending Inc]

Quality beats quantity any day of the week. I'm with Ron, buy Oak, Eagle, Northwesterns, A&A, or Beavers if you can afford them.

A&A's machines are made in china, but they were desinged here, and are duplicates of quality machines. However, LYPC, Rhino, Selectivend and other "off" brands are both produced and designed in China, and are all clones of each other. I wish you good luck if you try to find parts for your LYPC/Rhino/Silent Sales Force machines in a decade, if they last that long. Of all the "Chinese" machines I've owned, not one was made of metal. You'll note that all the machines Ron and I listed are made of metal, and will last you a lot longer than the plastic ones will. As they age, the plastic gets brittle and stiff, and then it shatters without much provocation- I've had an SSF do that and it wasn't pretty.

To say it's cheaper isn't even right- The Oak Vista 450 is $48 NEW. There's only ONE Rhino machine cheaper than that.

Oak has been making the Vista for decades, their reputation is legendary. To top it off, they are cheaper than the Chinese imports.

As a vendor, I've learned this lesson the hard way. Buy quality and leave plastic junk by the wayside.