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Things to Consider When Setting Up Your Vending Machine Business

A lot of people get attracted to the vending machine business because the answer to the question "How much can I make?" puts dollar signs in their eyes. While you certainly can make a lot of money at vending, there's another critical question to ask yourself: "What's best for me?" The answer to that question will determine how you should set up your vending machine business, and whether you'll still love the business a year from now or hate it, and be thinking about how to get out.

A friend of mine believes that everything in life comes down to "time, dirt and money". We'll leave out the dirt part of the equation for a moment (there are many kinds of "dirt") and just focus on life coming down to time and money. To be more specific, time versus money. Which do you have more of? Time or money?

If You Have More Time Than Money
If you have more time than money, honor snack vending is the best way for you to get started in the vending business. This will require that you do not have a nine to five job, or at the very least that you'll be able to take an hour or more off for lunch every day. This is because the only time you can service those in-office honor baskets is during office hours.

As an honor snack vendor, you'll be able to focus on small offices that are overlooked by larger vending machine business owners who don't have the time to go after smaller, though possibly more lucrative niches like this. Expect to check your honor baskets once a week, maybe every two weeks. You'll need to keep the honor baskets well stocked and be friendly with the people in the office for the honor system to work for you. Well-maintained honor baskets in private locations don't usually lose more than 20% of their inventory to shrinkage, which is the industry term for theft from this kind of setup.

You can make a tiny little income with honor snack vending, and the cash outlay to get started is very small. Its the least expensive way to get started in the vending business.

If You Have More Money Than Time
In this scenario, you want the equipment to do the heavy lifting for you. Forget honor baskets. Get top of the line automated vending machines that look really good and come with first-rate service plans. You still want to be the one collecting the money from these machines, but you don't want to be messing with iced-up compressors or bent springs.

The best vending machines and products to sell for you would be bulk snack vending and impulse or game machines. You'll be able to get away with checking on these machines once every month or so. Instead of the small offices and private locations that honor basket vending business owners would aim for, you want to go after larger, public areas like bars, sports areas, community centers and the like.