So you could do with some convenient access to snacks and drinks throughout the day. Maybe your nearest shop or cafe is a fair walk away or maybe it’s just never open when you need it. Perhaps you run an office and have noticed that your staff are disappearing in the afternoon for half an hour to find something to satisfy that 3pm hunger urge. Well vending machines definitely offer a solution and have been bringing convenience across the word for many many years, read our blog post titled How Does a Vending Machine Work.
Vending machines are open 24/7, can carry snacks, drinks and even mini meals. They keep your food nice and cool and sit there waiting to serve you. Why wouldn’t you want one! So how to you get one located at your venue? Well there are a number of arrangements that are available to you. A few are described here for you.
1. You could buy a vending machine from a vending machine manufacturer. These will typically cost between $7000 and $15000. You would then need to set up food and drink supplier arrangements, create some food storage location in your site, set up insurances and food permits. You would be responsible for maintaining the machine and would restock it from week to week. This approach may be suitable for some locations, for example in a school with a dedicated catering group that manage on-site food services. In this case, incorporating a vending machine will improve the availability of food and drink for the location and generate an extra income for the school. However, in many cases this is all just too much hassle and contrary to the whole philosophy of vending – convenience! If you are interested in buying a vending machine contact vending machine manufactures or distributers (google works) and pop over to them so you can see their vending machines and compare costs and benefits.
2. Engage the services of a local vending machine business. This is a common approach for offices and workplaces, recreation centres and universities. The vending machine business will deliver you a vending machine and will maintain and restock it on an on-going basis. They will usually hold the necessary insurances (always check) and food permits. In most cases the vending machine and on-going services will be provided for free. The vending machine business is able to make their income by selling snacks and drinks through the vending machine that they buy at wholesale prices. It’s that simple really. However, since the vending business are reliant on sales through the machine to make the service profitable for them, the vending business is likely to only offer their service in venues that are likely to experience a high enough level of sales i.e. a venue of a reasonable size. In venues of a very large size, the vending business may even offer a commission back to you to have them around. If you are interested in this approach then contact a handful of local vending business and arrange a meeting for them to your venue to talk to you about their service. We have written a blog post to help you choose your vending service provider.
Of course since this is the Snack Savvy Vending blog we will urge you to consider our health focussed vending business for your vending needs (or at least ask your vending provider to ensure as many healthy products as possible are available in your vending machine)!
