Monday, June 25, 2007

How to Beat Out the Competition in Vending

The vending business is a very competitive business. If you want your Planet Antares vending business to be successful, you will need to beat out the competition by staying on top of your game. When you place a vending machine in a location that already has snack and beverage vending machines, you will find that the degree of competition among the vending operators will increase greatly. To beat out the competition you will just need to implement some strategies in your vending business.

Quality Vending machines
If you have a quality vending machines that function without too much trouble, your chance of beating out the competition will increase. Planet Antares vending machines are attractive vending machines that are strong, durable and have the ability to attract the attention of potential customers. Vending machine sales are impulse sales, so if a potential customer sees an attractive vending machine that is offering some kind of refreshment, he will be compelled to buy from the vending machine. Your vending machine will be singled out from the other vending machines that are offering the same merchandise, because it is the one that managed to grab the attention of the customer. All this means that you should consider the looks of a vending machine before buying it.

Implementing Technology
Incorporating some form of technology in your Planet Antares vending business will be a quick and easy way of pulling customers to buy from your vending machine. If other vending machines in the same location are all offering the same kind of service and your vending machine is offering a vending experience with a difference, customers will definitely buy from your vending machine. In addition to this, location owners would want to have such a machine in their location because they know that it will bring in more business for them as well. The use of technology in your vending machines will mean that you will have a quicker and more efficient service.

Products
Provide the customers of your Planet Antares vending business with quality products, so that they will continue to buy from your vending machine. Find a supplier that can provide you with branded products as well as a wide variety of other products. This will give the customers a wider selection to choose from. As customers continue to buy from your vending machine, you will slowly get to know which products are popular in each location. When you find that out, you should only keep those products in your vending machine, to ensure that customers will keep coming to your vending machine. Get the best deal that you can from the supplier so that you can sell your products at lower rates than other operators.

Maintenance
Make sure that your vending machines are serviced on time and the machines are well maintained, so as to avoid mechanical problems. Keep the vending machine clean as well. There are many vending operators that are late in servicing their vending machines or some that never clean their vending machines. People tend to avoid such vending machines. Provide quality services and you will keep customers to your vending machines.

Thursday, June 14, 2007

Mending a Vending Machine

The vending business is not only about restocking the vending machine and collecting money from the vending machine. If you have a Planet Antares vending machine, you need to make sure that it is always in good working order so that you do not experience any downtime. Having some basic knowledge about servicing your vending machine is important because you never know when you will be required to take care of malfunctions in your vending machines. Below are some few things that you need to know about vending machine repair.

The easiest way control malfunctions in your Planet Antares vending machines, is to have a technician look over them at all times. If you are running the vending business and probably going to a regular job at the same time, it will be very hard to service and repair all your vending machines on a regular basis. If this is your case, it would be wiser for you to hire someone to do all that for you. If you are renting vending machines in your business, make sure that the vending operator is practicing preventative maintenance on the vending machines.

Mechanical vending machines like those that are provided by Planet Antares are easy to repair. When you have a vending machine business, it would be important for you to know the most basic repairs that can be done easily with just a screwdriver. This means that you don’t have to call a repair man each and every time you need some work to be done on the vending machines. A product can easily get stuck in the vending machine. For that you do not need to call a technician. All that you would need to do is to open the door of the Planet Antares vending machine and move the candy out of the way. Doing such kind of repairs on your own can help you save money.

If your vending machine totally breaks down, this would be the best time to call in the professionals. There are mechanical problems that you simply can’t deal with on your own. A mechanic would come to the location of the vending machine and mend the vending machine on location once they have diagnosed the vending machine. There are some repairs that cannot be done at the location since it would involve some heavy machinery. In that case, the vending machine would have to be hauled to the mechanics shop.

Preventative maintenance of your vending machines is the only thing that will prevent your vending machine from breaking down. This is something that you need to do on a regular basis so that you don’t end up losing business when your vending machine is out of order. Vending operators lose money from downtime all the time. This is a situation that you want to avoid at all times.

Thursday, June 07, 2007

The Role of the Route Driver in your Vending Business

Route drivers are an integral part of a vending business operation. As an owner of a Planet Antares vending business, you know that increasing route driver productivity will increase profits. This is why route drivers are paid on a commission basis. The route drivers can receive a base salary plus a percentage of weekly sales. This is a system that you can use in your Planet Antares vending business to encourage soda vending machines route drivers to take a more proactive role in increasing sales.

Incentive programs are necessary to encourage route productivity. However, incentive programs alone may not be enough to maximize profits. In theory they work when employees have total control over their own productivity. When it comes to snack and beverage vending machines, consumers also play a role. Incentive programs are created so that route drivers are encouraged to service as many machines as possible. This will allow for the collection of as much money as possible. If you are using this system in your Planet Antares vending business, you will need to make sure that the route drivers are not cutting any corners in an effort to work faster. The route drivers can easily decide to speed in-between locations, ignore sanitation and cleaning requirements or fail to test vend each soda vending machine after service. This can jeopardize the profitability of your vending business.

The route drivers of your Planet Antares vending business must be encouraged to do a thorough job in a proficient manner. They must follow all health and safety guidelines. When the vending machines are well maintained, costly future breakdowns will be prevented. The route driver is the one that checks on the vending machines on a regular basis, so they know better than anyone else what the vending machine requires. The vending machines need to be kept clean at all times and serviced on time. A good route driver will know exactly when a vending machine needs to be serviced.

The route drivers should spend a little extra time talking to clients to determine what products and services consumers’ desire. Route drivers should carefully pre-select product menus for each location to maximize sales. When the vending machine has products that the consumers desire, there will definitely be an increase in sales.

The route driver for your vending business should be efficient at all times by never failing to deliver. When you are designing incentive programs for your route drivers take the above factors into consideration. The incentive programs should encourage them to be more efficient, not to make them less efficient.