Uncle Sam
Member
The past 15 years has seen the introduction of many new vending products into the car wash industry as well as the vending of token packs, token notes, Gift Cards, Loyalty Cards, etc. I recently browsed through a couple of the leading catalogs counting the number of vending products that are listed and was surprised when I reached 750 individual items. There is a multitude of product available to sell, but very few ever see the vending machine at the wash.
An accepted fact in published vending articles over the years has stated that vending sales volume always increased as the number of items presented for sale at the wash increases. Yet there is a real reluctance on the part of wash operators to want to vend more than 10-12 different products to their wash customers. Even presenting 18 products, as the smallest electronic vendors do, is a big hurdle for some operators to overcome. Ample evidence has been presented on posts in this user?s group that 39 to 51 selections in one vending machine can increase the vending sales profits for a wash quite handsomely. It does take some effort on the part of the operator to find out what mix of products will sell at a particular site, but it can be done. It is almost guaranteed that the mix of products at one site will not be the same as at a site down the street or 5 miles away, and that the mix needs to change frequently. Just as each operator puts his personal ?brand? on a wash site by the way it is run and presented to the public, the customers select vending products that reflect them and their demographics.
After the choice of a vending system is made, the selection of product mix is a continuing process that requires effort by the operator and changes frequently. If the vendor is located somewhere near the vacuum islands and offers a selection of many different products to the wash customer, the returns on that investment will be very handsome indeed.
Uncle Sam
An accepted fact in published vending articles over the years has stated that vending sales volume always increased as the number of items presented for sale at the wash increases. Yet there is a real reluctance on the part of wash operators to want to vend more than 10-12 different products to their wash customers. Even presenting 18 products, as the smallest electronic vendors do, is a big hurdle for some operators to overcome. Ample evidence has been presented on posts in this user?s group that 39 to 51 selections in one vending machine can increase the vending sales profits for a wash quite handsomely. It does take some effort on the part of the operator to find out what mix of products will sell at a particular site, but it can be done. It is almost guaranteed that the mix of products at one site will not be the same as at a site down the street or 5 miles away, and that the mix needs to change frequently. Just as each operator puts his personal ?brand? on a wash site by the way it is run and presented to the public, the customers select vending products that reflect them and their demographics.
After the choice of a vending system is made, the selection of product mix is a continuing process that requires effort by the operator and changes frequently. If the vendor is located somewhere near the vacuum islands and offers a selection of many different products to the wash customer, the returns on that investment will be very handsome indeed.
Uncle Sam
