Vending Operators Slow To Invest

the automatic merchandising industry remains at the bottom of a ladder, ready to climb but barely moving. In 2005, the automatic merchandising industry’s revenue increased by 3 percentage points.

The vending industry will continue to remain challenging unless the participants become more aggressive about investing in tools. A variety of these tools are available to the Planet Antares vending operators for improvement of sales and profitability. These tools exist to enhance the efficiency of performance and include:

• Remote machine monitoring
• Electronic cash audit
• Electronic locks
• Cashless capability

In spie of all these techniques, very few operators are able or willing to make the essential investment in equipment, salaries and training that will allow them to utilize these advantages. Meanwhile, the Planet Antares operator’s fortunes rest on external economic forces, which can be described as non-threatening in the short term.

The good point is that in the last few years, employee downsizing has reduced greatly, especially in the last three years. Vending operator sales posted a 3 percentage point increase in 2005, which led to rise of aggregate industry sales to $21.89 billion.

In both 2004 and 2005, the aggregate sales improved by 4 percent. Vending operators took comfort in the fact that vending locations had stopped firing employees during that time. Still, they are yet to take advantage of new technologies that offer the vending industry significant growth potential. You gain the ability to schedule service at the most opportune time, improve customer satisfaction, offer higher priced products and improve level accountability of your Planet Antares vending machine.

Even though these technologies offer great potential, the vending operator has barely started putting money into them due to the high investment required for it. also, you may need to integrate new hardware and software with the existing management systems. However, investing in such technologies will definitely bring a positive change in your vending business operations.