A portion of a recent article in the Fort Meyers, Florida News-Press described Garage Vendors as the unlicensed, uninsured, unaffiliated “bane” of the vending machine industry. To portray these hard working men and women in this way is unfair and in the vast majority of instances entirely unwarranted.
The term Garage Vendor is a vending industry term used to describe a small vending company that operates out of their garage or a small rental storage facility. Other industries often use the term “mom & pop” operation.
Most of these companies are family businesses with only 1 or 2 maybe 3 people working long, hard hours desperately trying to compete with larger vending companies who have advantages that they don’t have or may never have. They have their life savings wrapped up in their fledgling companies and are struggling to stay afloat. I know lots of Garage Vendors; they are some of my favorite people. I help them whenever I can, usually at no cost.
Many of the largest and most respected companies in the vending industry started as lowly Garage Vendors. Nathanial Leverone (Canteen’s founder) and Davry Davidson (one of Aramark’s founders) both started as Garage Vendors in the 1930’s. The prosperous dot com companies existing today that were started in garages are legendary.
Let’s be sporting. Give these folks the respect they deserve for risking their capital and making the effort to build something from nothing, it’s the American way.
Tom Britten
Analyst . Intermediary . Consultant
Phone 813.469.5437
E-Mail tombritten@msn.com
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Biography of Tom Britten:
Analyst, Intermediary, Professional Consultant. A full service resource to large and small operators "Helping Vending, OCS and Food Service Operators to Grow and Profit" 813.469.5437 tombritten@msn.com
Featured Speaker: Business Meetings, Trade Associations, Fraternal Groups, and Government Agencies
Topics: Security, Loss Prevention, Acquisitions/Divestitures, 25 Things That Don’t Change, Time Management, Effective Sales Prospecting
Consultant: Establish strength in the market place, significantly improve profitability.
Areas of Interest: Systematic Sales Prospecting/Booking New Business, Account Retention, Expense Management, Acquisitions and Divestitures/Exit Strategy, Increased Productivity, Right Sizing, Loss Prevention, Improved Internal Controls, Security Analysis, Executive Recruiting
Career Synopsis & Credentials: Tom Britten has broad-based operations and marketing experience in food service, vending and distribution. The client base he has served and sold extends to business / industrial, education, government, health care, and corrections facilities. He has worked in key positions both domestically and internationally and was instrumental in the introduction of Canteen’s full line services in Japan and reorganization of operations in Spain.
He successively progressed through executive positions at Macke, Service America, and Canteen where he became Vice President. He also served for eight years as Vice President of Sales and Operations for the Haddonfield Group, Management Consultants. In this assignment, he designed and implemented profit improvement programs for clients in retail and service businesses. In 2003, Britten formed Britten Management Services LLC, a profit improvement firm.
Professional Associations: Mr. Britten was a member of the Board of Directors of the state vending councils in Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Washington. He is a former recipient of the NAMA chairman’s award for legislative action and has been widely published in a number of trade journals. He published the popular “25 Things That Don’t Change” which has been adopted as essential reading by many food and vending companies. He now serves on the editorial advisory board of Automatic Merchandiser magazine and holds a certificate of appointment as a Federal Contracting Officer for the Veterans Administration, where he is an appointed representative of the American Federation of Government Employees. Britten is also a past Chairman of the Human Relations Board of Hillsborough County.
He can be reached at tombritten@msn.com
Leave a Reply
July 23rd, 2008 at 12:33 pm
I don’t believe you were dissing or downing the “garage vendor” but I would like to respond to your article which I usually wouldn’t do but I am compelled to in this case. I am a “garage vendor”. I am not a gumball or mechanical machine vendor, but a full line using professional vending equipment. I do have a valid business license, insurance, taxes and presently building a new facility at this time. Here is the short version of how it happened. I had worked for a corporately owned vending company for over 28 years as a middle manager, when about 10 months ago they decided to release me because they couldn’t afford to pay me and it would help their bottom line by reducing labor cost quickly and also enable the corp. managers to receive their bonuses. That is what the VP’s and corporate officers are about anyway. They just don’t understand that vending is a people business. They did the same to 3 other managers within this region last year that they did not replace anyone. Bad mistake. I should have seen it coming but I was blind to the fact. After about the first month that I was gone, many former customer contacts started calling me at home to complain about the bad service, empty and nonworking machines, and other issues that they now faced, something that never happened when I was managing the business. They had no leadership in place to deal with the customers or employees, and people said it was like a circus at the company. The customers could get not get their issues resolved and were looking for another vending company. Many pleaded with me to start a company and verbally agreed to a immediate contract over the phone given my previous customer service history throughout the years they had known me. I initially told them that I couldn’t help them but after mulling it over a few weeks, I had over $100,000 worth of new equipment initially delvered to a rented warehouse and started installing a few major accounts that led to even more accounts calling. I had to turn many down at the time because it was overwhelming, there was just too much business at one time if there is such a thing. Anyway this was less than a year ago and my business is blowing me out of the water. My biggest problem now is deciding how big I want to grow and do I want to get back into a large scale operation with a commissary again. I now make more money working less than half the hours and have many less headaches than before. Customer issues are nonexistent. I feel like I am free from my previous babysitter job working appx. 60-70 hours a week and also enjoy life more. This all took place less than a year ago and started on what I then thought was the worst day of my life. I sure wish that I had become a garage vendor 20 years ago, because it is better than I thought was possible. As for my former employers, they are in serious trouble within this area and probably won’t be around here much longer because their reputation has suffered significantly within this community. While this may not be your typical garage vendor, it is what has pushed me in the direction that I did. Of course my background id different than most people who start vending businesses and my results have been better than typical. It must have been what God intended for me to do. I had planned on retiring in 5 years before this all happened but if things keep going like they are now, I may never retire. I wouldn’t believe that not working for a corporation could be so great. Thank you for listening and best of luck to all the garage vendors.
August 3rd, 2008 at 11:13 am
Sir:
My brother is a garage vendor who takes this profession seriously. His biggest issues are how to finance new purchases of machines and finding a reputable locater.
I have not as yet seen any posts or articles regarding these areas of need.