The Catastrophic Implications of Vending Machine Theft
Vending Machine Theft. It’s a real problem in vending. Vending machines are considered by insurance companies as liabilities because they are like little “safes” all over town. They hold a lot of money and product, and it makes it easy for thieves to walk up, break in, and steal the money inside the machine.
For vendors dealing with the already low profit margins, experiencing vending machine theft could mean losing a significant portion of the revenue made in a day or week. This also prevents the machine from being used while it is down, also reducing revenue.
Strategies to Beef up Your Security
I pose this blog post as a question for vendors out there. What are some of your strategies in dealing with vending machine theft? Because if theft is ultimately inevitable in certain areas, how can vendors protect themselves from losing too much?
One of the suggestions I heard in the past was to move the machine to a different location. If a machine often experiences vending machine theft, and the management at the location does not inform the vendor, then the best course of action would be to move the vending machine to a different location. There would be increased cost and money lost from doing so, but a vendor has to weigh the cost and benefit of moving the machine and losing the contract versus continuously having the machine broken into and losing money and product. In the worst cases of vending machine theft, thieves could break the machine, requiring high cost repairs that would further reduce the value of the location.
Another suggestion would be to purchase more expensive locks for the vending machine. However, using more expensive locks increases the cost of using the vending machines and makes it harder to make up the difference over time. However, if the new lock were to stop thieves from getting into the machines and curb vending machine theft, then it would be a wise investment.
There are other suggestions, but the real problem is that vendors are not always informed when their machines are broken into or when they break down. Vendors have to know when vending machine theft might happen as soon as they happen in order to keep their revenue up.
Parlevel Systems Provides Peace of Mind
That’s the great thing about Parlevel Systems and our vending management software (VMS). The VMS will inform vendors in real time when their machines break down and if something goes wrong. Therefore, instead of vendors receiving notice from their route drivers when the machine has been broken into, they will receive it via their phones or computers from our VMS. This way they’ll always be on top of things and be able to respond right away.
A busy operator needs to stay on top of their operation at all times to help deter theft. The Parlevel Business Feed app helps operators monitor their company at all times. Operators can receive notifications on their phone about their vending business at any time. Machine service notifications, route details, potential break-ins, and more are sent to an operator as they happen. With access to this info, operators can monitor business and keep an eye out for theft remotely.
Because the last thing you want to experience is vending machine theft.
Please continue visiting our vending resources for more useful information for vendors on the vending industry. We will discuss more on theft and how to deal with it in future blog posts.
