Skip to content

Unit economics and reading the numbers

Unit economics and reading the numbers

Lookup page for a beginner operator. Use it when a number sounds good and you need to know what is left, whether a stop is worth keeping, which cost actually matters, or how to read a month, a hire, a loan, or a sale price.

Current doctrine first. Then nuance. Then conflicts. Claimed results stay attributed. They are not promises.

Current doctrine

  1. Revenue is not profit. Beginners hear a machine does $5,000 a month and think they keep $5,000. How to Start a Vending Business (with ZERO Experience) (2026-07-07). Same rule later: a machine doing $1,000 in sales still has to cover inventory, processing, rev share, gas, maintenance, insurance, software, and service. How to Buy Your First Vending Machine (Step-by-Step Process) (2026-07-24). Mike Kaufman (2025-03-10): profitability is the metric; revenue is not. Mike Kaufman (2025-06-20): a number such as $135,000 in monthly revenue “does not mean anything until you know profit.” Mr. Passive (2025-07-11): make EBITDA / profit the number-one KPI. Ignore marketed top line as the north star.
  2. Run the leftover number before you place, buy, or agree to a split. Do not treat advertised monthly revenue as what you keep. How to Start a Vending Business (with ZERO Experience). Mike Kaufman’s line: revenue is vanity, profit is sanity, cash flow is reality. Top 5 Beginner Vending Mistakes.
  3. Judge quality, not machine count. You do not want five locations doing $200 a month each. One strong location is worth more than several weak ones. How to Start a Vending Business (with ZERO Experience). Score revenue per machine, not only the building total. How He Built a $50,000/Month Vending Business in One Year. If someone leads with machine count, ask revenue per machine first. Mike Kaufman (2025-03-10).
  4. A weak stop is a movable asset, not a life sentence. Give it a defined trial, then move it. Living with a dud is how you create another low-paying job. How His 3rd Location Hit $8K/Month In Revenue While Working Full-Time. Anthony (2026-08-11): the goal is not merely getting placed. The goal is a stop that actually performs. A weak location that still makes “a few hundred a month” is not a win if the same machine could do several times that somewhere else.
  5. Track money in and money out from day one. Profits, not revenue, are what Mike Kaufman calls the vehicle of business health. Everything You Need To Purchase Your First Vending Machine. Judge a live machine with numbers, not vibes. How to Buy Your First Vending Machine (Step-by-Step Process).
  6. The location, in-building placement, and mix set the ceiling. The machine is equipment. Same traffic can produce very different revenue if the format, planogram, or indoor spot is wrong.

The working stack most often repeated for a placed, selling machine is:

  1. Start from monthly revenue.
  2. Subtract cost of goods.
  3. Subtract card / software / data fees, and any revenue share.
  4. Subtract labor if you are not stocking it yourself.
  5. Subtract the machine payment if the asset is financed.
  6. Subtract fuel, maintenance, and insurance when they apply.
  7. Treat what is left as take-home, then compare it with a margin target.

Note

Almost every dollar figure in this corpus is an operator claim, a walkthrough assumption, or one location’s result. Keep the name next to the number. Several speakers use “about 50%” as a teaching shortcut after COGS and fees, before a full labor-and-loan P&L. Fuller later models add labor, data, insurance, software, and loan payments and land lower. See Conflicts.

What is the difference between revenue and profit?

Current doctrine. Top line is what the machine rang. Profit is what is left after product, fees, any property cut, labor, and the other operating costs. Anthony’s most repeated beginner error: hearing “$5,000 a month” and treating that as take-home. How to Start a Vending Business (with ZERO Experience) (2026-07-07).

Mike Kaufman uses the same distinction and adds cash flow as a third layer: leftover profit still has to cover real cash leaving the account. Top 5 Beginner Vending Mistakes.

What to track from the first sale (How to Buy Your First Vending Machine (Step-by-Step Process)):

  1. Revenue.
  2. Product costs.
  3. Processing fees.
  4. Inventory.
  5. Restock visits.
  6. Maintenance.
  7. Profit.

If a product sells, buy more. If it does not move, replace it. If the machine is weak, look at placement, awareness, mix, pricing, and traffic.

Books, not vibes.

  1. Open a business checking account and use a dedicated business card before the machine makes sales. How to Buy Your First Vending Machine (Step-by-Step Process).
  2. Track receipts, inventory, and sales. Mixing personal and business money makes the profit number unreadable later.
  3. Start tracking sales and inventory cost on day one. Mike Kaufman uses Expensify by payee and category so he can calculate profit, not just revenue. Everything You Need To Purchase Your First Vending Machine.
  4. Anthony keeps an owner spreadsheet of COGS and profit per machine, then monitors reports instead of visiting. This Boring Machine Makes Me $1,000 Per Month, Here's How.
  5. Sandy and Joe sit down weekly: money in, bills out, match transactions, reconcile in QuickBooks. How This Mom & Son Built a Profitable Vending Business Together.

Tax records (high level only). Mike Kaufman and Mike Hoffman both say to track route expenses so an accountant can take deductions, including accelerated depreciation on machines. Neither specifies a form, schedule, or California treatment. Don't Start A Vending Machine Business, Until You Watch This.... How To Set Up An LLC For Your Vending Machine Business. Guest CPA Stephen Lee’s later operating advice is in Tax and depreciation numbers that change take-home.

Not specified in the corpus: which California sales-tax, seller’s-permit, or city business-tax line items belong on a San Diego P&L.

What to track by the end of month six

Anthony (2026-02-06) wants these numbers in hand:

  1. Revenue per machine per month.
  2. What each location is actually doing.
  3. Cost-of-goods percentage. His target in that video is 35% to 40%.
  4. Profit margin per location, and what you actually take home.
  5. Hours spent per location per week.
  6. Use those figures to count how many locations replace income. His example: if one location profits $500 and you need $5,000, plan on 10 locations. In the same video he also uses a more conservative $1,000 net per location, which would be about five locations for $5,000.

Anthony (2025-12-26) on the weekly/monthly scoreboard:

  1. Keep a month-over-month spreadsheet for each machine.
  2. Require the change to be in the green, even if only by a percent.
  3. If it is not green, look back for the cause, including a seasonal dip.
  4. Track labor, COGS, and revenue, and each expense as a percentage of revenue.
  5. If machine operating systems do not match, lump everything into one Google Sheet income statement per month.
  6. Use machine software for sales-by-product, best sellers, profit analysis, and gross margin by SKU while building pick lists.

Mike Kaufman (2025-06-20), on a large Illinois route with a GM already in place, reviews monthly COGS, revenue per machine, and top-selling products in a 30-minute P&L block. That cadence is his owner workload after scale, not a beginner solo schedule.

How do I turn a “$5,000 machine” into leftover profit?

Current doctrine. Do not decide on a location, a rev-share ask, or a labor plan from top line. Walk the stack, then decide from what is left. How to Start a Vending Business (with ZERO Experience) (2026-07-07).

Anthony’s walkthrough (illustration, not a guarantee):

  1. Do not treat advertised monthly revenue as what you keep.
  2. Subtract cost of goods.
  3. Subtract revenue share if any.
  4. Subtract credit-card processing, machine software, and other fees.
  5. Subtract stocking labor if you hire it out.
  6. Use the leftover profit to decide whether the location, the rev-share ask, and the labor plan make sense.

His $5,000/month example (2026-07-07):

Line Assumption he used Dollar amount he used
Revenue Hypothetical machine $5,000
COGS about 35% $1,750
Revenue share 5% example $250
Processing, software, other fees 8 to 10% $500
Hired stocker 2 hours/week at $25/hour about $200/month
Leftover after those four cuts around $2,300

He calls around $2,300 left on a $5,000 machine a strong machine, and still says you need the real number. How to Start a Vending Business (with ZERO Experience) (2026-07-07).

Mike Kaufman’s later “full stack” (2026-03-20), same $5,000 starting point, different leftover:

  1. Start with monthly revenue.
  2. Subtract COGS of 30 to 40 percent.
  3. Subtract card fees.
  4. Subtract revenue share.
  5. Subtract fuel.
  6. Subtract maintenance.
  7. Subtract insurance.
  8. Judge leftover profit and cash flow before you place or keep the machine.

He says that $5,000 can become about $2,000 after that stack. He does not give specific rates for card fees, rev share, fuel, maintenance, or insurance. Top 5 Beginner Vending Mistakes (2026-03-20).

Mike Kaufman’s earlier live P&L (2025-02-17) starts at the same $5,000 and ends around $1,800 to $2,000. The spoken math in that video is messy (see Conflicts). Hidden expenses he says beginners miss: revenue share, SaaS and merchant fees, and labor. Don't Start A Vending Machine Business, Until You Watch This....

Warning

Three walkthroughs start at $5,000 and do not land on the same leftover. Use the method. Recalculate with your invoices.

Anthony’s actual apartment-machine month (claimed, one machine, 2026-01-02):

  1. Start with monthly revenue ($2,300).
  2. Subtract COGS ($790 at 35%).
  3. Subtract software, backend, and card fees (spoken as $2.62; the arithmetic that reaches his $1,040 leftover implies about $262).
  4. Subtract the monthly machine note ($170).
  5. Subtract stocker/picker labor ($37.50).
  6. Subtract driver time from warehouse to site ($37.50).
  7. Treat the remainder as monthly net. He states about $1,040, and also rounds it to $1,000.

He also lists two $37.50 labor lines while the $1,040 figure only fits if one labor line is dropped or the fee is $262. This Boring Machine Makes Me $1,000 Per Month, Here's How (2026-01-02).

Mike Kaufman’s micromarket November P&L (claimed, one installed market, 2024-12-14):

  1. Pull the kiosk dashboard for a full month.
  2. Add weekday sales ($9,747) and weekend sales ($5,672).
  3. He rounded revenue down to $15,500 for the profit math.
  4. Subtract product / COGS ($5,000).
  5. Subtract a 10% SAS and transaction fee (calculated $1,555, rounded to $1,600).
  6. Add hired labor: 3 days/week, 2 hours/day, $25/hour, 4 weeks = $600.
  7. Add a $100 stocker tip.
  8. He rounded all-in expenses up to $9,000 and stated take-home over $6,000.

He did not subtract the $15,675 equipment cost or a loan payment. He used day-one stocking cost as the month’s COGS and did not walk replenishment buys. Stock a new micromarket versus a normal vending machine (2024-12-14).

How do I estimate monthly profit on one machine?

These are teaching models. They are not the same leftover, and they are not guarantees.

Simple conservative model (COGS + fees only)

Mike Kaufman (2025-02-26):

  1. Start from monthly revenue. His example is $2,000.
  2. Budget about 30% to 35% of revenue as cost of goods. On $2,000 that is about $650 to $700. He rounds up to $700 to stay conservative.
  3. Budget another 10% to 15% for merchant-service fees and possible revenue share. To stay conservative he uses 15% of $2,000, or about $300.
  4. Add those two buckets ($700 + $300 = $1,000) and subtract from revenue. His leftover is $1,000, or about 50%.

He presents this as simple rounding, not a full P&L. The fee bucket mixes card fees and location share.

Anthony’s later one-machine stack (includes loan and stocker)

Anthony (2026-02-27) and the same stack in How To Replace Your Full Time Salary With Vending (2026-02-06) and The Best Strategy To Buy Your First Vending Machine In 2026 (2026-02-20):

  1. Use a conservative well-placed revenue of $2,000 a month. He also says a good location does $1,500 to $3,000.
  2. Subtract COGS of 35% to 40% (in the 2026-02-20 telling he calls that about $750).
  3. Subtract about 10% for credit-card processing and software (about $200).
  4. Treat the remainder as about 50% to 55% gross, or $1,000 to $1,100 on $2,000. In the 2026-02-06 telling he says roughly 50% to 45% before labor.
  5. Subtract a machine payment of about $150.
  6. Subtract stocker labor. He uses $100 to $150 in the 2026-02-20 / 2026-02-27 tellings, and about $200 per location per month in the 2026-02-06 telling.
  7. His leftover net is about $680 to $830 in the $10,000-start video; about $750 to $850 in the first-machine video; and about $900 to $1,000 in the salary-replacement video after a $200 labor line. He later rounds to $800 per machine when he scales the example.

Financed smart-machine model with more line items

Mike Kaufman (2025-05-29), on a $1,000-revenue example:

  1. Subtract a financed payment he rounds to $150 a month over 48 to 60 months.
  2. Subtract COGS at 30%, or $300.
  3. Subtract about $15 for insurance.
  4. Subtract about $50 in data fees for a smart machine.
  5. If you outsource stocking: $25/hour, 2 hours a week, twice-a-week service, or $200 a month.
  6. He lands on about $710 of costs and $290 profit.
  7. If you stock it yourself, delete the labor line and he treats profit as about 50%.

Warning

The corpus flags that his spoken running total on that board does not perfectly match the line items he named. Treat it as illustration, not a balanced worksheet.

Two-machine side-hustle check

Mike Kaufman (2025-06-20): if two machines are doing $2,000 a month in revenue, set take-home at least at $1,000.

First-machine cash-flow comparison he actually used

Mike Kaufman (2025-06-05) and EXACTLY how much my vending machine route makes in 24hrs (2025-07-18): his first machine in 2020 did $600 revenue and about $300 profit, which matched the $300/month profit from a rental that had required a $14,000 down payment.

How to build a take-home P&L for the whole route

Mike Kaufman (2025-06-20):

  1. Start from monthly revenue, not the headline number alone.
  2. Subtract labor.
  3. Subtract software fees on AI micromarkets. He uses a high-side 2% to 5% and budgets 5%.
  4. Subtract credit-card fees on card-only machines. His example is about 5.9%.
  5. Treat combined manufacturer software plus card fees as about 11% of top line before data, insurance, or product.
  6. Subtract cellular/data cost per machine, or a lower route-wide number if machines are on Wi-Fi or a cheaper data band. His example per-machine data cost is $15; after moving to a cheaper band or property Wi-Fi he said data fell to about $200 for the whole route.
  7. Subtract route insurance. He stated $60 for a 100-plus machine route and called that both “peanuts” and “very high.”
  8. Budget one-time extras such as $50 to $75 to turn on or ship a router if the machine does not include it.
  9. Subtract cost of goods sold, including $500 to $600 of opening inventory on each new machine.
  10. Compare leftover profit with a 40% to 50% margin target on top-line revenue.

His spoken example that month: $135,000 revenue; about $15,000 to $15,300 for the 11% fee bucket; around $45,000 COGS at 33%; he called expenses $60,000 and profit $75,000.

Warning

The corpus flags that his spoken expense add-up does not match “$135k minus $60k equals $75k.” He also said he was shooting high.

Mr. Passive (2025-07-11) on an $84,000 May:

Bucket What he used
Revenue $84,000
COGS 33% / about $27,000
GM $5,000 plus commission, about $6,000
Part-time labor modeled as 40 hours/week at $25/hour, about $4,000
Fees (software, transactions, insurance, etc.) about 11%, rounded to $10,000
Stated leftover about $37,000

He said that if they did not grow at all they were on track for $1 million over the next 12 months. That is his claim, not a forecast method.

What costs belong on the stack?

Current doctrine. At minimum: product, any property cut, card/software fees, and labor if you do not stock it yourself. Later Mike Kaufman also names fuel, maintenance, and insurance. Anthony later also names gas, maintenance, insurance, software, and service. How to Buy Your First Vending Machine (Step-by-Step Process).

Mike Kaufman’s three operating-cost buckets: machines/financing, cost of goods, and labor (outsource vs self-stock). How Much Does It REALLY Cost To Run A Vending Business?.

Cost of goods

Repeated working assumption: around 35% of revenue.

Note

35% is a planning figure, not a law of nature. Mix, waste, expiry, and buying source move it. Mike Kaufman says beginners miscalculate profitability because they have the wrong products at the wrong prices. How Much Does It REALLY Cost To Run A Vending Business?.

Processing, software, and other fees

Source What they subtract When
Anthony 8 to 10%, called $500 on $5,000 2026-07-07
Anthony (later teaching stack) about 10% for card + software, about $200 on $2,000 2026-02-06 / 2026-02-20 / 2026-02-27
Mike Kaufman 8 to 9% typical, then 10% for simple math, then lumped SaaS + merchant as $1,000 on $5,000 2025-02-17
Mike Kaufman 10% to 12% merchant + software as a P&L target 2025-04-23
Mike Kaufman 10% SAS + transaction on one micromarket kiosk 2024-12-14
Mike Kaufman software 2% to 5% plus card about 5.9%; combined high-side about 11% on card-only AI equipment 2025-06-20
Mike Kaufman about 5% card/merchant plus about 5% Wi-Fi/SaaS on smart machines 2025-03-10
Anthony (live machine) software / backend / card; spoken $2.62 on $2,300, math implies ~$262 2026-01-02
Traditional combo, no AI camera “super small fees” because there are no manufacturer SAS fees How To Buy Vending Machines Online For CHEAP (2025-01-29)

Not specified in the corpus: your actual card-network rate, which software SKU you will pay, Nayax / 365 / MicroMart schedules currently in force, or whether cash sales change the percentage.

Revenue share / commission

Treat it as a cost line, not as a courtesy.

When a number is too high. John Newcombe’s asset manager asked for 25%. He declined, explained the machine investment, did not budge, and they came back. He would not state the final percentage on the podcast; he only said it was significantly less than 25%. Can You Start Vending at 60? Ask This Former Real Estate Agent (2026-07-17). Sandy first offered a school 10% after mishearing a teaching point, then renegotiated to 5%. How This Mom & Son Built a Profitable Vending Business Together.

Mike Kaufman (2025-09-26) treats share as a price decision:

  1. Do not volunteer revenue share. Do not negotiate the meeting on it.
  2. If they ask, flip it: do they want to make revenue off this, or do they want an amenity whose prices will not make employees, patients, or tenants complain?
  3. If they still want share, tell them you can give it but you will mark up product (in the live example, increase the cost of the Poppy).
  4. If they worry employees will complain about price, steer to no share so you do not have to raise prices.

He says he has negotiated over 100 placements and does not pay a revenue share on over half of them. He argues that in today’s inflation there is not a lot of margin left to give back. Most operators, he says, walk in ready to give away 20% and then wonder why the business is not profitable.

Mike Kaufman (2025-04-30): medical outpatient sites typically have minimal revenue-share requirements if you stock the machine and frame it as an amenity.

Tip

Model commission on gross at hotels if the property takes a cut of gross. Tom Canterino says hotel pricing has to absorb that. From Zero to $18,000/Month at ONE Hotel Location (Here's Exactly How He Did It).

Labor

Plan labor as a real line even if you currently stock yourself. That is how you know whether the stop still works after you hire.

Repeated planning figures:

Distant high-volume stop. Mike Kaufman compared stocking a ~$10,000/month location 1.5 hours away himself (about $4,500 left) versus hiring it out (about $3,800 left) and gave up the $600–$700 to buy owner time. From Laid Off to Replacing Their Salaries With Vending. Here's How (Step by Step) (2026-08-19).

Tiny unit profit cannot pay a $25/hour helper. Anthony: buying a fruit-snack bag for about 30 cents and selling it for $1.25 leaves about 87 cents. Do not plan hired labor on that margin; change the item or the price. Can You Start Vending at 60? Ask This Former Real Estate Agent (2026-07-17). Same idea later: in a smart machine with limited cubic inches, do not keep a high-margin item that only makes pocket change. Prefer high profit dollars per transaction, such as $20 to $25 protein, over an 87-cent snack profit that cannot support $25-an-hour labor. Anthony (2026-04-21).

Financing, insurance, fuel, repairs

Include these when they apply:

Theft and downtime as unit-economic events

Mike Kaufman (2025-11-01):

  • One night of theft can wipe out three months of profit.
  • A cashless smart machine with only about $300 of snacks is a weak robbery target.
  • If a site would expose you to constant theft risk, walk away.
  • If a wrecked machine sits unrepaired, expect the property to replace you.
  • Insurance can cover the machine; you still pay the deductible.
  • A 30-day wait for a tech doubles a two-week lost-revenue example.
  • Open micromarket raids leave you eating the inventory.

How to file a claim, what deductible to carry, and California insurance minimums: Not specified in the corpus.

What does a “good” number look like?

These are attributed bars, not targets you are owed.

What “healthy” looks like on the route

Question Current attributed answer Source
Healthy route margin on top line About 40% to 50% Mike Kaufman (2025-06-20)
Product margins “always around” 50% to 60%, depending on how well you buy Mike Kaufman (2025-03-10)
Anthony’s personal margin aim At least 60% to 65%; he shoots for 65% Anthony (2025-12-26)
COGS while adding machines Around 33%, because each new machine needs $500 to $600 opening inventory Mike Kaufman (2025-06-20)
COGS if you pause new locations Push closer to 30% Same video
COGS if the route has plateaued Get it consistently between about 31% and 35% Anthony (2025-12-26)
COGS in Anthony’s teaching P&Ls 35% to 40% Anthony (2026-02-06)
Profit ratio Stephen Lee hears operators chase Above 50%; his clean S-Corp illustration was about 60% after salary and expenses Stephen Lee (2025-12-19)

Warning

Anthony’s December 2025 margin and COGS targets do not match his February 2026 teaching stack. The 50% margin goal and the leftover examples also do not match. Keep both. See Conflicts.

Per-machine revenue

Who Bar they use Context
DJ Fuchs about $1,500 per machine per month Baseline that makes it worth being there. Some units can sit a little under if the fleet average is still ~$1,500. How He Built a $50,000/Month Vending Business in One Year (2025-12-23)
Anthony conservative planning average $2,000 per location per month; good location $1,500 to $3,000; a dialed-in stop can do $5,000 Same location underperforms with the wrong machine or planogram. How To Replace Your Full Time Salary With Vending (2026-02-06). Start a Vending Business in 90 Days | Complete Roadmap (2026-07-10)
Anthony well-placed smart machine or smart market about $1,500 to $2,500 revenue and roughly $700 to $900 profit after expenses Depends on location, mix, equipment, and demand. 10 Boring Business Ideas That Quietly Make You Rich (Like Vending) (2026-08-04)
Anthony minimum opportunity he wants when parking profits to scale: about $1,500 a month Anthony (2025-12-26)
Anthony $1,000 per location is not enough once you want to outsource or hire Build more than $1,000 so labor can be covered. He backed into about $2,000 per location from seven stops and a $14,500 best month. Anthony (2026-06-16)
Anthony about $4,000 or more a month His working definition of a “banger.” A $6,000 to $7,000 stop can change capacity quickly. \$8,500 First Month… His FIRST Location (2026-05-05). Anthony (2026-03-30)
Charles, via Mike if a new location will not do over $4,000 a month, say no Mike Kaufman (2025-03-10)
Matt Morrison first accounts around $1,000 to $1,200 are an acceptable start Raise the bar after you see what a real account can do. Matt Morrison (2026-03-30)
Mike Kaufman first-location target $1,500 to $2,000 revenue in months 4–6 Proof of concept, not quit-your-job money. How I’d Build a $5K/Month Vending Business (Starting Today) (2026-04-03)
Mike Kaufman take one $1,000 stop over five $200 stops He does not want “Jiffy Lube-type” locations. Mike Kaufman (2025-03-10)
Mr. Passive about $2,000 per location on four stops A great return on the route he bought. On a small route, optimize revenue per location and hours per location, not revenue per machine. Mr. Passive (2025-07-11)
Mr. Passive difference between $500 and $1,500 a month can be indoor placement Congregation and impulse spots. Vending Machine Placements So Good, They Feel ILLEGAL
Anthony on student housing he does not run it himself but hears community operators say a minimum of $4,000 a month there One operator he recalled still did $2,500 in summer. Judge student housing on the full year. Anthony (2026-06-16)

Per-machine profit

Who Bar they use Context
Mike Kaufman $800 to $1,000 net per strong machine Used to size a $4,000–$6,000/month route as 5 to 7 strong stops, not 20 or 50. How I’d Build a $5K/Month Vending Business (Starting Today) (2026-04-03)
Anthony roughly $700 to $900 after expenses Well-placed smart machine / smart market. 10 Boring Business Ideas That Quietly Make You Rich (Like Vending) (2026-08-04)
Anthony about $1,040 / $1,000 net on a $2,300 machine One apartment machine after COGS, fees, note, and labor. This Boring Machine Makes Me $1,000 Per Month, Here's How (2026-01-02)
Anthony later teaching leftover about $680 to $1,000, often rounded to $800 On a $2,000 conservative machine after loan and labor. See the one-machine stacks above.
Mr. Passive smart machines average about $800 to $1,500 profit 7 to 10 machines at that range ≈ $7K to $10K. Mr. Passive (2025-10-03)
Mike Kaufman 50% profit-margin goal on the location P&L 30% COGS + 10–12% merchant/software, then remaining rev share / fees / labor. How Much Does It REALLY Cost To Run A Vending Business? (2025-04-23)

Warning

The 50% margin goal and the leftover examples do not match. Anthony’s $5,000 walkthrough leaves about $2,300 (46%). Mike’s later $5,000 stack leaves about $2,000 (40%). His February 2025 walkthrough leaves about $1,800–$2,000. His first-machine story later says $300 profit, then $1,200 on that same machine. Why You Shouldn't Start a Vending Business In 2025. A $1,500 revenue machine at 35% COGS plus fees is not automatically an $800–$1,000 net machine.

Location-type revenue bands

From Top 3 Vending Locations — These Are All You Need (2026-03-27). Planning bands, not guarantees.

  • Multi-shift warehouse: weak $1,500; solid $3,000 to $5,000; high-volume $5,000+ with multiple machines.
  • Centralized residential: underperforming $1,200; average $2,000 to $3,000; strong $3,500 to $5,000.
  • Outpatient medical: conservative $1,200; solid $1,800; high-specialty $2,000.

Mike Kaufman (2025-04-30) also stated: urgent cares / pet hospitals $1,200 to $1,800 per machine; apartments “over $2,500”; big multi-shift warehouses “upwards of $5,000.”

Anthony on similar types: some stops on a 40-location route do $3,000, $4,000, even $5,000 a month. A convenient-to-home stop did only $700 or $800 tops. He blames the location, not the cabinet. This Is Boring, But These Vending Locations Do $3K–$5K a Month (2026-01-09). About 7 of his 45 locations averaged roughly $5,500 to $6,500. How He Built a $102K/Month Vending Business (2026-01-20).

One stop can dominate the route

Manuel Duval: a manufacturing plant with three machines (one Haha Pro plus two cash-enabled) was on track for about $8,000 in a month and was his only “kill” location. The rest of a 10-location route only brought the total to about $10,500–$11,000. At that volume he planned to restock every two days. How His 3rd Location Hit $8K/Month In Revenue While Working Full-Time (2026-02-17).

Other attributed single-stop claims (all anecdotal):

Andy’s caution: do not assume every new stop will be a $10,000 location. How He Built $10K/Month From His First 2 Vending Locations.

How do I know if a location is worth the capital?

Current doctrine. Run math before emotion. Operators place after numbers, not before. Top 5 Beginner Vending Mistakes. Do not force a square-peg stop just to create cash flow; that is another low-paying job. How His 3rd Location Hit $8K/Month In Revenue While Working Full-Time. How He Left Corporate Law to Build $7K/Month in Vending Revenue.

Anthony (2026-08-11):

  1. Treat the goal as a stop that performs, not merely a placement.
  2. Look at traffic, but do not stop at traffic.
  3. Identify who is walking by and why they are there.
  4. Judge how long they stick around.
  5. Ask whether they have a reason to buy.
  6. Check easy alternatives nearby.
  7. Confirm the property even wants the machine.
  8. Check whether the numbers still work after you factor in servicing the stop.

A weak location may still make a little money. When you are new you often blame mix, the machine, or time instead of the site.

Tip

Anthony (2026-08-11): the cost of a weak stop is not what you made. It is everything you did not make while the machine sat there.

Five capital-protection filters (Anthony)

Score before you install. Say No to Most Vending Locations (2026-04-24):

  1. Daily physical presence: warm bodies with wallets, not unit counts or payroll on paper.
  2. Traffic rhythm: how people split across shifts, not one big headcount. Want two strong shifts minimum; three is elite. A 75 / 25 / 12 split is one shift with leftovers.
  3. Traffic concentration: choke point vs scattered open space.
  4. Low alternatives: if someone can leave in about 60 seconds and buy the same thing, treat the site as less valuable.
  5. Verified demand: ask actual users what they would buy. Conversations are free; inventory mistakes are not.

If it scores high across all five, proceed. If it fails two, walk. If daily presence is weak, he says nothing else saves it. A total of exactly 30–32 on Mike Kaufman’s separate 1–10 scoring system is not specified.

Mike Kaufman’s four-trait score (each 1–10): high daily traffic, captive audience, central visibility, limited alternatives. Under 30, pass. Over 32, investigate hard. Top 3 Vending Locations — These Are All You Need (2026-03-27).

60-second alternative test

If a buyer can walk about 60 seconds to a gas station, cafeteria, or convenience store and get the same thing, expect the machine to compete harder and treat the site as less valuable. If leaving costs time, breaks are short, access is controlled, or the nearest alternative is inconvenient, the machine can win on convenience. How to Start a Vending Business (with ZERO Experience). Same idea in Say No to Most Vending Locations and This Is Boring, But These Vending Locations Do $3K–$5K a Month (24/7 store within a couple of blocks is a negative qualifier). Also ask whether the workplace already gives free snacks or cheap sodas. This Is Boring, But These Vending Locations Do $3K–$5K a Month. How This Mom & Son Built a Profitable Vending Business Together.

Unit count is not destiny

Current doctrine. Revenue follows behavior: choke points, waiting areas, line of sight, habitual traffic. A 700-unit garden complex with scattered buildings, no choke point, and mail at the doors can be a dead machine. A 300-unit high-rise with one elevator bank and one lobby can outsell it. Top 5 Beginner Vending Mistakes. Say No to Most Vending Locations.

Mike Kaufman: one 170-unit doing about $3,500 vs another operator’s 150-unit doing $8,000. Surrounding retail and shopper behavior change the number. From Laid Off to Replacing Their Salaries With Vending. Here's How (Step by Step) (2026-08-19).

John Newcombe’s 150-unit Beast vs Anthony’s 199-unit ~$1,800–$2,100 stop is the same lesson. Observed Beast traits (not a formula): little around the property, machine outside the elevators, prior vending always empty, about 40% of sales from 8:00 p.m. to 3:00 a.m., some customers $30–$40 every other day, daily run rate often $275–$300 and sometimes over $400. Can You Start Vending at 60? Ask This Former Real Estate Agent.

Stated size minimums (they do not agree)

Who Rule they stated Date
Anthony Residential: do not place under 200 units. Manufacturing/warehouse: 150 employees minimum. Outpatient: packed lot, ~150 employees + 100+ patients/day (~250 flow). 2026-01-09, This Is Boring, But These Vending Locations Do $3K–$5K a Month
Mike Kaufman Warehouse: 150+ employees, two strong shifts minimum. Residential: 250+ units, centralized. 2026-03-27, Top 3 Vending Locations — These Are All You Need
Lane Early group rule he remembered: do not mess with under 200 units. He still tested a 100-unit with elevator / entrance / package-room placement and it became a top stop. 2026-04-28, He Had No Sales Experience… Now It's $200K/Year

Lane’s 100-unit result and John’s 150-unit Beast sit against Anthony’s January 2026 “200-unit minimum.” See Conflicts.

Indoor placement is a revenue line

Mike Kaufman: if the property is vague about where the machine will go, walk. People will not use a basement machine they do not know exists. A location and its revenue are only as good as where the machine sits. Everything You Need To Purchase Your First Vending Machine. The BEST Contract To Use For Your Vending Business.

Anthony: wrong part of the building can drop sales about 25%. Put it where people walk by. This Is Boring, But These Vending Locations Do $3K–$5K a Month (2026-01-09). He also cites a relocate from a workspace area into a lobby that had him looking at about $9,000 in the first 30 days. How He Built $10K/Month From His First 2 Vending Locations.

Lane / Anthony: fight unused-clubhouse placement; ask for elevators, main entrance, package room. He Had No Sales Experience… Now It's $200K/Year.

Mr. Passive: office break-room machines do about 50% less than elevator-lobby placement; he claims moving to the lobby doubled office revenue. Manufacturing: bathrooms, smoker corner, loading dock; one plant with 16+ break rooms claimed at $75,000/month. Vending Machine Placements So Good, They Feel ILLEGAL.

Napkin math before a takeover

If the owner already vendors and will share numbers:

  1. Ask foot traffic and customer demographics.
  2. Ask what they do today and what it generates.
  3. Have someone finance-minded run size of prize, inventory turnover, and other retail metrics.
  4. Confirm you can execute stocking and ordering.
  5. Decide from their actual current numbers, not hope.

Andy Kunselman used that process on two seven-day warehouse-style fitness centers; rolling 30-day revenue landed close to the $10,000 they expected. How He Built $10K/Month From His First 2 Vending Locations.

Match machine quality to throughput. Mike Kaufman: do not put a high-end expensive machine in a low-throughput urgent care (~50 patients, five days). Load high-end equipment at high-throughput sites (example: ~700 units / 900 residents). Everything You Need To Purchase Your First Vending Machine. Javier Zetter judged open-market vs AI machines on ROI, not novelty, and kept the open market. He did not publish the ROI math. \$8,500 First Month… His FIRST Location.

An eight-week equipment lead time is six to eight weeks of lost sales versus a machine that arrives in under a month. Everything You Need To Purchase Your First Vending Machine.

There is no formula in this corpus that converts foot traffic into expected monthly revenue.

After it is live: keep, fix, or move?

Current doctrine. A machine is a movable hard asset. Do not live with a bad building. From Zero to $18,000/Month at ONE Hotel Location (Here's Exactly How He Did It).

Trial windows (they do not agree)

Who Window Then what
DJ Fuchs 90 to 120 days If still slow, move it. How He Built a $50,000/Month Vending Business in One Year (2025-12-23)
Anthony 90 to 120 days, or whatever window you set Pull it and reinstall in the next site you have been developing. From Zero to $18,000/Month at ONE Hotel Location (Here's Exactly How He Did It) (2026-03-25)
Anthony 90 days / three months He used to wait six months. He no longer does. Anthony (2025-12-26)
Anthony 60 or 90 days Use an out clause so you are not trapped for a year. How to Buy Your First Vending Machine (Step-by-Step Process) (2026-07-24)
Mike Kaufman about 60 days Use the out clause rather than leave it all year. Everything You Need To Purchase Your First Vending Machine (2025-11-07)
Mike Kaufman patient at first, then do not leave it after 6 to 9 months; later says month 9 or even 12 is too long Have the hard conversation. If they offer more marketing, let them try. If they offer a $500 or $1,000 monthly minimum to keep a low-use machine, he calls that straight margin because you are not losing inventory. 10 HUGE Mistakes New Vending Machines Owners Make (2025-07-05)
Matt Dix through a full season Two weaker pool-side machines installed in November were left through the end of summer so he had seasonal data. Matt Dix (2026-04-14)

Manuel still had to wait out one-year contracts before he could move his first two duds. How His 3rd Location Hit $8K/Month In Revenue While Working Full-Time.

How to move a machine you already own

Anthony’s procedure (How His 3rd Location Hit $8K/Month In Revenue While Working Full-Time):

  1. Identify a low-revenue machine you want to keep using.
  2. Find a better building.
  3. Pay movers a few hundred dollars (he said a couple hundred / like $300).
  4. Treat the first month in the new building as the test.

His attributed before/after on that one move: $900 a month before, $3,700 in the first month after, almost $3,000 overnight swing. In a later telling the weak office was sub $1,000 and the luxury apartment did $3,700 in month one. From Zero to $18,000/Month at ONE Hotel Location (Here's Exactly How He Did It). One move, not a guaranteed result.

Anthony (2026-04-21) on moving instead of adding debt:

  1. Keep prospecting while the route runs.
  2. Identify bottom-feeder locations.
  3. When a better location comes in, move the existing machine rather than buying another one.
  4. Keep the same debt on the balance sheet; only change where the asset sits.
  5. If a manager misses a promised occupancy target after the time you gave them, give 30-day notice and move. His office example: promised 80% occupied, six months given, then 30-day notice.

Keep developing the next site while you wait. From Zero to $18,000/Month at ONE Hotel Location (Here's Exactly How He Did It).

Mallorie Rauch (2026-04-21) waits until a higher-volume location is in, then reviews each stop:

  1. What is the ROI?
  2. Is this worth our time?
  3. Do we keep this or transition out?

She still kept a low earner that was six minutes from home.

Weak but not failed

Attributed examples of “still making money” that operators later treated as the wrong use of the asset:

  • Garden-style first machine: about $100 a month. They left it 3 to 6 months until they had somewhere else to put it. Jason (2025-12-30).
  • Garden loss-leader: $450 a month, then $3,500 in the first month after the move. Anthony (2026-04-21).
  • Under-occupied office: a little under $1,000, then $3,790 in month one after the move. Same video.
  • Car-dealership vanity stop: $400 a month for four months; after the move to a shelter, $400 in three days. Anthony (2025-12-26).
  • 55-plus high-rise kept because it was six minutes from home: about $325 a month. She still called about $4,000 across all locations fairly low. Mallorie Rauch (2026-04-21).
  • Joe (2026-01-06): if you finance the machine and the location is bad, you may not make enough to pay for it and will start behind.

Ramp, not just the first week

Mike Kaufman: the first month with the property manager as an on-site salesperson decides whether sales ramp in about two months or drag toward 12. Visit 2–3 times a week even if it is quiet; weekly manager check-ins in month one; track sales and inventory cost from day one. Everything You Need To Purchase Your First Vending Machine (2025-11-07).

Anthony: after almost a year, that apartment machine was doing about 20% higher numbers than the first couple of months. Once running, he expects month-to-month fluctuation of only about 2% to 5%. This Boring Machine Makes Me $1,000 Per Month, Here's How (2026-01-02).

Angelina: if a given month looks different from the last one, expect market factors to move results; you cannot control everything. From Laid Off to Replacing Their Salaries With Vending. Here's How (Step by Step).

Seasonality that skews projections

Maximize the stop you already have before adding more

Anthony: if you have not maximized the location you already have, do that before rushing to the next one. When you add, cluster. A 45-minute drive to a $700/month stop does not work if you are paying someone to run it. Want stops about 5 to 10 minutes apart. A 45-minute restock is a good problem if it means you are selling out. Start a Vending Business in 90 Days | Complete Roadmap (2026-07-10).

Evan Tomahong: a high-volume stop at $2,700 is not finished. Push it over $3,000 with pricing and planogram work. Every location is different; there is a starting point, not one formula. How He Left Corporate Law to Build $7K/Month in Vending Revenue.

Mike Kaufman: if a micromarket is stuck around $17,000, adding a freezer was his lift to over $20,000. One location, not a guarantee. These Vending Machine Items Make Me Over $20,000/Month.

DJ Fuchs, once you have route staff: prefer sites that can take two or more machines so a paid driver fills two in one visit and you can stretch time between stops. Still keep a strong onesie. How He Built a $50,000/Month Vending Business in One Year.

When can I trust the number?

Forecast after install

  • Same spot that previously had vending: treat roughly month six, plus or minus 5%, as the run-rate. Anthony (2026-06-02).
  • Building that never had vending: wait about 10 to 12 months for the building to get conditioned before using that same plus-or-minus-5% expectation. Same video. He described this as about two and a half years of operating observation.
  • Machine in place more than about five months: plan around roughly plus or minus 5% month to month. How He Built a $102K/Month Vending Business (2026-01-20).
  • New stop, mix still unknown: give it three to six months to see what sells, then dial the mix. Anthony (2026-06-16).
  • Mike Hoffman (2025-10-10): do not expect sales to peak in 30 days. People have to learn the machine is there. He has seen sales take up to six months to increase.
  • Matt Dix (2026-04-14): two weaker pool-side machines installed in November were left through the end of summer so he had seasonal data before deciding whether to move them. Some location revenues were pretty stable; overall numbers were still hard to gauge.
  • Anthony (2026-02-06): first location should be profitable within 60 to 90 days if you pick the right location.
  • Same speaker in If You Have $10,000 Saved, Watch This Video (2026-02-27): a first machine can be profitable in 30 or 60 days.
  • Mike Kaufman (2025-05-29): product sales are profitable right away because of margins, while getting the down payment back takes a couple of months.

Warning

The pull window is not settled in the corpus. Anthony’s current stated rule is 90 days. His own forecast rules use 5 to 12 months before a number is “stable.” Mike Hoffman uses up to six months for discovery. Seasonal stops need a full season of data. See Conflicts.

How do I read live sales (not a P&L)?

These dashboard checks are not a substitute for COGS, labor, and fees.

Mike Kaufman (2025-07-18):

  1. Open the machine-company dashboard in the morning. He opens 365 around 5 a.m.
  2. Read overnight sales after midnight as late-night munchies, not daytime volume. His flashed example: $212 already on the 365 dashboard at 5 a.m.
  3. Recheck later in the day. Same-day flashes in that video: $714 on 365 before the after-7 p.m. rush; over $1,000 on a second company’s dashboard; about $80 more MicroMart and $50 to $60 more 365 in a roughly 30-minute dinner window.
  4. If you use more than one machine company, open each dashboard separately.
  5. If it is still before 7 p.m., do not treat the total as the full day. He says most of their sales happen after 7 p.m.

Matt Dix (2026-04-14): when you wake up, look at revenue generated after you went to bed. He describes this as curiosity, not a full operations system. Precondition: remote sales visibility.

Anthony (2026-01-20): after the first 24/7 location, he reported $20 to $30 nights to his wife for 30 days.

How should I read revenue share, bidding wars, and “free amenity” deals?

Current doctrine (Anthony, 2026-02-13, and Mike Kaufman, repeated). Lead with zero cost and zero work. Do not open with 10%. Leading with money makes them negotiate upward (Anthony’s example: last vendor paid 15%, so they ask 20%). Use These Negotiation Tactics, They’ll Blow Up Your Vending Business (2026-02-13). 10 HUGE Mistakes New Vending Machines Owners Make. Mike Kaufman: nine times out of ten, share will not even be brought up.

If they ask:

  1. Do not refuse or get defensive.
  2. Frame it as a partnership.
  3. Offer share to properties that introduce you to sister sites.
  4. Anthony asks for two or three other managers. Mike Kaufman requires three or more properties before he will do a share.
  5. Get whatever you agree in writing.

Anthony’s talk track is in Use These Negotiation Tactics, They’ll Blow Up Your Vending Business.

Bidding wars. Stay out. Protect margins. You are trying to win profitable locations, not every location. Everything You Need To Purchase Your First Vending Machine. How to Buy Your First Vending Machine (Step-by-Step Process).

Nuance. Mike Kaufman also says a share can help because the property will push the market to residents. He still uses 10% as a selling point when they already get paid and will market it. How To Start A Vending Machine Business Step-By-Step (With $0). John Newcombe believes introducing a share helped him win an apartment, then he held a ceiling under 25%. Can You Start Vending at 60? Ask This Former Real Estate Agent.

Clawback / termination fee. Mike Kaufman uses it so a new manager cannot boot a new machine or micromarket after 90 days for free. He says nine times out of ten they will not pay the fee and you stay; if they do pay, you still come out ahead of equipment cost. The BEST Contract To Use For Your Vending Business.

Paid amenity / monthly minimum. A roofing company pays his company to provide a micro market as an employee amenity. 10 Passive Income Ideas To Pay Your Rent In 2025. A $500 or $1,000 monthly minimum to keep a low-use machine is, in his words, straight margin. 10 HUGE Mistakes New Vending Machines Owners Make.

Does equipment change the unit economics?

Current doctrine. Traditional spiral machines cap what you can sell, so they cap what you can make. If it does not fit the coil, it does not sell. Anthony’s same-building example: traditional about $1,200/month and about $2.50 average transaction vs a modern smart machine over $2,500/month within about 60 days, average ticket $5 to $6. He attributes the lift to higher-ticket products, products people needed, and higher AOV. COGS stayed around 35%; he says if top line rises and margin holds, net scales with it. Same Location... Double the Vending Revenue? (2026-04-10). Same $1,200 → $2,500 story attributed to Mike Hoffman in How to Start a Vending Business (with ZERO Experience) and retold as the apartment mailroom swap in Mike Kaufman (2025-03-10) and Mike Kaufman (2025-09-19).

Mike Kaufman: expect a smart machine or micro market to make more profit because you can sell premium items at much higher prices. He says smart coolers have done 2 to 3x the revenue of their old-school machines because of multi-item “while I’m here” baskets. How AI Vending Machines Trick You To Spend More (2025-06-27). He also says leaving a high-friction traditional machine in place can mean about a 3x decrease versus smart. Mike Kaufman (2025-09-19). Mike Hoffman (2025-10-10) says traditional does one third, sometimes one fourth, of AI-smart revenue. Open-shelf micro markets raise basket size; he cites one market at $20,000 to $25,000/month. I Mind Control People With My Vending Machines, Here’s How. Open micromarkets produce more transaction value than closed smart coolers because people grab more items, with higher theft risk. Mike Kaufman (2025-09-19). Traditional multi-item friction: each extra snack needs a new card tap and code, so many people take one item and walk. Same video.

Note

In the same Mike corpus, location still beats machine: Mike Kaufman (2025-06-12) says how nice or modern the machine is does not matter as much as foot traffic.

Planning density. Anthony: $5,000/month on average traditional machines means planning five to six machines. With two to three strong modern placements he says you can target the same $5,000 via higher revenue per location. Same Location... Double the Vending Revenue? (2026-04-10).

Unproven revenue. Mike Kaufman: use one hybrid combo machine rather than installing both a drink and a snack machine. 10 HUGE Mistakes New Vending Machines Owners Make. For an unproven or back-of-house stop, he uses a cheaper traditional combo as training wheels rather than going all-in at about $11,000 on a separate snack machine plus drink machine. How To Buy Vending Machines Online For CHEAP (2025-01-29).

Cash-only used machines will kill revenue potential, in his view. 10 HUGE Mistakes New Vending Machines Owners Make.

First-fill cash is not the same across formats. Mike Kaufman: about $300 to fill one normal vending machine vs about $5,000–$6,000 into a room-sized micromarket. Stock a new micromarket versus a normal vending machine (2024-12-14).

Manuel’s $8,000 plant mix: 1 Haha Pro + 2 cash-enabled machines. Brand of the cash machines: Not specified in the corpus. How His 3rd Location Hit $8K/Month In Revenue While Working Full-Time.

Equipment upgrades that change the unit

These are attributed incremental-revenue claims, not install guides.

Add-on Attributed economic claim Source
Frozen cabinet beside a smart cooler $800 to $1,500 extra a month; same weekly visit; long shelf life Mike Kaufman (2025-09-19)
Freezer on a $2,000 micromarket Over $3,000 after the add; over $1,000 extra cash flow Mr. Passive (2025-07-11)
Freezer on a plateaued ~$17,000 micromarket Over $20,000 after the add (~20% lift) These Vending Machine Items Make Me Over $20,000/Month (2025-04-09)
Freezer at a $4K+ student-housing stop Plan toward $6K to $7K; not a completed result John Sanchez (2026-06-16)
Smart swap at same apartment $1,200 to over $2,500 Mike Kaufman (2025-03-10)
Ice vending Startup upwards of $40K to $50K; only if climate and tourist traffic fit; then “autopilot”; water-to-ice margins “extremely high” / “absurd” Mike Kaufman (2025-09-19)
Specialty coffee / robotic barista High margins; best case is employer-paid free lattes invoiced to the company Same video; Joe (2026-01-06) also marks up apartment coffee and has the property pay the difference. Standalone coffee machines, Joe said, are not great because people are picky.
Employer-subsidized coffee Turns the account into B2B revenue rather than only per-cup taps Mike Kaufman (2025-09-19)

San Diego climate fit for ice machines: Not specified in the corpus. Mike’s skip case is a cool climate that is rarely hot (he used Oregon).

How do I read product, slot, and price math?

Current doctrine. Vending is not only whether someone buys. It is revenue per slot. Every row has to earn its space. I Thought These Vending Products Would Sell Like Crazy — They Flopped Hard (2026-08-13). Take-home profit matters more than top line or margin percentage alone. 10 HUGE Mistakes New Vending Machines Owners Make. Reserved cubic inches should go to the most profitable items. Mike Kaufman (2026-04-07).

Compare two sizes in the same slot

Anthony’s chip example (2026-08-13):

  1. Write cost and vend price of the small bag.
  2. Subtract to get profit per small bag.
  3. Repeat for the larger bag.
  4. Calculate how many small bags equal one large bag’s profit.
  5. Choose the size that earns the slot more money.

His numbers: 1 oz bag costs about 38 cents, sells $1.25, profit about 87 cents. 1.75 oz bag costs about 65 cents, sells $2.99, profit about $2.34. You would need almost three small bags to match one large bag. Chips still work; the smaller bag quietly kills profit. I Thought These Vending Products Would Sell Like Crazy — They Flopped Hard.

At shift-work sites he later used a large bag at $3.99 instead of $2.99 and said they started selling a lot more after switching. Size makes the higher price feel reasonable. Anthony (2026-07-29).

Margin percent vs dollar profit

Mike Kaufman: a 16 oz water and a 16 oz Monster can both show 65% margins, but Monster at $4 vs water at $2. He says a case of Monster brings in $112 vs $51 for water. Optimizing the percentage favors the cheap item and, in his view, kills growth. 10 HUGE Mistakes New Vending Machines Owners Make (2025-07-05).

He also says drinks have the best margins and shelf life, and he would add a fourth drink row instead of defaulting to three drink / three chip. Chips: about 90-day shelf life. Same video. He says drinks are about 70% of their sales. Everything You Need To Purchase Your First Vending Machine. Madison prices a high-volume manufacturing break room more competitively — even a little under the closest 7-Eleven — and keeps higher prices at fancier residential. She’s Doing $10-12K a Month With Just 6 Vending Locations.

Matt Dix (2026-04-14): look at reality and margins. High-ticket bars produce revenue, but a 50-cent soda sold for $2.25 is also strong.

Convenience and emergency items

Repeated rule: people buy vending for convenience, not the cheapest store price. Price for the problem, especially when leaving is painful.

Mike Kaufman’s attributed emergency-tax examples (I Mind Control People With My Vending Machines, Here’s How, 2025-09-05):

  • Ibuprofen 4-pack: COGS $1.50, sell $6, he calls that 300%.
  • Phone charger: pay $3.99, sell $11.97 (he also mentions a $9.97 / under-$12 tactic), he calls that 200%.
  • Makeup wipes: COGS $4.97, 400% markup; retail price not stated.
  • Laundry pods, 14-pack: pay about $3.99, sell right under $15, greater than 250%.

Later Advil 4-pack: pay 50 cents, aim about a 600% markup, sell $3 in most locations, $3.50–$4 in offices/medical, $5 only in airports or hospitals. He says $2.50 felt too cheap. Price OTC pain relief by location and target markup (2025-12-12).

Phone chargers, later telling (Mike Kaufman, 2025-12-05):

  • Cost about $2 to $3; sell at $12 to $15 depending on location.
  • Hotels, especially with business travelers facing a closed gift shop or about a $30 front-desk charger, are the gold-mine case.
  • At work, if leaving would take about an hour and their hourly rate is probably $50 to $100, a $15 in-building charger is the cheaper option.
  • Gas stations about $25; he positions $15 as cheaper and 24/7.
  • One charger’s profit equals about 10 candy bars. He says he sells about 1 to 3 chargers daily per location.

Condom 3-pack test: about $3.49 after rebate, sell over $9 / almost $10, about $6 profit; he says that beats 6 to 10 waters. Night closer to $10, weekday closer to $9. Judge on margin, not frequency. Trial a condom three-pack in campus apartment smart machines (2025-07-25).

Smart Water examples (same operator, different videos): buy $1, sell $3.75; or warehouse-club about $1.20, sell $3.95 (~3x), 405 units in that November market; or cost $0.75 sell $4.50; Arrowhead cost $0.17 sell $1.50–$2.00. These Vending Machine Items Make Me Over $20,000/Month. Stock a new micromarket versus a normal vending machine. Don't Start A Vending Machine Business, Until You Watch This....

Water markup story used as the aha: Anthony (2026-06-16) retells Mike paying $6 at an airport for water that probably cost 30 cents. Mike Kaufman (2025-06-12) tells it as a $3 Denver airport water that cost about 25 cents at Costco, which he calls over 1,000% margins. Anthony (2026-07-01): once you are the operator, know the cost, put it out at a chosen price, and take that margin.

Drink pricing rule he states: 2.5x to 4x cost, sometimes 5x or 6x, especially water and impulse thirst. Don't Start A Vending Machine Business, Until You Watch This... (2025-02-17).

Candy: Reese’s at $2.50 only about 100% because candy is expensive to him. These Vending Machine Items Make Me Over $20,000/Month.

Laundry pods vs candy: four $15 bags from a $30 Costco box = $30 profit vs about 20 Snickers for the same $30. How Much Does It REALLY Cost To Run A Vending Business?.

Häagen-Dazs cups at $3 with a sub-75-cent cost are Mike Kaufman’s frozen-item example (2025-04-30).

Dubai chocolate, Matt Morrison (2026-03-30):

  1. Order from Fair as a promo / one-off supplier; use VendHub for regular restock.
  2. Watch expiration-based promotions. He paid $2.99 at first, then $1.99 on closer-dated bars.
  3. Sell at $11.99.
  4. He and Anthony treated that as about a $10 spread. The $1.99 cost was a promo on the last six to eight boxes, not everyday cost.

Beaver Nuggets (Texas novelty, extra driver labor), Tim Barnes (2026-04-07):

  1. Confirm there is no wholesale channel.
  2. Price the special trip into the bag. They landed at $15.89.
  3. Do not underprice at launch just to avoid looking greedy.
  4. Tim guessed cost about $7 to $8. Mike Kaufman called that about an $8 spread.

Warning

Mike Kaufman uses “margin” and “markup” for figures from 100% to 1000% in the same walkthroughs. Treat the percentages as spoken sales language, not one accounting definition. How Much Does It REALLY Cost To Run A Vending Business?. Anthony calls Coke from 83 cents to $2.75 a “69% markup”; that figure matches gross margin on sell price, not markup on cost. This Boring Machine Makes Me $1,000 Per Month, Here's How.

Rebuild the planogram from the report

Mike Kaufman (2025-03-10):

  1. Open sales-by-product and transaction reports.
  2. List top sellers and the category they imply.
  3. If drinks dominate a 5-row machine that is 3 drink / 2 snack, flip toward 4 drink rows.
  4. Add flavor and brand variants of the winning category.
  5. If first foods are Twix and Reese’s, pull some chip facings and add more candy.
  6. On the next pallet, order extra of those top sellers.
  7. If a winner sells out, pull a weak row and give the winner a second row.

His on-screen example that month: 82 Smart Waters; 40 Gatorade fruit punches. Those counts are one report, not a par.

Anthony (2026-06-16): if Smart Water or another high-margin seller is moving and it is hot, pull slow movers and give that item three or four rows.

Default 5-row mix Mike Kaufman prefers for profit: majority drinks; one water/Gatorade row; one energy row; one recovery row; one snack/chip row; one candy and/or fresh-food row. He says drinks last longer than chips (~90 days) or salads (~7 days) and you can charge more for them.

Anthony (2025-12-26): focus more on drinks and higher-margin drink items. He attributes most of his mix to drinks and snacks, not fresh food or incidentals.

Signs the mix is wrong, Anthony (2026-08-11): products sitting for weeks; inventory expiring; cash frozen in stuff nobody is buying.

Do not trust club-store unit price until leftovers are counted

Anthony (2026-01-20):

  1. Track unit sales by flavor, not just by case.
  2. Note leftover flavors that do not sell.
  3. Add spoilage and forced extra purchases into an effective cost per unit.
  4. Stop the variety pack and order only the winning single flavor by the case.

His Gatorade Zero example: Sam’s Club unit cost 77 cents; effective cost $1.24 after leftover Fruit Punch and Glacier Cherry; lemon-lime outsold the others about 3 to 1.

Mr. Passive (2025-07-11):

  1. Stop treating Costco variety-pack per-unit prices as the real cost.
  2. Do not buy a 21-pack of Celsius if about seven cans are a flavor that will never sell. That is 14 sellers for the price of 21.
  3. Stop last-second Walmart fills caused by reactive tracking.
  4. Move purchasing to VendHub for manufacturer rebates the prior owner missed.
  5. He said lowering COGS about 10% from a 45% baseline increased profitability about 10%. Later he stated current COGS at 33%.

Mike Kaufman (2025-06-20) and How He Built a $102K/Month Vending Business (2026-01-20): they left Costco / Sam’s / Walmart buying for VendHub because of rebates. Mike says product rebates can run about 3% to 5% and in some cases 10% to 12%, with a rebate check every quarter.

Jason (2025-12-30): if you buy by the pallet, cutting even about half a percent of shrinkage adds up quickly.

Mr. Passive (2025-07-11): if VendHub runs a flash sale on a long-shelf-life item (his example: Gatorade an extra $2 off in June), buy enough to last through the fall based on shelf life.

Raise price when cost moves

Mike Kaufman (2026-04-07):

  1. Watch COGS the way grocery stores do.
  2. Adjust vend prices instead of absorbing every increase.
  3. Use local comps. He used $10 to $12 walk-out restaurant prices to gut-check a $7-range protein drink as a meal replacement.

Mike Kaufman (2025-05-29) on old routes: $1.25 Snickers and 12-ounce cans are the stale baseline. Plan to replace cans with 20-ounce bottles, candy with higher-ticket items such as salads, and add $4 energy drinks / protein shakes and incidentals.

First inventory so waste does not eat the P&L

Current doctrine (Mike Kaufman, repeated). Spend only $250 to $500 on the first fill, stock a little of everything, then double down on what sells. Overbuying first inventory leaves unsold product as waste. Everything You Need To Purchase Your First Vending Machine (2025-11-07). After the first fill, do not buy another unit of an item until the units on the shelf have sold for 2x to 4x what you paid (elsewhere he says 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6x, and frames the next $500 order as happening after you have already made at least about $1,000). Stock a new micromarket versus a normal vending machine. Why You Shouldn't Start a Vending Business In 2025.

Anthony: keep the first order controlled; enough to stock, test, and learn. How to Buy Your First Vending Machine (Step-by-Step Process). His own first-machine inventory budget elsewhere is around $1,000. Reasons You Shouldn't Start a Vending Business (2026-06-26). In February 2026 he used $700 to $900 additional inventory, then $600 to $900 to fill it the first time. How To Replace Your Full Time Salary With Vending. If You Have $10,000 Saved, Watch This Video. See Conflicts.

Price off the nearest convenience store, then mark up a little because buyers do not have to leave. Charm prices such as $3.97 vs $4. Put a premium item next to a cheaper-looking neighbor (Monster next to a Rockstar 50 cents less); the cheaper-looking item can be higher margin. Everything You Need To Purchase Your First Vending Machine.

Not all premium products create premium profits. A cheap large Rockstar at a roofing site beat the 12 oz premium healthy energy drink he personally preferred. Don't Start A Vending Machine Business, Until You Watch This....

Chips and PBJs: high unit margin, short shelf life. Buy limited volume. Quaker chips example: 44 cents cost, $2.50–$3 sell, expire in less than 90 days. PBJ: 38 cents cost, $2 sell, he calls that over 400%. How Much Does It REALLY Cost To Run A Vending Business?.

When does hiring help the numbers, and when does it hurt?

Current doctrine. Stocking is a $20–$25/hour task. Owner time is locating, closing, and reading the numbers. People who refuse to hire stay trapped; people who never cost labor fool themselves about margin. How to Start a Vending Business (with ZERO Experience) (2026-07-07). Mike Hoffman’s line to Anthony: you will not grow if you only do $20 and $25 an hour tasks. Same video. Mike Kaufman (2026-07-01): if stocking would pull a parent off being present for about $20 an hour, hire someone else.

You may still stock at the very beginning. Mike Kaufman: stock it yourself the first two or three times so hired labor is zero except your time. How Much Does It REALLY Cost To Run A Vending Business?. Anthony: you may still stock machines yourself at the very beginning. How to Start a Vending Business (with ZERO Experience).

When they say to hire

Who Trigger What they do
Anthony Hire before you think you are ready Part-time, flexible, checklists, dashboard review. Shift yourself to locating and numbers. (2026-07-07)
Mike Kaufman 3 to 4 machines, stocking is friction $20–$25/hour. Accept short-term profit compression. Use the time for acquisition. (2026-04-03)
Mike Kaufman 10 machines need 15 to 20 hours/week Hire that help part-time instead of stocking everything yourself because the route “is not big enough yet.” (2025-06-20)
Angelina Monthly revenue in the $20k–$30k range At least one person, starting part-time stocker. (2026-08-19)
Mike Kaufman (same conversation) He hired around $25k–$27k/month His own first-hire timing. (2026-08-19)
Mike Kaufman One stop ~$10k/month and ~1.5 hours away Dedicated stocker for that stop. Give up ~$600–$700 to buy time. (2026-08-19)
Javier A $700 day made him think he would need to hire if it continued First-month open market. (2026-05-05)
Mike Kaufman (on Madison’s episode) Hire the ~15-hour stocking work Accept a temporary profit dip (J-curve), then owner does pop-ins. Pick lists are a ~$15/hour task. She’s Doing $10-12K a Month With Just 6 Vending Locations

Drive-time test: you cannot pay someone to drive 45 minutes to fill a $700/month stop. Start a Vending Business in 90 Days | Complete Roadmap (2026-07-10).

Anthony (2026-06-16): $1,000 per location is not enough once you want to outsource or hire. Build more than $1,000 so labor can be covered.

Budget hours before you decide you cannot afford help

Mike Kaufman (2025-06-20):

  1. Estimate time to stock the machine.
  2. Estimate drive time.
  3. Estimate time to get product.
  4. Budget about 1.5 to 2 hours per week per machine for those combined tasks.
  5. Multiply by machine count. For 10 machines, plan on 15 to 20 hours per week.
  6. Hire that help part-time instead of stocking everything yourself because the route “is not big enough yet.”

Inputs he named: stocking time, drive time, product pickup, how many days each machine must be visited, and whether Saturday coverage is needed on high-sales machines.

Pay operators on profit, not revenue

Mike Kaufman (2025-06-20):

  1. Start on an hourly wage at a local labor-market rate. His example start is $20 an hour; he says it depends on where you live.
  2. Add incentives tied to profits, not total revenue.
  3. Frame upside as a higher effective hourly rate (his example target $25) or a month-end / quarter-end bonus.
  4. Put profitability benchmarks on the scorecard so stocking and COGS raise their pay.

Mr. Passive (2025-07-11):

  1. Inherited stocker was $25/hour flat with no incentive.
  2. He cut base to $22/hour and added a $5 to $7 bonus if a profit margin or quota is hit.
  3. Path to roughly $30/hour is hitting those profit benchmarks.
  4. Later part-time pickers/stockers: $20 to $25/hour plus the same $5 to $7; bonus shrinks if they create shrinkage or extra hours.
  5. GM version: $4,000 to $5,000 monthly base plus commission / long-term incentive on route profit (he said about $6,000 all-in).

Mike Kaufman (2025-06-20) current-route labor example, described as shooting high: GM $5,000 a month once on a managed salary; three part-timers totaling 40 hours, high-side $4,000 at $25/hour; about $9,000 a month total. At the two-machine stage the Oregon GM earned $20 an hour times 4 hours a week, not $5,000.

Anthony (2026-06-02) staffing picture on his stated $120,000 a month route: one full-time warehouse person, one full-time stocker, one full-time ops manager, one three-quarter-time person. About four people.

Scorecard roles that roll up to EBITDA, Mr. Passive (2025-07-11) and Mike Kaufman (2025-06-20): picker metric is warehouse organization; stocker metric is machines full enough to maximize profitability; leadership metric is adding stops or cutting expenses; company #1 KPI is profit.

How to find, onboard, or legally classify a stocker in California: Not specified in the corpus.

How much cash do I need before the first machine makes money?

Current doctrine. This is not a $0 business. Cash goes out before consistent income. If that outlay puts you under pressure, the business will feel stressful. Reasons You Shouldn't Start a Vending Business (2026-06-26). You can choose the wrong machine, location, and products and lose money. Same video.

First-machine cash pieces named in this corpus

Anthony (2026-06-26):

  1. Plan $500 to $1,000 down for a machine, not a $0 start.
  2. Budget around $1,000 for inventory.
  3. Budget about $350 for totes, wagon, and storage.
  4. Treat all-in as a few thousand dollars to get the first machine running properly.

Anthony (2026-08-04): qualified operators can often start with about $5 to $1,000 down. All-in about $3,000 to $5,000 including inventory and basic setup. 10 Boring Business Ideas That Quietly Make You Rich (Like Vending).

Anthony (2026-07-24): machines from a few thousand dollars on the low end, significantly more for a higher-end smart machine. Budget beyond the cabinet: initial inventory, insurance, setup, delivery/install, small emergency fund. How to Buy Your First Vending Machine (Step-by-Step Process).

Anthony (2026-02-06): getting the first machine installed and stocked is about $1,500 out of pocket in his telling: financed 5% to 10% down, $150 to $200 monthly payment, $700 to $900 additional inventory, $50 to $75 monthly insurance. He says the machine pays for itself with the revenue it generates.

Anthony (2026-02-27), if you have about $10,000:

  1. Finance the first machine with 5% to 10% down.
  2. Budget about $150 for the payment.
  3. Budget $600 to $900 to fill it the first time.
  4. Keep the remaining cash as operating capital.
  5. Start with two to three machines while still holding a reserve.

He says these are estimates based on historical averages and what he has seen. He also says this is not financial advice and results will vary. If You Have $10,000 Saved, Watch This Video.

Mallorie Rauch (2026-04-21): she is putting in $3,000 to $5,000 per machine. If a location fails, that loss is survivable; pick the machine up and move it. Same $3,000 to $5,000 survivable-loss range appears in zi3KK_wdsnc (2026-06-19).

Mike Kaufman (2025-11-07): machines behind him $3,000 up to $10,000; have $6,000 to $10,000 cash ready if paying cash; first stock $250 to $500; per-machine emergency fund $200 to $500. Waiting a week after they sign is a week of sales lost. Everything You Need To Purchase Your First Vending Machine.

Mike Kaufman (2025-08-08): price equipment $4,000 to $6,000 (model the high end); first inventory about $500; optional ~15% down. He verbally called 15% of $6,000 “$1,800” and totaled $2,300 cash. 15% of $6,000 is $900; the spoken math is wrong. Insurance about $20/month on one machine. Why You Shouldn't Start a Vending Business In 2025.

Mike Kaufman (2025-04-23): 10–15% down in a lot of cases; 10% of a $6,000 machine = $600; fill $300 to $500. How Much Does It REALLY Cost To Run A Vending Business?.

Mike Hoffman’s first machine: no money down, 60-month note, first payment 90 days after install, first payment $112, after three months of sales. He contrasts that with a $14,000 rental down payment that made about $300/month. First machine about $1,500/month while still employed. Finance the first machine with no cash down and a delayed first payment (2025-01-06). Those were his terms, not a stated universal offer.

Used asking price vs new

Mike Kaufman (2025-01-29):

  1. Identify the used model.
  2. Compare it on evending.com with the same machine new, including whether new includes warranty and a card reader.
  3. If used is $5,000 and new is $5,000, buy new.
  4. If used is only about $1,500 cheaper than a new unit he estimated around $5,500 to $6,000, treat the savings as possibly not worth it.
  5. His first used machine: $2,800 “mechanic-refurbished,” then unoperable; another $2,000 in refrigeration parts just to make it run, and it would probably break again.
  6. Focus on real cost, not the front-end used price.

Jason (2025-12-30): old machines can be harvested for parts, then scrapped. He cited “like 50 bucks” for a roll-off dumpster before scrap value. Exact scrap payout: Not specified in the corpus.

Financing the machine from its own cash flow

Mike Kaufman (2025-09-12):

  1. Treat the machine as an income-producing asset and collateral, not an expense.
  2. AI smart machines in his range: $3,000 to $9,000. He uses $6,000 for easy math.
  3. Put about 15% down (about $900). Typical downs he quotes are 10% to 20%; sometimes none. A personal guarantee is usually needed.
  4. Finance the rest over about 60 months at around $150 per month.
  5. First payment not due until 30 days after install.
  6. On his example of $1,500 revenue and about $1,100 after COGS, more than $900 remains after the payment.
  7. Apply leftover profit to principal if the lender waives prepayment penalties. Aim to pay off in 12 to 24 months.

Lease-to-own example in the same video: $7,000 smart cooler, $180 a month for 48 months, $2,500 a month revenue claimed, over $1,000 profit claimed after expenses, $1 buyout.

Mike Kaufman (2025-06-12): they typically pay 48- and 60-month loans off in 12 to 18 months, sometimes in less than a year. Monthly payment that then disappears: $115 to $175, varying with rates. He earlier cited a $112 payment on one $5,000 machine.

Anthony (2026-02-20): finance over 60 months to keep the payment low; pay it off in 12 to 18 months from cash flow; keep reserves for inventory instead of draining savings to pay cash. He disagrees with saving up for a year because that is a year of no revenue.

Mike Kaufman (2025-01-29): do not get caught up in 15% vs 8% vs 5% on a roughly $6,000 machine loan. He said the difference is like $10 to $12, not a house mortgage, if the location cash-flows.

Joe (2026-01-06): if you do not buy the machine outright and the location is bad, you may not make enough to cover the payment.

Payoff vs keep the cheap note.

John Newcombe splits weekly deposits across Profit First accounts and has not taken personal draws; machines paid off. Can You Start Vending at 60? Ask This Former Real Estate Agent.

How do I read a broker route, a franchise, or a sale price?

Current doctrine. Get their numbers. Run the calculations yourself. Walk if the numbers and the feel do not add up. Manuel Duval did not share the actual broker or franchise numbers he saw. How His 3rd Location Hit $8K/Month In Revenue While Working Full-Time (2026-02-17). If someone already has three or four machines, Mike Kaufman’s first question is what those machines do per month. How To Start A Vending Machine Business Step-By-Step (With $0).

Mike Kaufman’s 1x yearly-revenue rule of thumb

If you are using his rule: value around 1x yearly revenue. A $2,000/month location ≈ $24,000. An $84K/month route ≈ $1 million. Using “Buy Now, Pay Later” To Buy A Vending Machine Business (2025-08-01).

His $96K purchase (claimed): four locations, $8K/month at close (about 1x yearly revenue), later he said that same route did $84K in May 2025. Handshake locations get discounted (example: a $20K/year urgent care treated as about $15K of value). If financing can be shaped in your favor, he may pay a higher sticker; if it cannot, do not automatically stretch.

Anthony valued Tom’s hotel conservatively at $20,000/month × 1x = $240,000 on an asset statement. From Zero to $18,000/Month at ONE Hotel Location (Here's Exactly How He Did It).

Price the listing

Mike Kaufman (2025-05-29):

  1. Expect listings around 0.7x to 1x of total / annual revenue.
  2. Convert monthly revenue to an implied ask. A route doing $12,000 a month is probably listed around $120,000 to $144,000.
  3. As the buyer, decide using 1x or less. Walk away or renegotiate above 1x.
  4. Calculate revenue per location, not just total route revenue.
  5. Ask machine count per stop, whether you can raise prices, and whether you can put in newer machines or a micromarket.
  6. Check whether current soda equipment is limited to 12-ounce cans.

He first says 0.7x–1x of “total revenue,” then illustrates with 10–12 months of revenue and later calls it a yearly multiple.

Mr. Passive (2025-07-11) paid $96,000 for four locations doing $8,000 a month (about $2,000 each). He treated that as 1x revenue, not EBITDA, and was comfortable because the machines were new. Same $96,000 / $8,000 / 1x fact pattern is retold by Mike Kaufman (2025-05-29) and p9ML5Cr_wXU (2025-04-30).

Anthony (2026-02-27): machines or routes sell for 1 to 1.5x revenue. He said a 15-to-20-location operation “doing $150,000 per year” would be worth $360,000 to $540,000, and a $1 million revenue operation could sell for $1 million.

A second valuation shortcut in the same Mike video

Mike Kaufman (2025-04-30) also says:

  • A packed residential route can sell for 24 to 36x monthly profit.
  • He later calls 24 to 30x monthly profit a typical vending-route valuation.
  • He said he could get over 1x revenue just from selling a $1,500/month urgent-care location.

Warning

The corpus itself flags more than one valuation shortcut: about 1x yearly revenue on one example versus 24–36x monthly profit elsewhere, and Anthony later uses 1 to 1.5x revenue. Do not collapse them into one rule.

Diligence checklist actually used

Mr. Passive (2025-07-11) and Mike Kaufman (2025-05-29):

  1. Pull monthly revenue, location count, and the implied multiple.
  2. Inventory machine types and age.
  3. Ask why the seller is selling and whether they will do seller financing.
  4. Judge a small route on revenue per location and weekly hours, not revenue per machine.
  5. Check whether machines are new and still being financed so you can take depreciation after purchase. How to actually take that depreciation: see Stephen Lee below; the mechanical tax election is not fully specified as a filing procedure in the corpus.
  6. Decide whether the business is owner-centric.
  7. Map sister-property / land-and-expand upside.
  8. Look for value-adds such as adding a freezer.
  9. Confirm written location contracts, a paper trail, and that the seller will introduce every decision maker and stay involved after close.
  10. If you will keep the seller’s equipment, ask age, working condition, and spare parts.
  11. Score the above before offering. Even careful diligence will miss items that only show up after you take control.

Seller financing structure Mike Kaufman suggests: 10%, 20%, or 30% down; balance over five years. His Midwest example: 10% down, remainder over five years.

Jesse’s neglected drink route: seller-financed after a bank turndown, 18 drink machines doing $7,000/month before he optimized, 5-year interest-free note with small monthly payments plus lump sums from other cash flow. He calls stumbling onto seller financing luck, not a template. Buy and improve a neglected drink route.

Value-add math after you own it

Flip math, not just buy math. Buy a cheaper old-school route for the locations, swap Pepsi/Coke spirals for a micro market or smart cooler, stock higher-ticket items the old machines could not do, depreciate the new equipment, and use higher revenue to raise route value. Using “Buy Now, Pay Later” To Buy A Vending Machine Business.

  • Swap traditional to smart / micromarket: the $1,200 → over $2,500 apartment mailroom story above.
  • Add a freezer to a $2,000 micromarket: Mr. Passive (2025-07-11) said it went over $3,000 and added over $1,000 monthly cash flow.
  • Add a frozen-food machine next to a smart cooler and stock it on the same weekly visit: Mike Kaufman (2025-09-19) cites $800 to $1,500 extra monthly revenue. Frozen shelf life is long, so less shrinkage.

Phase timing Mr. Passive (2025-07-11): phase 1 revenue lift is marginal; phase 2 is the bell-curve spike; months 6 to 12 are hyper-growth where purchasing discipline and labor planning have to catch the volume. As you scale, the question is whether you are scaling efficiently or just adding expenses.

Preparing a route to sell

Mike Kaufman (2025-04-30):

  1. Document all revenue, profits, and losses.
  2. When negotiating, focus on terms rather than the headline price.
  3. Offer seller financing over a longer period.
  4. Emphasize enterprise value and remaining TAM, not just current cash flow. Example: two urgent cares now, five to ten more the buyer could add in that city.
  5. Show EBITDA and how efficiently the route has been run.

Mike Kaufman (2026-07-01): if you have to leave the state, sell the route as an asset the same way you would sell a rental.

How should I read the economy, habits, and “recession-proof” talk?

Current doctrine in this corpus is opinion, not a forecast. Several operators say food and water keep selling. That is not the same as “your P&L cannot fall.”

Kyle’s comparison: vending stacked and was not really seasonal, unlike his carpet business. How He Scaled to 30 Vending Machines Generating $40K/Month in Revenue. That is one operator’s mix, not a law.

Cash timing, reinvestment, and income replacement

Weekly collections vs monthly bills

Anthony (2026-01-20): vendor processors pay him weekly, which he uses to sequence credit-card payoffs and other cash needs.

Anthony (2026-06-16): vending pays out every week, unlike real-estate commission chunks. That lets him put COGS on a card for 30 days while cash is already coming in. Same-day examples he named: a $10,000 365s payout that day; a $16,500 or $17,000 micromarkets payout the previous week.

Do not treat early profit as beer money

Anthony (2026-02-06):

  1. Whatever profit you make in the first couple of months, do not touch it.
  2. Put it in a separate account designated as growth capital.
  3. Treat the business as an asset, not beer money.
  4. He did not pay himself a dime for the first several months.

Same idea in y5Z8ZqqHwDQ (2025-12-26): park profits in a different account and reinvest. By month six, aim for about three or five quality locations rather than forcing weak sites.

Income-replacement math

Anthony (2026-02-06):

  • Personal baseline expenses: $5,000 a month. He says he hit that around month four.
  • If locations net about $1,000 each and you need $5,000, you need about five solid locations. For $10,000, about 10. In the same video he also uses a $500 net example, which would be about 10 locations for $5,000.
  • After three to six months he sketches a typical proof-of-concept: three to five locations, about $5,000 to $8,000 a month in revenue, and profitability.
  • Most people in the community, he says, hit $5,000 to $10,000 a month in revenue within 6 to 12 months. Getting to $50,000 to $100,000 a month takes 18 to 24 months. That is his claim about “most people,” not a schedule you can book.

Four criteria he uses before quitting a W-2:

  1. Vending profit covers baseline expenses (mortgage/rent, car, insurance, food, utilities).
  2. Three to six months of expenses saved.
  3. A full pipeline / clear path to scale.
  4. Systems so you are not stocking every machine yourself.

You do not have to quit. Some operators keep the W-2. Graham Parker (2025-12-09) kept the W-2 when vending was close to replacing income but not there yet.

Mike Kaufman (2025-05-29): building from scratch is not a fast W-2 replacement. Work backward from locations per month times revenue per location. Use a 12-, 18-, or 24-month horizon.

Mallorie Rauch (2026-04-21) and Chelsea Hoffman (2026-07-01) both needed the numbers translated into family terms: machine cost, overhead, time away from family, and what foot traffic actually looks like. Mike’s later framing assigns each location to a named bill (a third of a nanny, a safer car) and treats the route as a salable asset / college fund, not only weekly cash.

If expenses are covered, you have 3 to 6 months of runway, and the pipeline is strong, Mike Kaufman calls that optionality. If any check is red, do not make the major move yet. How I’d Build a $5K/Month Vending Business (Starting Today).

Tax and depreciation numbers that change take-home

Guest CPA Stephen Lee (2025-12-19). This is his operating advice, not a filing manual and not San Diego-specific legal research.

Do not elect S-Corp on revenue

  1. Compute net profits, not revenue: gross sales minus COGS.
  2. Subtract financing or lease payments on equipment.
  3. Subtract all other vending expenses.
  4. When annual net profit is above about $70,000, and in the $70,000 to $80,000 range, start considering an S-Corp election.
  5. Do not elect just because you expect to scale later.

If you have an S-Corp, pay a real salary

  1. Pay yourself a W-2 salary. Stephen said that is an IRS requirement.
  2. Set it as reasonable compensation: what you would pay a replacement in your region to do your role.
  3. Take remaining profit after salary, COGS, and expenses as distributions.
  4. Use the distribution portion as the part not subject to FICA and unemployment.
  5. Put a number on the “salary for officers” line. A blank line, he said, will likely draw a letter.

There is no IRS 50/50, 60/40, or 70/30 split rule. You cannot justify salary with “my accountant told me” or a round $1,000 a month. If salary is unreasonably low and undocumented, he said the IRS may convert all profits to salary and assess FICA, unemployment, penalties, and interest.

Anthony restated a popular version as paying about 30% to 35% of $100,000 revenue as W-2. Stephen called that a fair grasp of the FICA-avoidance idea, then used a cleaner illustration: $100,000, $30,000 salary, remaining amount reduced by expenses to about $30,000 of distributions.

Depreciation vs next year’s lending

  1. Treat depreciation as the largest deduction most vending operators have.
  2. Section 179: cherry-pick which machines get a 100% write-off now. It cannot take the deduction past zero or create a loss.
  3. Bonus depreciation: also 100%, but can take taxable income negative and report a loss.
  4. Regular depreciation: he contrasted a five-year spread.
  5. Before maxing write-offs to zero tax, ask what is coming in the next two to three years (mortgage, business financing). Banks can add depreciation back, but he said they still want to see some taxes paid.

Mike Kaufman (2025-09-12) said that with 100% depreciation today, a $6,000 machine goes against the books and minimizes taxable income. Stephen’s later video is the more detailed, and more cautious, version.

Quarterly estimates and the tax account

Stephen’s annualized / actual method for seasonal vending:

  1. If there is no profit, do not pay estimates on that basis.
  2. Track year-to-date profit every quarter or month.
  3. Get separate federal and state effective rates from last year’s return or your tax preparer.
  4. Tax-to-date = YTD profit × each rate.
  5. Quarter 1: pay tax-to-date ÷ 4 to the IRS and separately to the state agency (he named Department of Revenue or Franchise Tax Board).
  6. Later quarters: recompute from the new YTD profit.
  7. Quarter 3: divide remaining unpaid tax by 2.
  8. Quarter 4: true up to profit as of December 31.

Park the money:

  1. Open a savings account used only for tax.
  2. Every month, transfer a conservative 25% to 30% of profits. He said 30% should cover federal and state for most operators.
  3. Do not spend leftovers after a quarterly payment. Some months you will fail to transfer the full amount.

Exact California Franchise Tax Board rates, LLC/S-Corp fees, and San Diego local tax: Not specified in the corpus.

How they compare vending’s numbers with other uses of capital

Use this only as attributed comparison talk, not as investment advice.

Rentals. Mike Kaufman (2026-01-20): a $100,000 house at about $20,000 down cash-flowing about $300 a month versus a financed or cash vending machine with a much smaller outlay. Anthony (2026-02-27): $10,000 does not get you into a typical rental; 20% to 25% down on $200,000 is $40,000 to $60,000 plus 2% to 5% closing costs. On a $100,000 rental after mortgage, taxes, insurance, and vacancies he puts cash flow at $200 to $300 a month if everything goes well. He allocates 50% of gross rent to operating costs (URb-_RQtqVs, 2026-05-01), including maintenance, HVAC, gutters, pest, roof, water heater, plumbing, electrical, turn costs, and paid management. One bad tenant, he says, can wipe out a year of cash flow; one major repair can wipe away two. Mallorie Rauch (2026-04-21) already owned rentals and still preferred vending’s $3,000 to $5,000 downside. Mike Hoffman’s first-machine contrast: $14,000 rental down payment that made about $300/month versus his first machine about $1,500/month. Finance the first machine with no cash down and a delayed first payment (2025-01-06).

Amazon FBA. Anthony (2026-05-01): bare-minimum launch $500 to $2,500 with tight margins and high per-unit costs; more realistic first product $2,500 to $6,000; private label $20,000 to $30,000 after he corrected himself from $20,000 to $3,000. He stated Amazon referral fees as around 50% of the selling price per item. You are platform-dependent; Amazon changes the fee structure. Low-inventory fees apply if stock is insufficient.

Dropshipping. Same video: if serious, budget $1,000 to $3,500 and expect the first 60 to 90 days to be testing, not profit. A $200 to $300 first month leaves almost no margin for error.

Digital products. Creation can be cheap ($0 to $50 ebook, $0 to $500 course, etc.), but a product with no audience generates zero sales. Paid ads $500 to $5,000 a month for meaningful traction; paid traffic can run $5,000 to $20,000-plus before meaningful ROI. First-year hard costs $0 to $2,000 plus significant time.

Airbnb on an already-owned property. About another $3,000 to $10,000 to make it guest-ready. He says you may not see much return right away unless you are in a highly lucrative tourist spot.

ATMs. First-year startup $4,500 to $11,000. Solid location: $250 to $600 net; high-traffic: $600 to $1,000. He does not state the time period. Your own cash sits in the vault.

Car washes. Self-serve barrier $150,000 to $500,000; in-bay automatic $250,000 to $700,000 per bay with stated annual revenue $80,000 to $200,000; conveyor tunnel $1,000 to $3 million startup and $200 to $2 million annual revenue. The $1,000 lower bound is what he stated.

Laundromats. He calls them recession-resistant with a 95% five-year survival rate. Jason (2025-12-30) kicked the tires on unattended laundromats and said the math did not work.

Day trading. He says multiple studies find 80% to 95% of day traders lose money. To earn $50,000 a year at a 10% annual return would theoretically need $500,000 starting capital.

Index funds. He grants the long-term case, uses a generous 10% historical average (about 7% after inflation in his telling), and says $10,000 is not quitting-your-job money on that path (paZxR-zrl50, 2026-02-27).

Decision rules (short)

Use these as yes/no checks. Details and exceptions are in the sections above.

Conflicts

Do not collapse these into one “correct” number. Recalculate with your invoices and your contract.

Warning

Leftover profit on a $5,000 month. Anthony (2026-07-07): about $2,300 after 35% COGS, 5% share, 8–10% fees, and ~$200 labor. How to Start a Vending Business (with ZERO Experience). Mike Kaufman (2025-02-17): about $1,800–$2,000, with internally inconsistent spoken math (35% COGS then 50%, 8–9% fees then 10%, then $1,000 lumped SaaS + merchant). Don't Start A Vending Machine Business, Until You Watch This.... Mike Kaufman (2026-03-20): the same $5,000 becomes about $2,000 after 30–40% COGS plus card, share, fuel, maintenance, and insurance. Top 5 Beginner Vending Mistakes.

Warning

What margin to aim at. Mike Kaufman (2025-06-20) wants 40% to 50% on top line after a full expense stack. Mike Kaufman (2025-03-10) also says product margins are always around 50% to 60%. Anthony (2025-12-26) shoots for 60% to 65%. Anthony’s own February 2026 teaching P&Ls land near 45% to 55% after COGS and fees, then much lower after labor and the loan. Anthony’s $5,000 walkthrough leaves about 46%. Mike’s later $5,000 stack leaves about 40%.

Warning

COGS target. Mike: 30% to 35% in the simple model (2025-02-26); typically 35% then 30–40% then a 30% target for a 50% margin goal; 33% in hyper growth and 30% when stabilized (2025-06-20). Anthony: 31% to 35% when the route has plateaued (2025-12-26); 35% to 40% in the 2026 teaching P&Ls; 35% on live machines. Mr. Passive inherited 45% and later stated 33%.

Warning

Fee load. Anthony: 8–10% = $500 on $5,000, later about 10% on a $2,000 teaching stack. Mike: 8–9%, then 10%, then $1,000 (20%) lumped, then a 10–12% merchant + software target, then 10% on one kiosk, then software 2–5% plus card ~5.9% for an 11% combined high-side. These cannot all be true on the same machine. Use your processor statement.

Warning

Labor cost on a $2,000 machine. Mike’s hired-stocker example is about $160 a month at $20/hour (Vv2vn7Prcl0, 2025-02-26). His later $1,000-revenue example uses $200 at $25/hour (nrlZCx2DA2Q, 2025-05-29). Anthony uses $100 to $150 in two February 2026 videos and about $200 in the salary-replacement video, then about $200 again on the $5,000 walkthrough.

Warning

When to hire. Anthony: hire before you think you are ready, even while costing ~$200–$400/month into early machines (2026-07-07). Mike Kaufman: hire when stocking is the bottleneck at 3–4 machines (2026-04-03). Angelina: hire in the $20k–$30k/month revenue range; Mike’s own hire was $25k–$27k (2026-08-19). Those are different stages.

Warning

Trial window before you pull a dud. DJ Fuchs and Anthony both use 90–120 days as the operating trial. Anthony’s current stated rule is 90 days, replacing his old six-month wait. His later contract language is an out at 60 or 90 days. Mike Kaufman says use the out clause at about 60 days, and separately says do not leave a dead machine after 6–9 months, then says month 9 or even 12. Anthony’s own forecast rules use five to six months for ±5% on a replacement stop, and 10 to 12 months if the building never had vending. Mix dial-in is three to six months. Mike Hoffman has seen sales take up to six months just for people to learn the machine is there. Matt Dix waited through a full pool season. Those are different clocks. Write the out clause you actually need.

Warning

First-machine profitability timing. Anthony says 60 to 90 days if you pick the right location (mT1B6bRVaCc, 2026-02-06) and, in another video, 30 or 60 days (paZxR-zrl50, 2026-02-27). Mike says product sales are profitable right away because of margins, while getting the down payment back takes a couple of months (nrlZCx2DA2Q, 2025-05-29).

Warning

Apartment unit-count rules vs results. Anthony (2026-01-09): do not place under 200 units. Mike Kaufman (2026-03-27): want 250+ centralized units. Lane (2026-04-28) remembered a 200-unit minimum, then a 100-unit with elevator / entrance / package-room placement regularly did about $3,000 and peaked at $4,000. John Newcombe’s 150-unit Beast did $9,500–$10,000. Anthony’s own 199-unit only did about $1,800–$2,100. Unit count is not a formula.

Warning

Location quality bar. Anthony’s conservative average is $2,000, and $1,000 is not enough to hire against. Charles, via Mike, will not take under $4,000. Anthony later calls $4,000+ a banger. DJ’s keep/install bar is about $1,500 revenue per machine. Matt Morrison accepts first accounts around $1,000 to $1,200. Mallorie still kept a $325 stop. Shannon’s unicorn is $22K to $25K sales, which Mike immediately flagged as skewed.

Warning

Revenue per machine vs revenue per location. Mike repeatedly says ask revenue per machine and ignore machine-count vanity (nTVKbWO1NhM, 2025-03-10). DJ Fuchs also scores revenue per machine. Mr. Passive, on a four-stop buy, explicitly did not care about revenue per machine and used revenue per location plus hours instead (eyAhpLaluvg, 2025-07-11).

Warning

First inventory budget. Mike Kaufman repeatedly: $250–$500, do not overbuy (2025-11-07, 2025-04-23). Also about $500, and he thinks that may be high (2025-08-08). Anthony: around $1,000 (2026-06-26), $700 to $900 (2026-02-06), $600 to $900 (2026-02-27), inside a $3,000–$5,000 all-in (2026-08-04). Micromarket first fill is a different animal: $5,000–$6,000 vs $300 for a normal machine (2024-12-14).

Warning

Pay off debt fast vs keep cheap paper. Machine notes: Mike Kaufman wants 12–24 month payoff on 60-month paper (2025-08-08), later 12 to 18 months (2025-06-12, 2025-09-12). Anthony: finance 60 months, pay off in 12 to 18 months (2026-02-20). Seller-financed route at 3%: do not rush to prepay (2025-08-01). John Newcombe pays machines off and does not take draws. Different cost of capital, different advice.

Warning

Lead with revenue share or not. Anthony (2026-02-13) and Mike Kaufman (multiple years): do not lead with a share; most sites never ask. John Newcombe (2026-07-17): offering a share helped him win, then he refused 25%. Sandy offered 10% too early and had to walk it back to 5%. Mike also uses 10% as a selling point when they already get paid and will market it.

Warning

Smart vs traditional lift. Mike says 2x to 3x, or about a 3x decrease if you leave traditional in place (n9vUTOG-L7Y, 2025-09-19). Mike Hoffman says traditional does one third, sometimes one fourth (voQ-17HFek0, 2025-10-10). In the same Mike corpus, location still beats machine: sQM9Ufwii40 (2025-06-12) says how nice or modern the machine is does not matter as much as foot traffic.

Warning

Route valuation. Buyer comfort rule: 1x revenue or less (nrlZCx2DA2Q, 2025-05-29; eyAhpLaluvg, 2025-07-11). Listings around 0.7x to 1x. Anthony: 1 to 1.5x revenue (paZxR-zrl50, 2026-02-27). Same Mike also states 24 to 36x monthly profit, then 24 to 30x monthly profit (p9ML5Cr_wXU, 2025-04-30).

Warning

Passive or not. Digital products and AI machines are called “truly passive” in ranking/promotional segments (URb-_RQtqVs, 2026-05-01; ZqCJmBwF4OU, 2025-10-03). Codie Sanchez (2025-10-10), in the clip Mike reviews, says you can make thousands with vending machines, but it is not going to be passive. Anthony and Mike both describe overnight sales, then separately describe stocking, hiring, broken machines, and 1 a.m. service calls (zi3KK_wdsnc, 2026-06-19).

Warning

Spoken P&Ls that do not add. Mike’s $1,000-machine board (nrlZCx2DA2Q, 2025-05-29) and $135,000-month stack (W5UHRw8UE0I, 2025-06-20) are flagged in the corpus as internally inconsistent. Mr. Passive’s “10% COGS cut from 45%” does not equal his later 33% figure. Anthony first said 10 machines need 10.5 labor hours, then corrected to 15 to 20. Anthony’s apartment-machine leftover only fits if one labor line is dropped or the fee is $262, not the spoken $2.62. Mike verbally called 15% of $6,000 “$1,800.”

Warning

Insurance on the route. Mike called $60 for 100-plus machines both peanuts and very high (W5UHRw8UE0I, 2025-06-20), about $20/month on one machine, later $62/month at 110 machines. Anthony’s first-machine stack uses $50 to $75 per month (mT1B6bRVaCc, 2026-02-06). Those are different units and different scales.

Note

Same operator, different leftover stories on “first machine.” Mike Hoffman: first machine about $1,500/month (2025-01-06). Mike Kaufman: first machine about $300 profit, later $1,200 on that same machine; first rental also about $300 after $16,000 / $14,000 down (2025-08-08). He also says that first side-hustle machine did about $1,000/month (2025-02-17), and separately $600 revenue / $300 profit in 2020. Do not mash those into one benchmark.

Note

Quality vs one-unicorn talk. Repeated operating advice is quality over a pile of $200 or $500 stops (How to Start a Vending Business (with ZERO Experience), How He Built $600K/Year in Revenue With Just 18 Machines). The same videos also say one location can change the trajectory. Anthony’s own qualifier: do not only hunt unicorns; stay consistent. From Zero to $18,000/Month at ONE Hotel Location (Here's Exactly How He Did It). The same corpus is full of $100 to $450 stops that did not change anything. Javier’s $8,500 in 30 days is explicitly called an outlier.

Checklists

Hidden expenses to put on a machine P&L

From Don't Start A Vending Machine Business, Until You Watch This... and Top 5 Beginner Vending Mistakes, merged with Anthony’s later list in How to Buy Your First Vending Machine (Step-by-Step Process):

  • Cost of goods (planning figures in this corpus: 30–40%, often 35%)
  • Property revenue share, if any
  • Merchant / card / transaction fees
  • Machine software / SaaS
  • Cellular / data, or a cheaper Wi-Fi band
  • Labor if hired (and owner time if you need to know true leftover)
  • Fuel / gas
  • Maintenance / service
  • Insurance
  • Machine financing payment, if any

Numbers to track from day one

From How to Buy Your First Vending Machine (Step-by-Step Process) and Everything You Need To Purchase Your First Vending Machine:

  • Revenue
  • Product / inventory cost
  • Processing fees
  • Restock visits
  • Maintenance
  • Profit
  • What actually sold, so you can pull losers and restock winners

Month-six scoreboard

From How To Replace Your Full Time Salary With Vending and Anthony (2025-12-26):

  • Revenue per machine per month
  • What each location is actually doing
  • COGS as a percentage of revenue
  • Profit margin per location and actual take-home
  • Hours spent per location per week
  • Month-over-month change, even if only by a percent
  • Each expense as a percentage of revenue

Questions that matter more than your opinion of a product

From I Thought These Vending Products Would Sell Like Crazy — They Flopped Hard:

  • What does this customer in this location actually buy?
  • What is the person doing right before they buy?
  • Does this product earn its slot on revenue, not just on whether someone might say yes?
  • Did I give it a fair test and watch the numbers?
  • If it is not moving, am I arguing with the machine?

DJ Fuchs’s current placement standards

From How He Built a $50,000/Month Vending Business in One Year (2025-12-23):

  • Judge the stop on revenue per machine, not only location total.
  • Use about $1,500 per machine per month as the baseline.
  • Prefer locations that can take two or more machines.
  • Keep some strong onesie locations if they already perform.
  • When staffed, send a paid driver where they can fill two machines and stretch time between visits.

First-machine cash pieces Mike Kaufman names

From Why You Shouldn't Start a Vending Business In 2025:

  • Equipment in the $4k–$6k range, often financed
  • Optional ~15% down if you want to cut interest
  • First inventory around $500
  • Insurance around $20/month on one machine
  • Optional 0% intro-APR card on inventory spend

Cross-check against Anthony’s later all-in few thousand / $3,000–$5,000 figures, and his February 2026 $1,500 out of pocket telling, before you treat any one list as complete.

Claimed operator snapshots

These are on-camera claims. They are not planning targets.

Who What they said Source
Anthony 45 locations, 79 machines, more than $102,000 revenue the prior month; works 8 to 10 hours a week in one telling How He Built a $102K/Month Vending Business (2026-01-20); How To Replace Your Full Time Salary With Vending (2026-02-06)
Mike on Anthony After expenses on $102,000, keeps about $50,000 a month rGtdOh0AILQ (2025-11-14)
Anthony Route around $120,000 a month with four people URb-_RQtqVs (2026-05-01); io0UBay3XtU (2026-06-16)
Anthony Five or six locations doing about $6,000 or $7,000 each; one machine $4,300 like clockwork co01wsvxJw8 (2026-06-02); mT1B6bRVaCc (2026-02-06)
Mike on Anthony’s first month $2,000 revenue and $500 profit rGtdOh0AILQ (2025-11-14)
Mike on Anthony’s scale checkpoints Month 1: $2K / $500; month 3: 5 locations, $8K; month 6: 20 locations, $35K; month 9: 35 locations, $70K; month 11: 45 locations, 78 machines, $102K Same video
Mike on Anthony’s best stop $12,000 to $13,000 per month Same video
Mike Kaufman Illinois 80-plus machines, Oregon way over 20; last month over $135,000 W5UHRw8UE0I (2025-06-20)
Mike Kaufman Micro markets over $23,000 last month nqWFWrEavVo (2025-06-05)
Mr. Passive Over $100,000 a month; best location over $20,000; 7 to 10 machines at $800 to $1,500 profit each ≈ $7K to $10K; smart machines average $2–3K revenue and about $800–$1,500 profit ZqCJmBwF4OU (2025-10-03)
Mr. Passive One machine $600 to $2,500 after AI optimization Same video
Matt Dix 10 locations, $20K–$24K/month; one community lead about $3,000 revenue and $1,500 profit after COGS with no employees; a $6,000/month location is about $70,000 a year VrZ-d378Ofo (2026-04-14)
Matt Morrison About $43,000/month before the next four installs; top location $7K class; first couple of stops $1,000–$1,200 tfjgFj0BLgI (2026-03-30)
Musa Sadie Just over $41,000 in April with 26 machines / 22 locations; new college-area stop surpassed $3,000 in the first two weeks; highest single location broke $4,500 kb8ryBm6g9k (2026-05-12)
Tim Barnes 41 machines, 34 locations, on track for $90,000 after $64,000 the month before; best micromarkets around $14,000 sGgnnwa2ySs (2026-04-07)
Shannon Four locations; one unicorn averages about $22,000 to $25,000 a month in sales, not profit; setup about $10,000 to $12,000 yP4Y_BBAvq4 (2026-01-13)
Mike on Shannon Highest location he has ever heard of; numbers will be a little skewed Same video
Joe Approximately $5,500 a month gvvz2nMax0w (2026-01-06)
John Sanchez Seven locations; one Orlando student-housing stop well over $4K in a month; last month a little lower because of student housing io0UBay3XtU (2026-06-16)
Mallorie Rauch About $4,000 a month across six locations io1Jkei-yFs (2026-04-21)
Texas teacher, via Mike Over $2,500 a month on one of his first machines, profited $1,200, about two hours a week Vv2vn7Prcl0 (2025-02-26)
Javier, via Anthony / host $8,500 at first location in 30 days; presented as an outlier co01wsvxJw8 (2026-06-02); kb8ryBm6g9k (2026-05-12)
Charles / Jason / Thomas, via Mr. Passive Charles: five locations over $20K; Jason: 30+ machines over $30K; Thomas: four locations $8K ZqCJmBwF4OU (2025-10-03)
Graham / Katie When they reached about $20,000 a month, Katie guessed they were only pulling in $5,000 because she was buried in logistics heSbv_uG734 (2025-12-09)

What the corpus does not specify

  • A complete beginner bookkeeping system, chart of accounts, or which software to use besides Expensify, QuickBooks, machine dashboards, and a Google Sheet / owner spreadsheet.
  • How to calculate sales tax, California seller’s permit, Franchise Tax Board rates, LLC/S-Corp fees, or San Diego local business tax.
  • Exact card-network or Nayax / 365 / MicroMart fee schedules currently in force.
  • How to find, onboard, or legally classify a stocker in California.
  • How to file an insurance claim, what deductible to carry, or California insurance minimums.
  • A formula that converts foot traffic into expected monthly revenue.
  • How to value a route using both 1x revenue and 24–36x monthly profit at the same time.
  • San Diego climate fit for ice machines.
  • The mechanical tax election as a filing procedure.

If a number you need is not above, write it down from your own books rather than borrowing someone else’s claimed month.