Routes score 90 to 92. A steel box selling snacks is glamour-proof, the demand is impulse plus captivity, hospitals, apartments, student housing, and the competition is fragmented hobbyists who quit after two bad placements. The score stays below waste because entry is cheap enough that competition does occasionally show up, usually briefly.
The database Category
Vending & ATMs
Two documented owners, two opposite routes in. Marcus Gram started Joyner Vending cold with $10,000 in 2018 and reached $500,000 in annual sales across six states by 2022. Adam Hill skipped the slow years, paying $60,000 in 2014 for an existing Tampa Bay route that now runs 100-plus machines at over $58,000 a month. Both prove the same thing: a machine either sits in front of foot traffic or it earns nothing.
The entries
Why it scores boring
Common questions
How many vending machines do you need to make a living?
Run Gram's numbers: $800 to $1,300 gross per machine monthly, about half of it take-home. Replacing a $50,000 salary needs roughly 8 to 12 well-placed machines. His own route took three years and 21 machines before he quit the day job, which is the realistic pace. Adam Hill's alternative was to buy a route outright for $60,000 and inherit its placements on day one.
Are ATM routes better than vending routes?
They're the same business wearing different boxes: placement is everything. Vending earns more per site but wants weekly restocking; ATMs trade lower service for cash-float requirements and surcharge dependence. Both documented operators here chose vending; the ATM figures on the ideas card are industry ranges, tilde attached.
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