fountain soda machine

Z

za4life

New member
Hey guys looking for some more help please. One of my two stores is a del/co and im looking to add fountain drinks and get rid of the 20 ozs. Coke has said they will not put one in for us. What I was curious about was if any of you bought your own machines. What were the headaches, certainly running the lines and the like. Any input is appreciated.
 
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We buy our 20 ozs and 2 lts through coke. Basically they told me we do not have enough dine in sales to make it worth there while (about 5% of total sales). This is not a super busy location about 10k a week, closer to 15k during football season. Not sure if this is just a way to make me buy there 20 ozs but we have fountain in the other location. Anybody else ever had this issue.
 
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Coke makes very little on fountain. Coke is really after bottle business. If you have very little prospect of dine-in thats the excuse they give. Buy your own fountain on craigslist.
 
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Thanks ittza. Is the instalation a do-it -yourself type of deal or will I have to bring someone in to do it. I’m not much of a handyman but can do most repairs in my stores. If I did need someone who would it be, Im assuming I couldn’t have coke come install it.
 
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A small water line, a small plastic drain line and an outlet. You might need a plumber but it should not be a big to do. You will need an ice maker or some fountain units come with a cuber. I like to keep seperate.
 
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This is absurd. Either call Pepsi or go up the chain of command at Coke. I would not do it yourself because you would also have to repair it. It is absolutely an effort to keep you stuck buying 20 oz’s. How many cases do you go thru a week of 20’s and 2 liters?

Jim
 
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itzzapizza:
A small water line, a small plastic drain line and an outlet. You might need a plumber but it should not be a big to do. You will need an ice maker or some fountain units come with a cuber. I like to keep seperate.
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It’s going to be a little more complicated than that. You also have to hook up the carbonator, CO2 system and syrup pumps. Not impossible, but probably not super easy either.
 
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Are you sure you need one? From your numbers, you are only doing $500 a week in dine in (5% of 10k). Even if 20% of that is drinks, you would only sell 75 $1.50 sodas a week. It costs about $50 for 30 gallons, so that is about 190 20 oz sodas, or 26 cents each. Add in the cup, lid, and straw, employee consumption and loss, and you are looking at around 45 cents each (higher by about 1.5 times if you add in free refills).

Figure a crappy used soda fountain off craigslist is about $400, and an ice maker is about the same. This one looks good, but the cost is $2500. Add in $500 for plumbing, you are looking at a long time before you recoup any savings.

75 sodas a week at $1.49
1.49 - .45 = $1.04
$1300/1.04 = 1250, so that is 20-25 weeks just to pay for the stuff alone (some people will want PET bottles)
$3000/1.04 = 2885, nearly 10 months in this case. (Also keep in mind the cost of additional inventory.)

Subtract the difference between the profit on your 20 oz. cokes and the fountain drinks, and you are looking at 2 years to see any positive gain from switching. I did estimate on the high side. You could reduce costs by shopping around, searching for rebates, using generic mixes, and cheap cups, but all of that takes time that could be used more profitably elsewhere.
 
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Uh, not really rocket science and you can call a beverage distributor and ask for help. I agree to call Pepsi, they have been steppin up game and trying very hard to compete with Coke. They pay back I found was that many of my customers really prefer fountain to bottles.
 
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Thanks for all the posts. I will take all these comments under consideration and try to come up with a plan.
 
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