I make money checking if forgotten vending machines are actually abandoned

[u/KazuKazu_hyperbowl]

I honestly didn't know this was a thing until a few months ago. From what I know, there are a lot of vending machines that are just sitting around in old laundromats, apartment buildings, repair shops, and other places where nobody really pays attention to them anymore.

What I do is basically check if those machines are still being maintained or not. Someone sends me a list of locations and I go there, take pictures, see if anything changed, check if the machine is still plugged in, and report back what I found.

Some people might think it sounds boring, but it is actually interesting because you find some weird stuff. One machine I checked was behind an old car wash and it looked like nobody touched it for years. There were weeds around it and the drinks inside looked really old. I honestly could not tell if it was still active or if everyone just forgot it was there.

From what I know, the owners need the information because sometimes it is hard to know if a machine is still being serviced or completely abandoned. My part is just collecting the information and sending it over.

Last weekend I checked 17 machines and made about $146. I never thought driving around looking at vending machines would make me money, but somehow it does. :PP

It is definitely one of the weirdest side hustles I have ever heard of, and now it is one of the ways I make extra cash.

[u/Bazza79]

Don't they need to be restocked? Or, doesn't the owner notice when they're no longer making money?

[u/jaybz00 → u/Bazza79]

It depends on who is responsible for restocking the machine. I know of a snack manufacturing company that basically just rents these vending machines for their offices and restocks the machines themselves to provide their employees a way to buy their own snacks for cheap. I suspect convenience stores/groceries/gas stations might have their own suppliers already and would want to restock vending machines themselves as well without having to deal with maintenance and other costs of actually owning these machines.

[u/KazuKazu_hyperbowl → u/Bazza79]

Yeah, they do. That's why most of the ones I check end up being active. Sometimes it's just older locations that haven't been physically verified in a while. I'm not deciding whether they're profitable or not, I'm mostly just confirming what's actually there and sending back photos.

[u/Competitive-Staff-38 → u/KazuKazu_hyperbowl]

This is clearly a lie.

[u/Bazza79 → u/KazuKazu_hyperbowl]

I mean good for you for the side hustle, but it seems weird to send someone out there when there are people already interacting with the machine. Give the guy who restocks the machine and/or takes out the money an app and have him photograph/check. They can even spot things you can't because they can open the machine as well.

[u/AwkwardCockroach1488 → u/Bazza79]

Things change. Owner dies, new people come in. Someone who lives across town buys the bodega and pays some guy to work it.

All of the sudden the contact info for the vending machine gets lost and no one knows where to call. So they keep it, stock it up, never let the company know what's up.

Or sometimes the vending machine is actually forgotten, and the company retrieves an idle unit. Puts it back into service.

[u/Patient-Web6850 → u/AwkwardCockroach1488]

My old manager retired a couple years back. When he left, that motherfucker took the fucking rolodex with like every single client and number we had ever for like his last tenure which was about 30 years. THE ROLODEX. sure everything was already computerized and we still had basically the information we needed but that thing was a life saver.

[u/nevrcared4whatheydo → u/Bazza79]

All the threads on here come back to this. Sure - I get the skepticism. On the other hand, if you pay someone $XXX,XXX/year to do a job, paying someone else $X,XXX/year to double-check that work makes sense.

[u/Bazza79 → u/nevrcared4whatheydo]

Good point. I'm just interested how this works, not familiar with the vending machine business.