A White Knight comes to save our vending machine dilemma
by Fred Roed on 01/04/09 at 12:03 am
1 comment
Those of you who follow Ideate’s adventures closely know that there are several themes that seem to reoccur on our hallowed pages, for example: iBurst, banking issues, e-commerce, PR, Zebras, coffee, small business owners, viral marketing and making your life easier.
Perhaps the most popular, and unexpected, was the focus on vending machines. It all started with an innocent post by Andrew documenting a visit to the small biz expo at the CTICC. He wrote about vending machines, and since then, we’ve been inundated with requests for quotes. “How much are your vending machines?” was a familiar refrain.
And so, we posted about it, we put up signage (e.g. “WE ARE NOT A VENDING MACHINE COMPANY”), we even wrote on other blogs about it. NOTHING helped.
Visitors to Ideate who had searched for “vending machines” were convinced that Ideate was a vending machine business.
To cut a long story short, we called for help – and someone answered.
Enter Henry Marques, MD of The Vending Company.
Henry saw the commotion and said “Hey, I can help!“ Like any true entrepreneur, he saw an opportunity and took it. After a brief interchange, we agreed that any enquiries that come through to us about vending machines, vending machine businesses or ANY kind of mechanical apparatus that sells stuff (from sweets to Japanese underwear), we pass straight onto Henry.
Not that we didn’t do our homework, mind you. We checked him out. Vendco is a stand-up company. It’s been around the block and Henry provides good aftersales service, as well as installation. Henry and his team at The Vending Company can also advise you on how to get going, where to set up, and how to keep stocked.
We’ve placed The Vending Company’s adverts on Ideate, and we’ll be tracking Henry’s results from here on.
(By the way, if you want to chat to Henry about your vending machine ideas, you can email him at henry@vendco.co.za or phone 011 791 7111 . Remember to tell him that we sent you!)
With happy hearts, we move on to the next stage of Ideate’s progress.
Now – anyone out there specialising in recycling bins or pool noodles* (or, to be frank, anything small business related)? Give me a call (seriously) and we’ll guarantee you some healthy referrals.
*yep, we get muchos enquiries for these key words as well – help…
Fred Roed is the marketing guy in the Ideate crew. Fred is the CEO of web marketing company World Wide Creative and the co-founder of online learning portal Heavy Chef. Fred loves writing about people out there doing marketing right. Follow Fred on Twitter here. View more articles by Fred Roed.
Tags: recycling, vending machines
Theunis
Jun 30th, 2009
we use a great company for recycling they supply the drums, collect them and sort the stuff – check them out on http://www.open-sky.co.za – person to speak to is Lido
music greetings