Pete where do you get £120 a year? I pay most sites on a 3 monthly basis and only use these invoices when paying commision (I use an A4 spreadsheet showing individual stock between commision payments) I make that 68p a year, hardly breaking the bank.PGBrew wrote:Very nice and pretty but at 17p each (£120 per year) expensive, time consuming and too much information. I only give receipts if asked and that is in about 10% of sites. I never state the comission rate and would never give out my home address. I would ask the question why would you want to give out this information? I have many sites where the commission rate is 25% or more. As soon as there is a change of manager or ownership the rate drops back down again to 20% and I tell the manager that is the rate. The last thing I want to do is draw attention to the commission rate, it becomes an unneccessary discussion point especially with newsagents & convienience stores. I had one phone me up for a machine, got to site and asked for 50% commission because the the other shop had told him that's what he gets. I always reply yes 50% of profit they say ok, i'll reply that it's easier to calculate as 25% of turnover to get the same comission figure, I try not to pay more than £50 per visit. Sometimes too much information can work against you.
I give receipts showing agreed commissions as I want to run a professional company that grows through transparancy, if the site management changes and I renegotiate commisions then a different percentage is written on the invoice hence the blank space simples!
As for showing my address this is my business address as well as my home, why would I want to hide this fact? I advertise on my website with an address also and am not aware of any companies that do not show an address why wouldn't they - unless of course they wish to disappear as quick as they arrive?
I have picked up several sites from unprofessional vendors playing at this game and clearly not in it for the long term, who have scrappy dirty machines, dodgy mobile numbers hand written on stickers, poor service, self potted non sealed pots with no sell by dates or ingredient stickers, and have literally stolen commssions from sites (as the sites have told me)
I am professional and have an open and honest ethical outlook to business. I am quite happy to count the money in front of site owners and consider many of them now friends which if you know anything about business you will know its all about people whatever you do or sell.
Why do you only pay £50 per visit? I regularly hand over more than £100 a time to my top sites and this impacts well with them rather than a couple of quid a week.
I emphasize to the site what they are getting from the start and then there is no confusion, 50% of profit??? what does that mean. Surely that depends on too many factors and is too confusing for sites, better they know that they get 20p I get 35/40p (average) but have the depreciation and maintenance of the machine as well as labour and fuel etc. Many of my sites comment how pleased they are with the all round service so clearly I am doing something right?
