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Free vending tool

Where to buy vending inventory: compare delivered cost.

Shelf price plus freight, minimums, membership and your drive. A sample basket is loaded: change any number.

Warehouse club saves you $41 a month.

Compared with Online wholesale on this basket, once freight, drive time and membership are counted. That is $494 a year.

  • Product
  • Freight and trips
  • Membership
  1. Warehouse clubyou pick up
    $482 a month
    • Lowest total
    • Lowest per unit on 6 of 6 items
    • $0.13 per unit added by freight, trips and membership
  2. Online wholesaledelivered
    $523 a month
    • $0.05 per unit added by freight, trips and membership

Sample prices, enter your own: change any number below and this updates.

Free: delivered cost per unit for every item, margin per vend and a printable copy. We may follow up about VendHub.

Your monthly basket

  • Chips, single-serve bags
  • Candy bars
  • Cookies and snack cakes
  • Soda, 12 oz cans
  • Bottled water, 16.9 oz
  • Energy drinks, 16 oz

Where you buy

Sample prices, enter your own. Replace each case price with your quote. Leave it blank if a source does not carry the item.

Warehouse club

Case prices
Fees, minimums and drive60 min, 30 mi round trip, 2 trips a month, $65/yr membership

Online wholesale

Case prices
Fees, minimums and drive$35 delivery, 1 order a month, $250 minimum
Fine-tune assumptionsYour time at $25/hr, units per case, vend prices
Chips, single-serve bags
Candy bars
Cookies and snack cakes
Soda, 12 oz cans
Bottled water, 16.9 oz
Energy drinks, 16 oz
Why delivered cost

Why delivered cost beats shelf price

The cheapest case on the shelf is rarely the cheapest case in your machine. Four costs sit between the price tag and your margin.

  • Freight

    A delivery fee per order, spread over the units in it. Small orders carry more per unit.

  • Order minimums

    A source that wants $250 per order forces bigger buys or fewer trips, or it is not an option.

  • Membership fees

    An annual fee is a monthly cost. It only pays for itself above a certain volume.

  • Your time and miles

    A club run is a drive, a load and an unload. Counted at what your hour is worth, it often outweighs the discount.

Example with made-up numbers: a case at $18 with $60 of freight on a 50-unit order costs $3.00 a unit delivered. A $20 case that arrives free costs $2.00. The cheaper shelf price lost.Illustrative only. Use your own quotes above.
How it works

  1. Start from the sample basket

    Two sources are already compared. Add items from the chips and set cases a month with the steppers.

  2. Enter your own prices

    Replace each sample case price with your quote. Fees, minimums and drive time sit under each source.

  3. Read the result

    The answer updates as you type. Email yourself the full breakdown for per-item cost, margin per vend and a printable copy.

Next step

Ready to compare real suppliers?

Pantry lets members enroll with national suppliers from one login and see case prices in one catalog. Add those prices above to see how they compare with where you buy today.

Explore eligible suppliers in Pantry
Questions

Wholesale cost, answered

What is delivered cost?+
The real price of a unit once it is in your van or storage: the case price divided by units per case, plus its share of freight, trip costs (your time and mileage) and any membership fee. It is the number that decides your margin per vend, not the shelf price.
How are freight, trips and membership spread across items?+
Evenly across every unit you buy from that source in a month. A delivery fee, a drive to the warehouse and a share of the annual membership are added up, then divided by the units you order there. Heavy items like cases of soda and light items like chips carry the same per-unit share, so treat it as a clean approximation rather than a freight invoice.
How should I value my time and mileage?+
Both are editable. Many operators start with what an hour of their time is worth on the route and the current IRS standard mileage rate. Set your hour to zero if you want to compare cash costs only.
Are the prices in the calculator real?+
No. Every starting price is a sample so the tool works on first load. They are labelled "Sample prices, enter your own" and none of them are quotes from any supplier. Replace each with the case price you are actually offered.
Is a warehouse club always the cheapest?+
Not always. A lower shelf price can lose to a source that delivers or sits closer once you add the drive, the membership and the minimum you have to hit. That is the comparison this tool exists to make with your numbers.
What happens if I do not meet a source's order minimum?+
The source is flagged with how far short each order falls. The total still shows what your basket costs there, but you would need to order more per trip, or less often, to qualify.
What do you do with my basket and email?+
Nothing leaves your browser while you use the free comparison. When you ask for the full breakdown, we store your email with a summary of your basket (how many items and which source types you compared) and email you a copy when email is available.
Is Pantry cheaper than where I buy now?+
We do not claim that. Pantry connects members with national suppliers under one login, and rebates apply only to eligible products. Add a supplier's case price to this calculator and see how it compares for your basket.

Know your real cost before the next order.

Free to use. Your numbers stay in your browser until you ask for the full breakdown.

Explore eligible suppliers in Pantry