 |
||||
  
 
 |
A pop machine in the yard: a side business and an address help By
Lynnette Hoffman
Visitors stopping by Tom and Tessa Sunderland's North Logan house don't have to search for the gray minivan parked in the drive way, or count three houses down on the left side of the road. Complicated directions aren't necessary with a Dr Pepper machine standing next to the garage and a circular driveway providing easy drive through access. "When we tell people where we live, that's the main identifying characteristic," Tessa Sunderland said. The only confusion might be their recent switch of brands. After sporting Coca Cola in the front yard for a year and a half, former Coke employee Tom Sunderland began stocking and maintaining machines for Pepsi three months ago. He sold the Coke machine to his sister and bought a second hand Dr Pepper machine for $25. Tom stocks the machine with Dr Pepper and Pepsi products that he buys when they go on sale at the grocery store. He and Tessa decide the flavors by trial and error, watching to see what sells the most. The maintenance cost is low, and Tom has never lost any money from his side business. The money they collect from the soda machine- about $350 every three months- used to go towards car insurance money. But now that they have that taken care of, the couple is saving the extra income for a camcorder. Since part of his job description includes repair work, Tom doesn't have to worry about technical problems in the old machine. "He knows how to run the machines. If anything breaks he knows how to fix it- that's his job," Tessa said. Still, the machine isn't new, and sometimes the customers catch the problems before Tom does. Eighth grader Colt Berezay, who lives around the corner from the Sunderlands', once got two cans because some quarters were stuck in the machine. Another time Colt's fifty cents got stuck, but Tom was on his way out the door. Colt got his money back, and a can of Coke to go along with it. Living next door to the Sunderlands' has its perks, Colt said. They give away cans of soda at Halloween. "We change into each others masks and go back twice," Colt said. Colt frequents the machine often, about twice a week. "We don't have that many quarters in the house because we use it all the time," Colt said. The money he spends comes from his parents, who often ask him to pick up an extra can or two for them. He gets an allowance, but most of it goes into his own savings account, not into the Sunderlands' camcorder fund. Neighborhood kids are the most common customers, Tessa said. Colt said his friends often buy sodas there as well. Still some parents would prefer their kids not give the Sunderlands' too much business. "My kids don't use it. I don't like them to have too much pop and
I don't like them to waste their money on it," said neighbor Debbie
Mays, a mother of six. |
Archived Months:
January
1999 January
2000 |
||