About Fine Print

What we cover

Fine Print explains how vending locators work, what they cost, what their contracts and guarantees say, which red flags to walk away from and how to get money back when a service doesn’t deliver. It is written for operators who are comparing locator offers, and for operators who have paid one and are worried it won’t deliver.

• How Vending Locators Work: How Vending Locators Work explains what vending machine locator services sell, from lead lists to signed host agreements, and how to tell them apart before you pay. Start with how locators work, what they cost and whether one is worth it, then the questions to ask, the red flags and how to check a locator’s record. The rest covers what you receive: leads or signed placements, who holds the contract, guarantees and what happens when a venue closes.
• Locator Contracts & Money: Locator Contracts & Money reads vending locator agreements clause by clause and does the arithmetic: monthly placement fees over 24 months, deposits, several machines and break-even sales. It also covers declining an offered location, non-circumvention, refunds, the FTC Business Opportunity Rule and state laws, each with a dated note: general information, not legal advice.
• Locators by State: Locators by State names a vending machine locator for each of the 50 states and shows the arithmetic behind the pick: which companies take placements there, what they charge upfront and monthly, and what the state itself adds — the licence a food vending machine needs, the agency that issues it, and the business opportunity law that governs the sale of a location. Start with the state-by-state overview, then read the guide for your state.

We do not review or rank named locator companies, we do not publish vending machine buying guides, and we do not run business-opportunity sales pitches.

How we work

These rules apply to every article we publish:

• Clause by clause. We quote the clause, explain what it means, then say what to ask for, and we do the arithmetic: totals over 24 months, break-even sales, refund timelines.
• Sample clauses are generic. Clauses labeled “Sample clause” are written as examples and are not taken from any company’s contract. When an article quotes a company’s actual terms, it labels them “Published term” and links the page they come from.
• No rankings. No star ratings, no “best locators” lists and no criticism of named companies. We name red flags by behavior, never by company, and describe patterns in public complaints without attributing them.
• A next step that helps whoever you hire. Each article ends with something useful with any locator, such as a checklist or a question to send before you pay.
• Legal topics cite the law itself. Legal explainers link the regulation or statute and carry a dated note: general information, not legal advice.

Every worked example uses the same house assumptions ($8 a sale, $1.80 cost of goods, a 40% venue share of net sales and a $100 monthly placement fee) unless the article says it is testing others, and each is labeled “an illustration, not a forecast”. Unless an article says otherwise, they treat the $1.80 as your whole cost per sale, before card fees. Where each input comes from is set out in our editorial standards, with the rest of the rules.

Who writes Fine Print

Articles carry the byline of one of two desks and are edited by Don Harrison, Editor of Fine Print. The desks are bylines rather than named reporters: AI tools assist research and drafting, and the editor checks each article against its sources before publication. Article photos are AI-generated and labeled as such.

• Editor: Don Harrison
• Fine Print Buyer’s Desk: How locator services work, what they cost, guarantees, red flags, questions to ask and real signed-location examples.
• Fine Print Contracts Desk: Contract clauses, fees, deposits, break-even math, refunds, the FTC Business Opportunity Rule and state laws.

Contact and corrections

To reach the editors, point out an error or ask for a correction, go to our contact page. When we correct an article, a dated note appears in a Corrections block at the end of it, as our editorial standards describe.