ARE CONSUMERS CUTTING DOWN ON SPENDING?

According to recently released figures by the Commerce Department in Washington, household purchases fell 0.1 percent in April. Once the figure was adjusted to account for inflation, the number looked even worse as it revealed spending had dropped by the biggest margin since September 2009.

Stephen Stanley, chief economist at Pierpoint Securities LLC, predicted this decline and stated “the risk at this point is that the consumer is falling back into a pattern of mediocre spending growth.” Stanley places the blame for the curbed spending on the fact that incomes have not risen to meet the increased cost of living.

What does this mean for the vending machine companies?
Unfortunately, whenever discretionary spending is hindered, the vending machine and other similar industries do feel the squeeze. There isn’t much that company owners can do, however, except wait on the economy to right itself, which will lead to consumers spending their extra money on candy bars and sodas once again.

The economy is always dipping and rising, seemingly at random. However, the vending machine business has held strong throughout all the turmoil and will indeed persevere through this latest downturn in spending.