Office Staff Split Their Week Between Two Buildings: Avoid Counting Them Twice
A team works in one office on Monday and another on Tuesday. If both buildings include the full team in their vending demand estimates, the combined proposal can overstate the customer base. Plan around attendance at each location and time, not the sum of two staff lists that contain the same people.
This does not mean the second building has no need for vending. It means each location needs an honest account of who can use the service and when. The relevant question is how demand is distributed, including busy shared days, rather than how impressive the total headcount appears.
Build a simple location-by-day picture
Use aggregate attendance information already available for workplace planning. Separate regular occupants, rotating staff and visitors without collecting unnecessary personal detail. Record whether figures are actual observations, booked attendance or estimates. A desk booking is a useful planning input, but it is not proof that the person attended or bought a snack.
For each building, identify the normal busy and quiet periods. Include teams arriving for meetings and staff who spend only part of the day there. If somebody visits both buildings on one day, avoid treating that as two full-day customers. The estimate should describe the opportunity to use each machine, not count every doorway crossing as a separate buyer.
Distinguish capacity needs from weekly totals
A weekly total can hide a concentrated Tuesday gathering or a very quiet Friday. Discuss the peak period as well as average attendance with the supplier. A small number of busy breaks may influence refill timing, while sustained demand across the week may support a different range or service pattern.
Consider a hypothetical team of forty people alternating between two buildings. That is not automatically eighty distinct staff customers. Nor does it establish forty daily purchases at either site. Explain the rotation, existing refreshment choices and access hours when discussing office vending options, so that the proposal can be assessed against the real pattern.
Keep the two sites' observations separate
During an initial review period, record availability and sales for each location on comparable dates. Note unusual meetings, closures or changes in the rota. Do not combine the results too early: strong performance in one building can conceal persistent shortages or weak demand in the other.
If staff can choose between both machines, ask whether differences in range or access are influencing that choice. A product moving slowly in one location may be purchased elsewhere rather than unwanted altogether. Treat this as a question to investigate through feedback and records, not a conclusion that follows from headcount alone.
Agree how changes reach the operator
Nominate a workplace contact to communicate planned rotation changes, particularly when a department changes its usual building. Give reasonable notice through the agreed service process. Avoid expecting the operator to infer a new attendance pattern from a short run of sales, especially where other events occurred at the same time.
Review the service after the pattern has had time to settle. Adjustments may concern the product mix, refill schedule or proposed capacity, depending on the actual arrangement. Keep the evidence and assumptions attached to each site’s decision so that a later manager does not return to the misleading combined headcount when planning the next change.
Related guidance: Office Shift Overlap: Count Who Uses Vending at the Same Time.
For help assessing your site, contact Vending-Machines.ie.
