Hari Shotham's shop is open 24 hours yet he doesn’t employ even a single store worker or a manager.
He thinks he's found the future of Australian retail shopping at his small St Kilda shop in Melbourne where he has 13 vending machines.
He believes that’s the future- vending machines.
He stocks a variety of products: vitamins, perfumes, mobile phone accessories, bandages, medicine, Coca-Cola, etc.
With no theft of products and no cost on account of salaries of employees, Hari is able to keep his overheads to the bare minimum which help him sell products at a much lower price than his competitors.
"The highest problem in pharmacies is everything has to be under lock and key. Theft is a massive problem. In a vending machine you cannot steal," He told.
So much so that he doesn’t even have to come to his store most days and just monitors the activity from home via the store's CCTV on his mobile phone.
Hari Shotham's shop in St Kilda. Source: Facebook
He claims his is Australia’s first vending-machine-only shop.
Hari says each of his machines is turning over $1000 a week and the target is now of 20 machines we to make $20,000.
"Surprisingly, the numbers have been amazing. We haven't even got a proper sign out," he says.
His biggest sellers at the shop ‘Vitamin Warehouse’ are perfume for young women.
But Hari feels that once he has more products he might need a name change.
Hari has worked with Chemist Warehouse and has 40-years’ experience in retail business.
He has also worked in Hong Kong where he learnt the potential for vending-machine retail business.
The original plan, says Hari, was to buy vending machines, fill them up and install them at local shopping centres.
But centre management was unwilling to allow his vending machines.
He then decided to scout for a shop and found one in St Kilda.
Now time will tell if Hari’s business strategy would work but he is confident that this venture is the start of something huge in Australia.
