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You are a Facilities Manager and you have been tasked with finding new coffee equipment, which will be used by your staff and your clients. The machine has to be easy to use, but needs to reflect positively on your company. What do you do? You search Google for “office coffee equipment uk” and get 1,920,000 results. Now what? Here is what you do. Firstly, you must thoroughly investigate the type of equipment you want. There a number of key decisions you need to think about. Here are just a few:
- the number of people using the machine?
- during what hours?
- are there peak times or is there a steady flow of drinks required?
- what drinks/products do you want?
- will you the company pay for these drinks or will your staff?
- where is the machine to be located?
- are the correct water and electric supplies nearby?
- do you want a new or used machine?
- how are you going to pay for it?
- what about maintenance, service and hygiene issues?
After properly investigating the type of machine you want, you now need to decide on a coffee equipment supplier. A significant consideration is whether you prefer to deal with large or small organisations. Do you want a friendly, flexible and personal touch or do you prefer to have the security and kudos that dealing with larger organisations brings?
A good coffee equipment supplier is one that will spend time with you listening to your requirements and not forcing you into the only machine they have to offer. Therefore, a company that has the ability to offer a range of different designs and manufacturers at a number of different price points is a good start.
At this point, you need to narrow down you search. Decide on 6 or so coffee equipment suppliers and take a look at their websites. Can you find the information you want easily, is their website easy to navigate round, do they offer the sort of coffee equipment you now need.
Finally, call three of your short listed suppliers on the phone and have a chat with them. See what sort of reaction you get on the telephone; do you like their manner, the way they dealt with your call? Ask them to send you some information about themselves, ie, services they offer, what they stand for etc, along with information and a quote on the type of coffee equipment you are looking for.
Once you have all the information from all three companies in front of you, you are ready to decide.
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