On the 29th anniversary of The Pelican Group’s founding (April 20), Jason Scherer was promoted to president of the company he grew up in. His father Richard, who recently celebrated 50 years in the industry, will stay on as CEO.
“Jason worked for me at Oakland Vending when he was a teenager, shopping games and cigarette machines,” Richard said. The younger Scherer then went off to college as Richard started Pelican in 1993. By 1995, Jason took over the company’s pay telephone division with his brother Casey.
“Then, Pelican evolved into a vending and amusement management company and Jason helped me as we expanded rapidly. Between ’94 and ’98, Pelican took over management of more than 500 Costco Wholesale locations for both employee and public vending.”
Over the years, The Pelican Group diversified by operating jukeboxes, growing that part of the business to more than 600 digital jukes before selling the route in 2016.
Today, Pelican manages 72 national accounts and 65,000 pieces of equipment in over 20,000 locations across the U.S., Canada and Puerto Rico.
“We are still a close-knit family business with all of the stock owned by the Scherer boys,” Richard reported. “We currently have 15 employees and gross sales of $25 million.” Learn more at www.pelicangroup.com.
