In the food truck business, it's not how much money you make, but how much income you get to keep after expenses that really matters. In today's post, we take a look at three different food truck concepts that are designed for profitability due to the high-margins of their product and strong demand no matter where you live in the country. There are a number of expenses that you can't get around when operating a food truck. You need a truck and cooking equipment obviously. But there's also expenses like health permits, insurance, gas, and monthly cell phone payments that [...]

An elevator pitch is a brief statement that explains the service your business provides and creates a desire for others to want to learn more about your business. Many folks think a formal pitch is only needed if you are a salesman by trade, but this couldn't be further from the truth. If you own a food truck or catering business, you need to be able to communicate what your business does and is all about. In fact, your ability to communicate effectively could be the difference between thriving and just getting by in your business. This is really important [...]

Writing a well-thought business plan is one of the most important actions you can take to set your mobile food business up for success. Best of all... It costs you absolutely nothing to complete and forces you to answer important questions about your future business. Big questions like: Where will I vend?, What will my expenses be? And who your competitors are? In today's post, we've provided a real-life example of a business plan for a shaved ice truck. Why? Because sometimes it's better to have an example of a business plan so that you can see how this concept [...]

Fire Safety Licensing You will undoubtedly come across fire safety regulations. Unfortunately, food trucks can be perceived as mobile bombs, especially public perception. Assuming you have a food truck that's been built with the correct safeguards in place this is an exageration. But with that said, it is important to take safety seriously. This is your business and livelihood. There have also been some recent examples like this news report of a food truck exploding that highlights the responsibility food truck owners and manufacturers share for public safety.  There are a lot of potential fire safety issues on board a [...]

Health Permits When I think of health inspections, I am reminded of an episode of the sitcom Friends. In this particular episode, Phoebe started dating a health inspector. The two would go on dates to restaurants and he would find health code violations and shut down those restaurants on the spot. Eventually, she became frustrated with his power, because he had closed all of her favorite restaurants. Needless to say it didn’t end well for those two. Hollywood is known to exaggerate the truth, and that is most certainly the case here. In actuality, your local health department is there [...]

Just beginning getting together your initial ideas for the type of food concept you want? When putting together your vision for your food truck or concession business there are a lot of things to consider. As you build your knowledge, you’ll come to learn that there is even more! But for now let’s just focus on what we know. Chances are, you’ve thought a little bit about what type of food you’d like to have. So start making some of your ideas concrete and putting them down on paper. The questions listed below can be used to help trigger the [...]

How does one make income projections for a concession business? We recommend thinking about your food cost as a percent of the menu price. In your income projections, you can use this percentage to calculate your food cost for that month. Let’s say you are projecting to make $8,000 a month with a one item menu. You charge $8 for that menu item, and your food cost is 25% of the price: $8000 total sales for month * .25 = $2000 total food cost In an Income Projections template spreadsheet, there are a few fillable sections that allow you to account [...]

The quick answer is "yes!" The big questions are "should you?" and "do you want to?" Brand sustainability, time and capital investment to franchise your concept are big factors in making the decision. Is your food truck business successful and running like a well oiled machine? If you have success with regular vending locations, a solid event and catering history, expansion may be the next profitable step. Franchising may catch your attention as a way of increasing your income streams from one truck to two with less effort and expense. Franchising eliminates the day to day operational responsibilities of additional [...]