Whether you’re just learning how to start a food truck or you’re already a pro with an established fleet of trucks, a business plan is essential to your long-term success. We show you how to write one in the latest lesson of “How to Start a Food Truck.”
On today’s episode of FoodTruckr School, I’m happy to welcome Matt Finkenbiner from the Minnesota Department of Health. Matt is here to help us understand more about the process of health codes and inspections and requirements for your truck – because before you can get your truck on the street to sell your food, you [...]
This week’s inspiration comes from an unexpected location: my neighborhood’s 90-year-old candy shop. I was intrigued—and impressed—to see an iPad Mini sitting on the counter. The iPad is part of the Belly program, a customer loyalty card/app/email list program that’s popping up around my metro area. Each time I shop, I scan my the barcode [...]
Wondering where to find a commercial kitchen space to store your famous steak burrito fixins and to prep your salsa verde? Learn about the most common types of commissaries for food trucks in the latest lesson of “How to Start a Food Truck.”
In this episode of FoodTruckr School, we’re very excited to welcome Jessica and Liza from Bowled and Beautiful, a food truck you may recognize from Season 4 of The Great Food Truck Race! Jessica and Liza went home early from the competition, but after the show they couldn’t imagine life without a food truck any [...]
Real food truck owners know that parking matters above all else. Ready to find that prime spot that will really boost your sales? FoodTruckr’s got the dish.
Running a food truck is an inherently creative endeavor, from the crafting of the recipes, to creating a visual brand for the truck, and especially to conjuring money for truck repairs out of thin air. Creativity, as we’ve all experienced from time to time, can be exhausting. We spin our creative wheels, but like a [...]
If you’ve made it this far in the series, we know you’re serious about learning how to start a food truck. So starting today, we’re moving on to a new unit of your food truck journey that’s crammed full of serious information, know-how, and advice to start your business off on the right, uh, wheel.
At FoodTruckr, our passion and purpose is to support your food truck business—whether you’re just getting started or you’ve been in operation for a decade. We do that by providing you with insights and resources to support your planning, marketing, and day-to-day needs. In order to better serve you and support this industry we care [...]
In this episode of FoodTruckr School, we chat with Brett Chiavari from BC Tacos, one of the most popular food trucks to reign South Florida! He’s also recently opened up a brick and mortar restaurant of the same name, and we get the insider scoop on how and why that happened, and how he’s able to [...]
On Wednesday in the “How to Start a Food Truck” series, we wrote about the importance of quality ingredients. As a customer, I wholeheartedly second that. I’m sure that as a business owner, you constantly feel the tension of ingredient prices. Do I buy the cheap grocery store-quality tomatoes, or do I buy the fresh-from-the-local [...]
This episode of FoodTruckr School is a bit different—Pat’s not here, so the team at FoodTruckr HQ took over! Matt Gartland, Nicole Farley, Jonathan Wondrusch, and Mindy Holahan held a roundtable discussion just for you where we shared insights on everything from developing customer relationships to the origin story behind the FoodTruckr brand.
Your unique selling proposition (USP)—or the concept that you come up with for your truck—is one of the key ingredients in your recipe to successful food truck ownership. You’ll be working with the USP and refining it a lot over the next several months, but for now, it’s simply important to come up with a solid idea with a supporting plan that’s as detailed as possible. So grab your favorite note-taking device and start those brain engines—we’re about to do some serious thinking!
I’ve been giving this question a lot of thought in the last nine months, since Pat first told us about his plans to start FoodTruckr. What is it, really, that makes food trucks so special? It’s food…from a truck. When you break a food truck down to its components, it doesn’t sound that special. In [...]
Are you the kind of person who sets resolutions each year? I am, from something as simple as choosing a guiding phrase for the year (2009: “Listen more, talk less”) or as elaborate as building a twelve month happiness project (2014). Whether I ultimately stick to my resolutions or not, I gain a lot of [...]
In this episode of FoodTruckr School, we talk with Matt Berkland from Truckily about best practices and tips for sharing your location on social media. How often do you share your location? How much time do you give your customers to locate you? What do you include in a tweet versus what do you share on [...]
If you’re used to parking in busy areas and getting a fair amount of walk-up traffic, you might not think you really need to worry about broadcasting your truck’s location. But here’s a little secret: Every food truck can benefit from sending out location updates. That’s right—every single one.
Winter is a tough time of year for a food truck fan living in the colder regions of the country. As I mentioned last time, I live in the Twin Cities. Today it’s a balmy 11 degrees, but yesterday dropped down to -8, and all my favorite food trucks have parked themselves for the season [...]
‘Tis the season of giving—did you remember to add your food truck to your gift list this year? With temperatures dropping and snow starting to fall, your food truck deserves a little extra special something. Before you head out on the road to meet your legions of hungry fans, make sure your food truck is in tip-top shape with these nine important winterization precautions.
In this third episode of FoodTruckr School, I don’t have a guest on the show with us this time around, however I pose a very important question to all food truck owners out there: Why aren’t you asking your customers for their email addresses? The only logical answer here is that you just don’t know [...]
As people cut their budgets in order to save more money for tree-trimming and gift-giving, it can be tough for food truck owners and other personal service providers to attract fans who may be reluctant to spend money on themselves. Fortunately, FoodTruckr has the scoop on six seasonal strategies your food truck can use to delight fans all throughout December.
What’s your guilty pleasure? Mine’s a grilled cheese sandwich: bread grilled until it’s dark and crunchy, cheese that’s impossibly melty, a bit of melted butter on my fingers. As a child, the grilled cheese sandwich was my mom’s go-to meal when she needed me to just sit still for a few minutes; and now as [...]
Mobile payment processors give your truck freedom—allowing you to attract customers who would walk on by if you only accepted cash, while also making it easier for you to manage credit and debit transactions. Of course, payment processors aren’t all knights in shining armor. They’re still businesses in their own rights that strive for profit, which means that you need to understand your options.
In this second episode of FoodTruckr School, we chat with Chris Adams from Rocketman Creative, a branding expert and strategist who helps food trucks new and old establish their identity and focus or re-focus their branding efforts for maximum impact. It’s so much more than just designing a cool logo – there’s an entire culture [...]
We all learned at an early age not to judge a book by its cover, right? That’s bad advice when it comes to brands. On a daily basis, customers are bombarded with advertisements and challenged to make quick decisions. In a split second, a hungry fella walking past your truck is going to decide whether or not to eat your tantalizing sandwich—and the power of your brand will influence his decision.