Every food truck wants to be more profitable. After all, profit is how vendors typically keep score in business. It’s not about what you make; it’s about what you keep. There’s is plenty of money to be made in the mobile food industry but many vendors overlook simple changes that could lead to more money in their bottom line. Check out these 10 steps to make your food truck more profitable and stay that way for years to come.

10 Tips To Make Your Food Truck More Profitable

Know Your Operational Costs

Work closely with your food truck vendors to make sure you ordering the correct amount of food to eliminate waste and ensure cost effectiveness. You can reduce the ingredient costs of your most expensive menu items by offering a similar lower grade option when available.

By knowing the cost to produce every item on your menu, you will be able to pass savings on to the customer while maintaining or increasing your profits. Don’t forget to keep your books organized, forecast your sales realistically, and order appropriately for each day of the week.

Determine Your Role

Overworking yourself can easily turn that dream of owning a food truck into a nightmare. Make sure you hire staff that you can trust. Delegate the tasks that you don’t need to, or don’t want to do so you can concentrate on making your food truck profitable.

Hire Great Service Window Staff

First impressions are always important. Food trucks need to have great service window staff members that will introduce themselves to customers and welcome them to your truck. Take their orders quickly, answer questions and provide great service and thank them once they have received their orders. Your food truck customers deserve nothing but the best service.

Know Your Customers

Food truck vendors need to look at their main customer base. If you have something on the menu that is not selling, re-work the dish or remove it from the menu. Understanding your customer’s tastes can maximize revenue and turn the new customer into a repeat customer.

Create A Marketing Plan

Food trucks need to get customers in line and satisfied before you can build good word of mouth about your mobile food business. There are plenty of advertising options depending on your budget: TV, digital, print and radio are just a few.

RELATED: 5 Essential Pieces Of A Food Truck Marketing Plan

Build An Online Presence

If you don’t already have a website for your food truck, create one. Your website needs to be easy to find and contain your menu, schedule, and phone number. Social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter are popular among many different generations as a means of communication and information gathering. They’re also free. This is a great way for food truck owners to connect with customers through interaction and responses to reviews.

Offer Catering

This is a great way to make sure your food truck stays busy year round. Open up your food truck customers by offering catering for offices, wedding and other special events. Generate additional revenue by accessing this previously untapped market.

Train Your Staff On Product Knowledge

Weekly training sessions are a must and staff must be kept up on how you want your food served. Allow them to taste whatever the daily specials are and ensure that they can answer any customer’ questions about every menu item.

Offer Specials

Offer daily specials or try offering free or discounted items in return for writing reviews or filling out online surveys. It’s a great way to get new customers in line at your truck and as long as they have a great experience you can bet you’ll see them back in line.

Focus On Customer Satisfaction

The last f our tips to make your food truck more profitable  is that customer satisfaction has to be a food truck’s number one priority. If one of your customers leaves your truck feeling unsatisfied they may never come back and even worse they are likely to give you negative reviews with their friends and family. If you need to comp a meal, or offer a free item and a discount card for their next visit. Not only will this ensure a great experience but it will entice them to track your truck down again.

Do you have any additional tips for vendors who want to be more profitable? Share your thoughts on social media. Facebook | Twitter