Food truck vendors have a lot of marketing freedom. This freedom allows them to engage in various guerrilla marketing campaigns. These are usually cheap and imaginative promotions for their mobile food businesses. Part of guerrilla marketing is creating unusual events to attract attention to your truck. Today we’ll discuss the use of publicity stunts as a marketing tool for your food truck.

Publicity Stunts For Food Truck Vendors

A cleverly planned publicity stunt can work miracles for your food truck businesses. For a publicity stunt to be effective, it must preserve your core message within it. Brainstorm an innovative idea that will draw customers to your truck and at the same time get your truck some free local press.

Examples For Food Truck Vendors

• If you sell burgers from your truck, you can hold an event to break the record for the largest burger in your state.
• Hold hold a fundraiser to raise money for a cause that’s important to you. Publicity stunts with a charity bent tend to gain serious momentum, because the event has a newsworthy angle.
• Hold a cook-off for your customers and promise to feature the winning recipe on your menu.
• Create your own day. 7-Eleven created their own holiday called, “Bring Your Own Cup (BYOC) Day.” Customers could bring any size cup to a store and could fill it for only $1.50. Right off the bat, people began questioning the definition of “cup,” and the rest is history.

Chuck E. Cheese Food Truck Publicity Stunt

Amidst an abundance of fun, games and entertainment, Chuck E. Cheese’s guests often discount its menu. They hit the streets of New York City in an unmarked food truck, video in hand.

Appropriately released on National Cheese Lover’s Day, the video they created shows Chef Casale and his crew sampling pizza on the streets of Manhattan and captures New Yorkers’ surprise and delight when they discover the great-tasting pizza was actually made by Chuck E. Cheese’s. Unsuspecting New Yorkers were wowed by two recipes from the brand’s enhanced menu, launched in 2015.

The brand put its pizza in the spotlight, and now more New Yorkers than ever are heading to their local Chuck E. Cheese’s for a piece of the pie.

Once Your Setup Your Stunt

Contact your local media outlets such as television and radio stations and newspapers to announce your event. Whatever stunt you choose, make sure it lasts for several days so that there is time for word to get around whether through word of mouth or media. Additionally, it’s even better if this stunt is coupled with a promotion. Give customers some value.

Finally, make sure to do it right. Creating curiosity goes only so far as these stunts should match your brand and not disappoint customers.

RELATED: Guerrilla Marketing Basics For Food Truck Vendors

The Bottom Line

A strong marketing stunt can be a valuable tool for any company. Great publicity stunts aren’t just for big businesses with bottomless pockets.  Although they typically get the lion’s share of publicity for their outrageous antics, food trucks can use some of these same stunts to make an impression in their local area and generate more business than they can handle.

It may seem impossible to pull off a cool publicity stunt as a food truck owner, but the sky’s the limit. Take some of these ideas and apply them to your business, then let us know what you did.

Have you run any marketing publicity stunts for your food truck? Share your examples in the comment section or on social media. Facebook | Twitter