In our quest to keep our readers up to date with the latest stories relating to the food truck industry has compiled a list of the stories that hit the wire this long Memorial Day weekend from Minneapolis, Dallas, Los Angeles, Boston, New Orleans, St. Catharines, Kalamazoo, and Kansas City.
May 25
Food Truck Operators Set Up Permanent Restaurants – Minneapolis, MN – Offering a lower barrier to entry, food trucks have allowed local entrepreneurs to test-drive their food concepts—but there’s a growing trend of trucks expanding their brands to permanent restaurants.
Food trucks offer the allure of lower up-front costs and overhead compared to permanent restaurants. But some local truck operators, hungry for year-round profits, are driving their businesses to brick-and-mortar eateries.
Find the entire article <here>
Food truck craze sparks Dallas-Fort Worth real estate opportunity – Dallas, TX – Charlie Flores III, his wife and their five children were coming back to Dallas-Fort Worth from a road trip in southern Texas when the family decided to stop in Austin and taste some cupcakes a relative had been raving about.
The cupcakery sat on wheels at a food truck park off South Congress Avenue in Austin, and it was that park that fueled the Flores family’s decision to turn its half-acre used-car lot into a food truck park of its own.
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May 26
Mexican street food in Los Angeles – Los Angeles, CA – Thomasina Miers stands on a sunny petrol station forecourt in Highland Park, a neighbourhood to the northeast of Los Angeles, enthusiastically eating a marinated beef-tongue taco. “It’s so delicious,” she says through a mouthful of corn tortilla, coriander and tomatillo salsa.
This low-rise residential area, an hour and a world away from the Walk of Fame, bristles with signs for cheap loans and fast food. It is not on any tourist map. Star-tour buses don’t pull up round here. But rather than celebrities, we’re looking for Mexican street-food trucks, picking out their vivid orange, blue and pink awnings or distinctive fin-shaped roof vents from among the stucco-covered houses, corner shops and drive-throughs. At the La Estrella and El Pique trucks, we found what we crave. We order more tacos, a beef torta (sandwich) and a buttery hot quesadilla and wolf them as the traffic whizzes past, juices running down our chins.
Find the entire article <here>
What Boston’s food truck mania sounds like – Boston, MA – Remember how, in cartoons like Tom and Jerry, you could actually see a good smell? It looked like smoke, undulating through the air as it found the nose. That’s how I imagine the aromas emanating from Boston’s many food trucks these days. It’s a veritable craze: The city, along with the Greenway folks, has added a bunch of new food truck locations this spring. Good thing. At lunchtime, hungry workers from downtown office buildings prowl the streets for sustenance.
Find the entire article <here>
May 27
New Orleans food truck operators to form nonprofit association – NEW ORLEANS, LA — Some food-truck operators in New Orleans say they plan to form a nonprofit association in hope of convincing officials to ease some of the rules they work under.
They’re hoping to increase the number of permits, expand operating hours and extending the time a truck can stay in one spot, The Times-Picayune reported.
Find the entire article <here>
Movement to allow more food trucks gathers steam – St. Catharines, Canada – The wheels are in motion to liberalize City of St. Catharines rules and let more food trucks ply their trade.
On Monday, a public meeting will be held during a St. Catharines city council session, in which Coun. Mat Siscoe will suggest council bump up the allowable licences to six from four downtown.
Find the entire article <here>
May 28
Food truck ordinance in the works for city of Kalamazoo – Kalamazoo, MI – Matt Askelson is a line cook by trade who spends his free time tearing apart a 1980 Grumman Step Van, complete with leaky roof and rotting wood.
The old festival truck spent the last two years sitting in the woods, but Askelson has visions of putting it on the road, quitting his job as a line cook at Oakwood Bistro, and making a living for his family by cooking upscale American street food.
Find the entire article <here>
Start-ups have to get creative to find financing – Kanas City,KS – Two foodies had an idea they wanted to try in Kansas City: an upscale food truck specializing in gourmet meatballs.
They had restaurant experience but had barely made more than minimum wage. Their savings were zilch, and they had no real credit history. Not only that, upscale food trucks are just starting to take off in Kansas City, so there is no track record on how the operations would do locally.
Find the entire article <here>