Inspection grades for restaurants in New York. If you live in states like California or New York, you're familiar with seeing a letter grade posted clearly outside of a restaurant. These letter grades are intended to give consumers confidence that they are eating at an establishment that maintains a clean and healthy kitchen. But are these ratings good for mobile food units as well? Within the state of California there are three letter grades that can be assigned to a restaurant by a health inspector two times per year: Rating A - This means the restaurant is safe to [...]

Gluten Free is Becoming a More Popular Dietary Lifestyle. According to this report from HealthDay, the number of Americans eating a gluten-free diet has tripled over the last 5 years. This adds up to 2.7 million people that are estimated to consume the diet that cite overall health and digestive reasons for their choice. With so many people choosing this lifestyle should your food truck adapt to meet this growing demand? Or is this simply a flavor of the month diet that will be quickly forgotten in a few months? We explore this topic in greater detail within [...]

Built by M&R Specialty Trailers and Trucks. Recently SmallFoodBiz.com published survey results from 154 food truck entrepreneurs operating their businesses across the United States and Canada. Although the results of this sample are a small percentage of the likely 15,000 - 20,000 vendors that operate in the United States alone, the results of this survey match much of what we have observed anecdotally helping hundreds of mobile businesses get their start at M&R Specialty Trailers and Trucks. Although the results of this survey align with our observations, some of the results contradict what you may have read about [...]

An infographic is a visual illustration of something that is complex. These images can help take something that is complicated like running a business and simply it into something that is easily understood. In 2017 there have been numerous of these infographics published that help better explain a variety aspects of the food truck business and operations. As the popularity of mobile food has continued to grow in recent years numerous organizations have designed infographics that dive deep into different aspects of running this type of business like marketing, history of food trucks, and overviews of the industry as a [...]

Over the past few years, you may have read stories like this Wall Street Journal article about the ongoing battle between food trucks and restaurateurs. The basic premise of the hundreds of stories written over the past half decade is typically the same: Restaurant owners want to restrict the number of food trucks in the area and to prevent competition. Food truck owners, on the other hand, want less restrictive laws that will allow them to vend when and where they want. While this animosity between restaurants and food trucks may have been the case a few years ago, this [...]

Jae Kim, owner and founder of the Austin-based Chi'Lantro, didn't make it into ABC's hit investment show “Shark Tank” on his first two attempts to be on the show. Kim’s concept was to launch a Korean BBQ inspired restaurant chain that had the potential to generate millions in revenue each year. But on Kim’s first attempt to be featured on the investment show, Chi’Lantro was just an idea without a proven track record of sales. Instead of getting discouraged by not getting on the show, Kim started to put his concept into action by buying a food truck because he [...]

Laurel Hague, owner of The Ugly Apple Cafe based out of Madison, Wisconsin, works with local farmers to minimize waste by using overstock produce to help the cities less fortunate. We had the opportunity to speak with Laurel about her business and the long-term vision of The Ugly Apple Cafe. M&R: Tell us about the Ugly Apple and your goals. Laurel: The Ugly Apple is a food cart that serves breakfast in downtown Madison.  Madison has strict size restrictions for mobile food, so it's a 6ft by 9ft trailer that is designed to look like an apple crate. It's a [...]

How many food trucks are currently operating in the United States? According to a 2015 report from IBISWorld, a leading industry research agency, that number is less than 5,000 (4,130 food truck vendors to be exact per the report). The number of active food truck businesses operating in the United States has been a topic of much debate over the past few years. Adding to the confusion of an agreed upon accurate estimated number of food trucks are the varying media reports. Some of the most cited reports have been inconsistent while others rendered completely inaccurate when a bit of [...]

According to a report in The Daily City, Orange County, Florida has adopted new zoning ordinances that impact food trucks. The new laws adopted on September, 13th 2016 prohibit vendors from operating past midnight. The new laws also prohibit music and customer seating for food trucks as well. Food Truck Curfews Nationwide Unfortunately,  food truck curfews are not exclusive to Orange County, Florida. This action has been taken in other locations across the country as well. Here are a few examples of cities or counties where food trucks are restricted to serve past a certain hour: Des Moines, Iowa – [...]

Photo Credit: Progressive Grocer The concept of a grocerant is the new and innovative term being used around grocery store circles. Care2.com defines grocerant as a new term for grocery stores that includes restaurant and ready made foods. Forbes even called these budding institutions "the future of food shopping" in a recent article. Of course restaurants within restaurants or department stores is nothing new. Retailers like Kmart or Target have had in-store cafe's that sell everything from slushies to hot dogs and pizza for decades now. What makes this movement different is the penetration into traditional grocery stores [...]