Do you or anyone you know run a food trailer/concession? How do you/they like it? I know things vary greatly, but how lucrative can it be?
I’m considering starting an Authentic BBQ trailer to have for lunch and dinner services 1-3 times a week and then for events. I’ve filled a lot of the holes to this plan, but was wondering if anyone could share some firsthand information/thoughts.
Thanks.
When I was 17 my friends parents let them use the concession stand (“Mamma’s Munchies”) for an event one Memorial Weekend. I didn’t think we were that busy but working 7am-10pm for 3 days found us $6000 richer after about $1000 worth of gas and supplies at an event with about 1500-2000 people. I didn’t think that was a bad weekend at all.
Good Luck I hope it works out for you 
I have seen many of these in operation in Philadelphia and San Antonio. In Philly they were mostly chinese food and some Cheese steak ones. In San Antonio they were Breakfast Burritos. Just about everything other than the Tortias can be made ahead and kept warm or cold as needed. The oriental ones ran only on Propane but a generator would be nice for cooling and lights.
The ones that I ate at always had lines so I’m sure they made good money.
Depends how good your product is. The type of event your at. Weather etc. When it’s 90 degrees people tend to shy away from hot foods, 65 and they aren’t hitting the lemonade and ice cream stands. Helps to have a product that your can make some good profit off too. Ex. corn dog 40-70 cents….turn around and sell for $3 +. Higher end products can be a challenge. They may be good but most people aren’t willing to spend big money on something coming out of a trailer.
Deep fried EVERYTHING
The fella down at Everts a few years back was making good money on the weekends.
I doubt he was certified in food safety or had a license to serve food…or any other licenses I’m guessing.
He did brats and bbq chicken and I think he did a hog on his last day down there.
I don’t suggest getting smashed while running your concession.
Down in Loozy there’s a guy puts 1250 lbs of meat in a tanker like trailer with rotisserie and clears almost $8000 in about 3 hours. Cash biz no register no silly sales tax and probably little if any income tax. He looks like he might kill wild hogs so maybe no meat expense either. I buy racks of ribs for $15 cooked. This is off top of my head but it might have been more $$$ I watched kid stuffing bills in lockbox and got told to move. Oops.
My gut feeling is money to be made in jambalaya n gumbo everywhere.
Good Luck
Thanks for the info. Keep it coming…
I know that Food Trucks have become popular in downtown Minneapolis over lunch in the warmer months.
I’m pretty darn sure I’d visit a BBQ truck
I go to a lot of outdoor equipment shows (agriculture and construction) in my business and these things do VERY well. I’m sure there is a flat fee for the spot but it’s almost the same traffice from year to year so you know what you’re getting for potential customer base. In the summer you could prolby run a 3-4 state area (during the week!) and make some good cash!
Chris,
Just about all county fairs, state fairs, carnivals ect require you to apply to sell at their events. You can’t just show up. The reason is they want all the vendors to do well so they won’t let 5 mini donut guys in for example.
Best way to get in is find a unique food product that nobody else is doing.
Another consideration is who is going to work your stand? You can’t handle it all day by yourself even if you wanted to. If you don’t have trusted family working with you your help will be stealing from you. It’s just the way it is. It’s a 100% cash business with little to no inventory control until you get to the state fair level, then you are over regulated.
Last, a USED well equipped trailer will start at around $20,000 for a moderately equipped trailer if you can find one.
Good luck with the venture, let me know if I can help.
Dutch,
Lots of good information. I’ve been looking at some trailers that are all set up for BBQ (smoker included) in the 8-10K range. But, they are mostly down South. I’ve been on the fair/festival webpage that lists all local events and most of them have an online form to fill out to get the ball rolling. As for help, that is always a tough one. I do have two friends that want to help out with events. They are quality friends and fishin/huntin partners. I hope to begin this adventure on a semi-part-time basis. I hope to get things rolling for the summer of of 2014. Thanks for the ideas and information.
As some one mentioned above most events take either a percentage or flat rate to be there, some take both. I know the WI state fair takes 24% which is why vendors have there prices so inflated. Lumber jack days in Stillwater is a joke. I want to say it was around 2000 just to have a trailer there. That festival is drawing less and less every year and they don’t do a good job of regulating what is there. I think there was five differnet donut vendors and 3 or four cheese curds. (not the same owners with multiple trailers either.)
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Do you or anyone you know run a food trailer/concession? How do you/they like it? I know things vary greatly, but how lucrative can it be?
I’m considering starting an Authentic BBQ trailer to have for lunch and dinner services 1-3 times a week and then for events. I’ve filled a lot of the holes to this plan, but was wondering if anyone could share some firsthand information/thoughts.
Thanks.
I have a friend who tried it. Top of the line trailer and equip. Sweet set up. After one summer season they now have a very expensive yard ornament.
It costs a lot of cash to buy your way into an event just to sell. The food/supplies appear to be expensive.
With all that being said anytime we have a personal party it is extremely well covered as far as food. My favorite is the Gyro’s they make. That Gyro machine is sweet.
Chris, there will always be the people that say it can’t be done but I say follow your dream.
I like the little roadside ones… that just pop up here and there I can’t pass the little older pink trailer, that sits in Isle by Pat’s, on busier weekends in the summer. A nice lady runs it, she makes mini donuts and I always get a snowcone too 
Who else is guilty of pullin’ in ??? 
There was a fellow who pulled his out onto Red Lake and parked it at a road intersection. He appeared to be very busy. Even selling ice cream.
I always thought that would be a good idea on Mille Lacs as well.
there’s a guy I know who cut his BBQ business at the pout fest in Walker, right out on the lake. Check out House of Q, went from trailer (a nice one) to his own restaurant to keep open year round.
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Chris, there will always be the people that say it can’t be done but I say follow your dream.
I don’t think anybody told him not to do it. He asked for opinions and got them, now it’s up to him to figure it out.
I have nothing against dreams……..but they can easily turn into a nightmare.
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Chris, there will always be the people that say it can’t be done but I say follow your dream.
I will say that virtually everyone has been supportive. Maybe it’s all the free ‘Que I’ve had them taste.
I used to sell smoked pork and turkey legs at music festivals. also did hog roasts for banquets, weddings, graduations, e.t.c. If you have a good product you can stay as busy as you want. Find yourself a small cafe who will let you use their kitchen for your licensed food prep area. it will save trouble in the end. We set up our own trailer for a lot less money than you can buy one. If you go with the BBQ have some easy side dishes like cole slaw, chips, pickles e.t.c then you can charge for a meal instead of a sandwich without adding a lot of cost. seet corn in season is easy to do and is wildly popular. if you want to ask some questions send me a pm Good luck!
Jeremys and others. How much work/time is involved? Are you finding that you are working all the time and not playing enough? Could you hire a chef/employees to run it for you while you play?
I had no idea what I needed when i started my mini donuts trailer. I bought my trailer from Cottage Concessions a couple years ago. They pretty much told me all I needed to know and were a great resource for information. I was going to sell other things and they turned me on to the mini donuts idea. I like this because it’s just mix and water, and everyone loves fresh donuts. They added a fan to blow the smell out : ). really light weight. I could tow it out on the ice with my sled easily. maybe I’d do some combo work/fishing trips : )
I could be a field taster
Find yourself a small cafe who will let you use their kitchen for your licensed food prep area. it will save trouble in the end.
This is an excellent point and something you should look into before you get too far down the line – you likely cannot do your prep for your commercial business in your personal kitchen without licenses and inspections.
I know the food trucks here in the Cities either use a brick and mortar restaurant or they lease time and fridge/freezer space at one of a number of shareable kitchens.
http://www.mda.state.mn.us/food/business/processedfoods/sharedkitchens.aspx
Hope this helps, good luck if you decide to dive in!
Remember that this post is 4 years old.
DT
Remember that this post is 4 years old.
DT
No one ever checks the date!
So cpetey did you ever get a truck?
I know a guy that worked a trailer for a retired couple. They pay college kids to work the trailer for them. They serve at 12 hand picked events a year. They also paid their help VERY well ($200-300 a day?) and claimed to pocket well over 100k after expenses. They only worked a few month out of the year and the rest was play time. Sounds like a good way to make a living to me!
Ha, 5 years old! Saw the Feb 14 time stamp, didn’t even notice the 2012 next to it…
Chris,
I’m an avid barbecue guy, less so now though that I try to spend every possible minute on the water fishing, and have competed in several bbq competitions along the way. I’ve looked at this concession type business model several times so I’ll just throw some stuff out there for you to consider. Hopefully give you some more information to think about and at the end a slightly different scenario to think about that could be more profitable and more of a known quantity.
Not sure if you are looking at this in Minnesota or Wisconsin; possibly both, in my opinion the number of hoops you have to jump through to sell bbq; to the general public, in the State of Minnesota is borderline ridiculous. I grew up in Kansas, where it’s common to see pit masters (guys with actual wood burning cookers) set up on the side of the road or in a parking lot. Selling right off the pit. None of this NSF rated cooker junk. So I just can’t fathom the amount of regulation up here. Also in Kansas I can fish with two rods and pay for a third, but let’s not go there! Other than those two things and the lack of blue catfish, I really love Minnesota.
If your going to do it right and have authentic, drool dripping down your chin bbq, it is best finished just prior to serving, resting several hours is fine too. None of this cook it on the weekend and re-heat it stuff. That opens up an issue with running a bbq concession business: waste factor. How will you know the amount to cook? With a fryer type of business you can batter up a corn dog and drop it in the hot oil. Short time later you have the product. You can’t do that with bbq. Some guys cook butts and briskets for 18-24 hours, I’m more of a hot and fast 6-8 hour guy myself. But even that requires a whole lot more work than a fryer business.
There is a different regard for bbq up here, it isn’t as passionately sought after. That’s hard for you and I to see because we love the bbq world, but I promise you that it is absolutely true. There are less people that appreciate great bbq, that’s not to say you won’t find some. I’ll relate it to walleye or catfish fishing. I’m from Kansas, I’m relatively new to walleye fishing and I do find it enjoyable but I’d pick a cat fishing trip 9 times out of 10 compared to a walleye trip.
Price, piggybacking on the previous thought that bbq isn’t as widely craved up here, leads to people not valuing your product as much as it should be. It is a ton of work to produce high quality bbq, very few people truly understand that. I can assure you that there is a whole lot more margin in funnel cakes and shaved ice than there is in bbq. You simply can’t ask for the same type of margins (and not even close) even though you are doing 100 times more work. If it was easy and fully valued, they’d be serving pulled pork sandwiches at movie theaters instead of popcorn.
Make sure you have killer sides, they can make or break your first impression. It took me at least 20 attempts to fine tune my smoked mac and cheese recipe. Don’t trust your friends and family when it comes to taste, setup a blind taste test with people that don’t know you and give them a form to fill out and evaluate your food. I’ve seen a guy win some money from an event (not bbq) and open up a bbq joint (used loosely in this state) because his friends and family said his food was good, to brutally honest, it was terrible. He didn’t last long.
Since your probably going to need to cook at night to have bbq ready for a lunch service, take 3-4 days off of work and try to create the schedule you’ll need to follow to make it work. See if your still having fun at the end of 3-4 days in a row of cooking bbq, when days can easily be 16+ hours.
And now for the alternative: have you considered private catering? This is an arena you can start to dive into a little at a time, you don’t have to have the NSF rated cooker, you can get around a lot of the “special” requirements in place needed to serve to the general public. Private catering is essentially cooking for any event that is not open to public walk-ups: wedding, retirement parties, work functions, birthday parties, graduations, etc…
I’ve done this a couple times and it’s still a whole lot of work, but you know how much you need to cook in advance, you know how much your costs are going to be, you know how much you are going to make. For bbq it usually ends up being buffet type service which is much simpler and requires fewer helpers. And finally, it’s pretty easy to build a book of business just off of word of mouth if your food is good. I do these mostly for close friends and family; because I don’t want another job, but in all cases it’s pretty common to hear: this is the best bbq I’ve ever had and do you have a business card. Afterwards, I’ve received calls from guests at the event wanting to book an event and I didn’t give out my number, they had to have requested it from the event host.
I’m very passionate about bbq, but what I’ve found after cooking each of those bigger private catering events is that if I had to it all the time, it would take something that I love to do and turn it into a job.
None of this is meant to scare you, just wanted to pass on the hundreds of hours of research and real life experience I have into the topic!
Ryan
Should have looked at the date first!
Top notch post, Ryan. I’ve been plugging holes in this plan for years. I was moments away from purchasing a trailer from Indiana this summer. Then we nearly lost my mom. The chef was working directly with our county inspector and was willing to make it meet WI code. Long story short, I’m holding off. I continue to do parties and private catering. I do it for fun and people seem to pay me well. I still consider it a hobby, but continue to tweak the adventure to set myself up for the future.
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