When I look back on the last couple of years of building a business and owning a food truck there are two words that describe it; intense and exciting. Frankly we never went into business light heartedly. We had years of restaurant and food service experience behind us, but there is nothing that could have prepared us for what owning a food truck in Chicago was. While working our full time restaurant jobs we spent days off building the truck and testing menu items. Finally, at long last we received our Mobile Vendor License from the city and we were ready to start selling. From that day on we would arrive at the kitchen at 6:00 am, make an educated guess on how much food we’d sell that day, wrap, label, load the truck and cross our fingers we could find legal parking. We knew that the daily operation wasn’t going to make us rich, but we hoped it could lead to a bigger future, namely a brick and mortar.
On the first day we hit the road we were ready to forget all the delays and consider that day to be the start of everything. However, lessons came quick when we realized that every day was a gamble. We knew the numbers we needed to turn a profit. Every day the choice had to be made, guarantee a sellout or be ambitious and risk wiping out a day’s profits by dumping unsold product. Was it going to rain or snow? Are we going to be able to find parking? Are the police going to ticket us for selling 195 instead of 200 feet from some unseen Corner Bakery or Chipotle’s back door? Was our generator going to fail and end our day early? This was just a start to uncontrollable variables associated with a Chicago food truck.
The idea of running a food truck was enticing but what we wanted more than anything was to make food we were proud of, the truck was simply an affordable entry point for us. The food truck movement hit Chicago like a culinary tsunami, bringing a change in the food scene that the city just wasn’t prepared for. From early 2010 to today we have seen no changes in the city’s plan, and over the last few months it became clear to us that the city had little intention of moving forward with a new ordinance. Part of the hold up can mostly be attributed to some claiming trucks have an unfair advantage. However every truck owner can tell that is not the truth. For example some of our expenses included a kitchen license, a mobile vendor license, truck insurance, business insurance, gas, paying for truck or equipment breakdowns, packaging, labels, and product. If you are lucky enough to have a kitchen of your own you pay rent, garbage, pest control, and a million other incidentals that everyone in the food service industry has to worry about. On the other side a major difference is that brick and mortar’s are not told what hours they can sell food and how far they have to be from anyone else serving food. When it became clear that the city had little intention to change the laws, we knew that it was time to move on.
Of all the good and bad with Chicago food trucks, the one thing that we could not accept was the quality of the food. Most people think that they are getting fresh food when they eat from a truck, but this is not always the case. Due to the fact that there is no cooking or preparation on trucks in the city we were limited in many ways. The food we served from the truck had to withstand sitting in a food warmer for hours at a time. Since we were not allowed to make any changes or modify an item, many times we ended up giving people an assortment of ramekins filled with condiments and other toppings with instructions with what goes with what. Of course all the extra containers added to the waste, increased food costs and changed the integrity of the food. In the end we realized that we could not be proud of selling disassembled, hours old food from a hot box to people.
We have met some amazing people during our brief stint and we will miss the comradery we had with our fellow truckers. I can say it was a not an easy decision, but for our own sanity and health we know that it is the right one, in the end this is business. We would like to say to all our fans and friends; we are not going away for good. Right now we have new prospects in the works and hope to return soon. Thank you again to everyone!
