Deciding whether to enter the food service business with a vending cart or food concession trailer can be a difficult choice.
During the course of a week I receive one similar question time and time again; "Should I start my business with a concession trailer or a vending cart?"
The answer to the question is subject to a lot of things, but at the end of the day, if this is someone's first venture into the food service industry then I usually recommend a vending cart.
For the individual who has little or no experience in the food service industry, a vending cart is a much easier and much more economical entry point than a concession trailer. Used vending carts can be purchased for as little as $3K and depending on the food service that the person wants to offer, little if any food cooking or preparation experience is required. Many vending carts are little more than freezers on wheels, offering ice cream, Italian ices and popsicles. Others are food warmers, offering hotdogs, pretzels and other hot, pre-prepared foods. The more complex carts are barbeques on wheels, allowing the operator to cook items to order such as hamburgers, sausages, hotdogs, and spareribs.
In recent years, vending cart franchises have started, offering the budding entrepreneur a supposedly proven methodology to a specific product. Along with the methodology comes training in everything from the item(s) to be sold to an education on finding venues and bookkeeping skills.
Robert Berman of mobilecateringbusiness.com
Using social media to promote your work and yourself can be a fantastic tool for an artist. However, timing is everything. The last thing you want when using these methods is to get everything posted perfectly, only for nobody to see it.
When it comes to close friends and family, your best bet is posting on the weekend when they have leisure time to spend reading involved posts and click on links you send their way. That's not who you market your art to, though, so let's talk about the perfect times to post on various social networking sites to reach new and returning fans. These times were pin-pointed by various research projects done over the span of the last decade to determine when most people use their social networking sites, and when they pay the most attention to new posts. Each site is a little different, since they try to target slightly-to-drastically different demographics.
If you think all you have to do is gather a few exhibits, buy some entertainment, advertise what is going to happen... and the folks will bang down your door!
Daily Deal sites like Groupon and Living Social have been around for a few years now. You've probably heard many arguments as to whether these programs are good for the independent food business owner. I admit that there are many pros and cons for using these and other types of coupon-ing or discount deal methods to attract customers to your business. I also think that the success or the benefit of using these programs depends on the preparation taken before you sign on.
