I'm considering attempting a made-to-order donut food truck. I would make a bunch of dough ahead of time and have a deep-fryer on hand. customers would order donuts and i would drop them in the fryer right in front of them. instead of fillings i would just have toppings that would be added to the donut, i.e. jelly, glaze, boston cream, chocolate sauce, nuts, etc. would all be drizzled onto the finished donuts at the customers request. sell them at a profit.
never had any experience running a food business, less a food truck business, but it seems pretty solid. any holes (pun intended) in this plan? would there be problems using a pre-prepared yeast dough?
I've seen pretty much this exact format with mini donuts. They even make prefab little donut machines that will form the donuts transport them by little conveyor belt and drop them in the oil then flip them out fresh hot and ready. Toppings are up to you boss. The guy I saw even had overhead mirrors set up at an angle on the overhang of his truck so customers could watch the little donut "factory". I assume you'd make booku bucks in the right location
Colton Foster
These ideas usually don't work. Granted, donuts are a nice food that is cheap and quick to make, but dunkin donuts doesn't make all its money from donuts. It makes the majority of its money from coffee.
Diversify your menu.
Jeremiah Long
Thanks a lot for the info. Curious about that machine, what would i search for to find it? Obviously I'd serve coffee and other refreshments. Hm, but you have a point. I was hoping to draw in people with the novelty of a fresh donut still hot from the fryer, and maybe do a 24-hour service to get the drunk crowd (if i was coming home from the bar and i saw made-to-order donuts i'd probably get like 3 at once)
Lucas Russell
Make sure to have trendy shit like siriacha and bacon crumbles- memes are what the people want.
Liam Bailey
>Curious about that machine, what would i search for to find it? Google "Donut machine" or poke around on the websites of commercial restaurant equipment.
Justin Sullivan
I went to something like this except he made them in small batches and only sold them dusted in sugar or dusted in cinnamon/sugar. they were the best donuts I ever had. he always parked in the same run down shopping plaza, in a small town. if he could do it under those conditions I bet you could do it with your innovative ideas and do it in a more populated area. you just might want to think twice before drizzling your nuts on them
Isaac Brown
Yeah do this op. Also snoop around Craigslist in a variety of urban areas within like a 6 hr radius of you on a regular basis. My dad got a whole set of food grade stainless steel sinks for pennies on the dollar this way.
Hunter Scott
>maybe do a 24-hour service lol so what you're just gonna live in your van hoping people come by for shitty little donuts?
Kayden Baker
beaucoup
Joshua Morris
Thanks. You are fine with just donuts. Remember more items=more overhead expense. The biggest mistake new restaurants make is not staying in their lane and deluding themselves into thinking they can get every hungry customer on the street. Make the best donuts you can and brew some damn good coffee (maybe invest in espresso machine). Also with coffee and donuts in a food truck it wouldn't be a bad idea to post up from like 4 a.m. to 10 a.m. in an industrial park area where there will be lots of working people.
Isaiah Moore
Make sure you research the regulations for mobile-ops in your area. Some cities will not allow you to cook food in the truck or offer limited liscenses to do so. Remember that the food truck market is already over saturated and finding good placement is competitive. In addition to the standard skill set needed in food service you'll also need to know how to repair the truck, all the guys I know who work in food trucks are half mechanics and need to know how to make quick repairs to keep that thing moving. You could be booked for a wedding and you need to know how to get that truck twenty miles down the road to make it on time. If you've never worked in a restaurant, do that before opening a business. Ideally you should manage a kitchen before starting your own project. There's basic skills you're going to fuck up a million times before you get them right and it's best to fail when you don't have a first year business on the line. Simple things like ordering the right amount of inventory and how to correctly operate kitchen equipment will make or break you, learn how a commercial kitchen functions first - this can't be emphasized enough. Plus having real restaurant experience will give you respect among your employees. Having connections in your local food scene ensures that your path to finding investors or good help will be easier. My old manager worked with my boss for long enough that he started his own mobile operation with the finianical backing of our owner.
Colton Miller
Personally, I get nervous about any shop that sells one thing. Cupcake shops in my hometown where wiped out a year or two ago and the bakery I started working at in high school just opened up a new location. We had regular customers because they know we'd make original concepts that you couldn't find anywhere else. You need food skills before you take a financial risk on the level of opening up your own restaurant. It's a bad idea. I've worked for too many guys who've had no experience and start buying cheap ingredients to save money. The quality of the food is shit, no one takes pride in their work, paychecks aren't coming in on time and they bounce when we get them. Don't be those guys, you'll put yourself in a position where it's impossible to be successful and you're hemorrhaging money.
Julian Stewart
Social media and the internet are important.
Whatever you name your bussiness make it unique so people have an easy time finding you online. Register your business with google and update twitter and facebook frequently to let people know where you are.
You can put info about your truck and it's schedule on listings/websites like this one:
Sometimes there are more local-specific sites for food trucks too so ask around and do some googling.
It can also be a good idea to have a website of your own with a menu, schedule, and "about us" on it.
Ryder Jackson
That's because cupcakes are stupid meme. Standalone donut shop are not. Nobody eats cupcakes as a meal but they will eat donuts and coffee for breakfast on the reg. Your statement is like saying standalone pizza joints won't work because you knew a bunch of tapas restaurants that went out of business.
Easton Wright
This. My town has 3 competing doughnut businesses (including Dunkin), but I've never even heard of a cupcake shop. Cupcakes are an inferior pastry.
Benjamin Johnson
I said I'm nervous about shops selling one item, not that it's necessarily a bad idea. The donut shop I worked for was more concerned with the quality of their coffee and baristas because $4 donuts and no/shit coffee will not cut it. Shitty donut shops are typically serving a full breakfast spread or late-night gyros. The wood-fired pizza shop I worked at hired bartenders that had made a name for themselves at a speciality bar down the road to make it a destination for cocktails. Even if you're running a restaurant that specializes in one item, you need a drink menu or something else to offer people. The only donut shop I've encountered that was just making donuts had a stand in a market but made most of their money by making donuts for other coffee shops and bakeries in the area that didn't want to stomach the cost and labor of operating a frier. It's not gonna be enough to just have fresh donuts and a truck with no experience. He needs to bring something else to the table.
Faggot.
Liam Carter
A donut shop just needs to not charge 4 fucking dollars for a donut. And op isn't opening a shop numb nuts it's a truck. Op should focus on making really good donuts and sell em for 8 bucks a dozen.
Ayden Watson
>pennies on the dollar How old are you man, like 200? Are you 200 years old man?
Charles Wood
Well when you get something for 50 bucks a pop when it was purchased new at a bare minimum 200 bucks I'm not really sure what other phrases fit.
Easton Jenkins
This was the lowest pricing option for the donut shop I worked for. $3.50-$5 for breakfast pastries beyond standard glazed donuts is not uncommon. If OP sells cheap donuts for $8/dozen, there's no quality difference between him and Krispy Kreme - at least in the mind of the diner. Plus he needs to pay for labor, if he's making donuts fresh in the truck all day then factors like grease disposal are in play. OP might not be running a permanent kitchen right now but the goal of most food trucks is to establish a permanent location. If he's successful, demand will necessitate it and he should be thinking ahead to that day.
Julian Flores
Relax my man, im just jivin.
Luis Cook
How about a fraction of the price, or perhaps even cheap
Mason Sullivan
How are you gonna keep Things organised, with that many flavours my man ?
Cameron Cooper
Inflating the price of cheap food like donuts to ludicrous levels is never a good idea. I go to a mom and pop place that sells any regular donut for ยข75 and they're damn good and really fucking busy. Here are some do's for starting a food business and actually making it >Do buy used equipment cheap >Do have a simple singular theme >Do use inexpensive quality raw ingredients >Do make it from scratch >Do set small margins on food and larger margins on beverages >Do work under the smallest possible margins you can pay your bills and your living expenses with >Do take out the smallest loan you can Here are some don'ts >Don't chase trends. >Don't get outside your lane >Don't do this industry expecting to get rich
Elijah Phillips
Those are some nice, nondescript and general pieces of advice. Explain to me what you mean by inexpensive, quality, and raw because to most of you old guys it means a watery tomato from Costco that's sliced on site. "Making it from scratch" means nothing. You can make a pie at a bakery but if you're using the same ingridents as the manufacturing plant pumping out cheese danishes, it'll taste like them. What about location? If you run a shop below a train stop in Chicago, you can't charge $0.75/donut like you can in whatever highway exit you live next to. As for the "trends/stay in your lane," I'm not talking about serving fake Kobe beef or whatever food of the month is in style. Ordering from the same wholesaler as Jimmy John's doesn't cut it anymore. I've seen restaurants in prime locations that have been open 22 years fall because they kept serving the same shit food when the consumer has drastically changed. You can't fool Americans with generic coffee beans and welted lettuce any more. You need to bring people an interesting concept with local (100mi radius) ingridents and a skilled kitchen staff. If you don't, diners will walk to the Potbelly's down the street that can operate at a loss selling the same food for far cheaper.
James Fisher
>4 AM - 10 AM in an industrial park area backing this 100%, it's a pretty underserved group. I work 3rd shift at a warehouse about a mile from downtown and it's a pretty dead area but the 24-hour convenience store makes a killing off of us with pretty bad food. If there were a food truck selling fresh donuts close to my work I would literally eat there every night. If you do serve the 24-hour crowd, coffee is also a great idea, with cheap being more important than good
Caleb Johnson
following up though, keep in mind that people can get a mid-tier donut from a grocery or convenience store for a dollar. you've got tough competition
Aaron Cruz
Good luck dealing with niggers
Ryder Clark
My CC has a food truck context once a week. Essentially, ~20 food trucks are brought in with their best foods and separated into snacks, dishes, and desserts. The food science club pays a "catering fee", and for two hours anybody can go to any of the trucks and receive a sample platter that will be judged. The 3 winners of this competition will then receive exclusive rights to use spots on campus without needing to pay -- when talking to them about the business, they all have said that the CC competitions are where they make nearly all their money from.
This is only tangibly related to you, OP. I just thought it was neat.
Mason Johnson
The donuts have to cool or else the icing will melt before you can even attempt to decorate it.
