Whether it’s a special event at the office, birthday party, or your wedding day, food truck catering is the best way to treat your guests to an amazing, memorable experience.
Food truck catering is a fun, unique and affordable alternative to traditional catering services. This is the only type of catering available where the kitchen comes to you.
Instead of the traditional catering process where food is prepared at their own location, then transported and set up hours before your event begins…a food truck has the unique ability to set up at your event and cook everything fresh, ensuring you and your guests receive the highest quality product and enjoy a successful and memorable food truck experience.
Here are 5 things to look for when researching food truck catering:
Years in Business
How long has this food truck been in business?
The food truck industry has a very high turnover rate, so one key indicator to look for is how long the food truck has survived in this grueling industry. This can also be a sign of experience. There are a ton of obstacles to running a successful food truck business and not everyone can overcome them. Remaining in business for an extended number of years usually means the food truck owner has figured out how to avoid or deal with some of these pitfalls, and worked out the kinks before showing up to cater your event. But just because a food truck has been in business for a long time, certainly doesn’t guarantee they are a top-notch food truck, so let’s take a look at another indicator we look for in a high-quality food truck business.
Online Presence and Ratings
Professionalism is important to us when we hire food trucks to cater your event, and we know it’s important to you too. One indicator we always take into consideration when booking a food truck is their online presence, ratings and reputation. Does this food truck have a website? Is it functional and polished? What are people saying about the food truck on Facebook, Google, Yelp, etc.? These things matter to us because in our experience, they have been direct indicators of the quality of the service and food the food truck delivers. Food trucks that pride themselves in their work and the output they create will be recognized for it in today’s online market.
Presentation
Who and what exactly should you expect to roll up to your event? While presentation isn’t everything, it is usually a good indicator of whether a food truck business is worth the money or not. How a food truck presents itself may not have an effect on the taste of the food itself, but when it comes to food truck catering, it’s about way more than just the food.
When you hire a food truck for catering, you not only want the food to taste delicious, but you want your guests to have an exciting, memorable experience. You can trust that if the exterior of a food truck is rundown, dirty and it looks like no one takes care of it…they probably don’t. The same lack of care more often than not transfers into the interior operations of the food truck and the production of the food. Luckily for food truck lovers, these types of food trucks rarely last very long, and are very few out of the many awesome and professional food trucks in the industry.
Atmosphere
You may be thinking, “well it’s just a food truck, how much of an atmosphere can it have?” One major factor that can make or break a food truck is its noise level. Almost all food trucks require a generator to power their electricity. The size, brand and placement of their generator plays a huge role in the customer experience. I’m sure we’ve all heard the loud roaring of a generator or engine at some point in our lives. Is that something you want to listen to when you’re trying to order your meal or sit and enjoy your food? No. Believe it or not, some food trucks have extremely loud, clunky generators right next to their serving window where customers can barely hear the person taking orders. This is a major negative to watch out for when hiring a food truck.
A couple of other factors to consider are: do they have an awning over the serving window to provide shade? Does the food truck provide tables, chairs and other dining arrangements? Are they friendly? Do they provide plenty of utensils, paper products, condiments and somewhere to dispose your trash?
Speed
Depending on the event that is being catered, how quickly a food truck can deliver the food to the customer is a very important factor. For corporate events, most of the time you have a limited timeframe where you can get everyone fed and back to work. It is important that the food truck is capable of getting everyone their food with enough time to not only eat, but network and enjoy the event as well. If you need to get 500 served in 2 hours, and the food truck can only serve 50 guests an hour, it simply won’t work.
Some food trucks don’t want to turn down the business and underestimate the task at hand. They end up getting in way over their head, leaving the customer with a less than satisfying experience. When hiring a food truck, you want to make sure they can get food out not only quick, but consistent each time.
One of the primary reasons people love the service we provide, is because we eliminate the risk of you running into one of the potential issues listed above. We are a team of past and current food truck owners who know the industry well, have strong relationships with all of the food trucks and know how to separate the good from the bad.
We work to ensure you and your guests enjoy a memorable, seamless food truck experience. We get the right food truck(s) hired for you and handle all of the communications and logistics. Our goal is to save you the time and headache of researching, contacting and going back and forth with different food trucks.
The best way to get started in the food truck catering process is by filling out our food truck catering request form. We’ll ask you a few quick questions about your food truck catering requirements and contact you within 24 hours to figure out the rest!