Transcription
Would you guys like to know how much a food truck owner makes? It will definitely surprise you. My name is Syed. I'm the owner of Able Mediterranean Grill, and I own three trailers. And I'll show you how to make 200k a year by opening a food truck business. That sounds incredible, you guys. Let's get started.
Tell us a little bit about your background, your story, and what got you into this business.
Yeah, I started the child with my mom back home in Syria, from a small village. I'm a farmer. And now I'm in the U.S. for the last 21 years. I started my first food truck in 2004. It was hard because I didn't have any money. I had to borrow money from here and there to open my first food cart.
But why food cart? You could have started a restaurant, any other business. Why this particular food truck business?
I didn't know better. I'm like, I'm a cook. I can open a restaurant. Food cart is a good way, and it's low risk. You can take it anywhere. You can sell it whenever you like. You can move it whenever, whatever you like.
Awesome. Say, let's talk about monthly expenses. Where are you dollar-wise per month, and what's the biggest expense monthly?
It's a tough question. It depends. If you have, if you're family operated, it doesn't cost you too much to operate a trailer, like maybe 200 a day, 300. Food cost, propane, gray water, electricity, and rent, insurance, tax. If you are buyers, if you have employees, to break even, you need to make 500 dollars a day at least with two employees.
I'm guessing we're still employees? Yes. So the biggest expense is labor. Labor, biggest expense? Yes. And then what will be the other one after that? Food cost. Food cost. Okay. What cost? You're obviously paying rent here. What is that per month here?
At least here, it's not bad. It's now, used to be 1200, now it's 1350.
How does that compare to other locations? Is that pretty good?
Pretty good, actually. The other location, um, could be busier than here because they have a tent, they have fire pit outside. They hit their customer more. I mean, this is a big lot. It's hard to heat up. 2500. Some other lot to start, which is that's really expensive to start a food cart. Don't be afraid. If it's a good plot, you gotta make it. But don't be afraid. After the rent, I did. I was afraid once and I regret it big time. Afraid to pay big rent. I lost a good location and I regret it big time.
Let's talk about what it, what you need to do to secure the best location. The steps to do that. Is it a contract? Is it relationships? Is it tips and tricks to be successful in the location?
First of all, you have to make sure this location has more than one food cart, at least 10. Make sure it has a brewery. The most important key to be successful is a brewery or a bar. Not a tent, not plastic, but a bar with a bathroom. Make sure you have a regular bathroom. Uh, gray water disposal goes in the city water. Make sure you have a good bar which is heated in the U.S. in the winter and has an AC in the summer so people are comfortable to eat and come down and play. Ground fire pit, tent, all this. Education is going to be a good location. Neighborhood, right? Neighborhood is very important. Parking. Make sure it has parking around the lot. You know, that's another indication that's going to be a successful lot. You guys, you have to give it at least one year. Don't just change location to location. You will never be successful. Sit there, even if you're losing money, sit there and wait just to work. How you become successful? Fix your mistakes. Do not just change location. You think you're gonna be okay? No, no.
Okay, is that, is that the mistake you can make? Is thinking, "Oh, the next location is the winner. The next location is the lottery."
Exactly. It happened to me. But you're saying stay in the same spot even though you're losing here?
At least it's not overnight. Okay. If some location takes time, some locations start like this. Usually, most of the location at the first month, they get really busy and then die down because a new location is a new car, it's a new concept, new food, and variety. Look, we have 30 food carts in here. Each one of them is different. Nice. Yeah. No competition, which is great. That's awesome.
Say, what's the difference between a stationary unit that you have versus like a mobile food truck? What are the pros and cons to both?
Big difference. Okay. Stationary making money every day, seven days a week. Food truck, you have to have a kitchen. You have to drive around, take a risk, insurance. You don't have events every day. You have events in the summer, festivals. But in the winter, you don't really, you don't make any money maybe. But stationary, you have the location. People know where you are. They come to you every single day, seven days a week. Money-making seven days a week.
So this would definitely be making more money than a mobile, for sure?
100%. That's a good tip.
Take us inside, kind of show us anything unique or anything like that.
Yes. I mean, you've got an open layout, basically. Is this pretty much the same for most or different?
All my carts are exact made the same. Open, open. That's where customers see who's making their food. Okay. And they see your hand, they see your face. I want the customer to interact with the cook. That's a trust issue. We have to. Good for them to see what's happening here. Okay. The second, for the whoever want to start the food cart business, make sure you have a width, eight foot. You don't want to be like going back and forth and bumping into each other. You have to have one cashier here. The cook, the main cook here. And the backup, the prep cook here. In the summer, mostly. Make sure everything, you lay out your menu. You have to have a map of your menu. This way, it's just quick, quick, quick, quick. You don't want to like look for things. Open and look. Make sure everything's up there. If you need a bigger one, a red table, have a bigger one, right? Make space for it. Okay. Yeah. If you have a big fryer, you can at least fry 10 orders of fries like that. 35-pound fryer. Make sure you have a stove to cook your rice for big orders. Grill is hot and sizzling. You're ready to go. Get it ready to go. Make sure your floor is clean. I see people skating inside their food cart. That's not okay. Make sure you have mats. Pay a company to come and clean them every month for you.
In terms of hacks, things that really changed your business, can you think of anything that you can share with our audience? What's a game-changer that you can share with us?
Yes. Represent yourself. Be authentic. Good picture. Fresh menu. Spend the money. Don't be cheap. Make sure people see you. See what you do. Be obvious. Build the website. Put yourself out there. Have people to have you give you reviews. That's the best way to be successful.
Those are the ways to stand out? Yes.
What kind of margins do you go for on your food costs? Is it 20%? 10%? 30%?
Well, with employees, you go about 20%. Family, about 50%. Nice. Okay. I speak differently. That's why I said family, family, family, if you can. But with employees, you're thinking it's an average about 20%? Yes.
Okay. I want to dive into the monthly revenue as well. Where are you at on average? I know Oregon's six months cold, six months summer. Yeah. On average, what would you say your food trucks are generating per month? You could say winter and then well, winter is Oregon. You don't make money in Oregon state. It's cold. It's cold. It depends if you have like a good gig next to a bar or next to a brewery, and they have heaters, and then yes. Right. In the summer, if you do 1500, just calculate it. What you do it seven days a week. That's calculated. So what is that like 50 grand a month? Yeah. You do 50 grand, about 40, 50 grand a month. Not bad. In the summer, I know a food cart do about 100 grand a month. Like sushi carts, poke bowls, some, some carts do. Kind of run them out. I'd love to know if you guys comment below. Let us know how COVID impacted your business in terms of you adjusting to it as well. I'm sure you've gone through some of the other things. So you guys, please comment. We read all the comments and we greatly appreciate that as well.
How do you manage multiple locations? Well, that's what everyone's asking me. The same exact question. It's a great question. How you do it? Hard work. Running around from cart to cart. Using good systems. Um, using, uh, numbers. You have to write down your. Make sure your books, your food cost, your barrel cost, your, uh, your rent, your utility. You have to know your numbers to to be a successful. Running around. Great idea. Make sure, honestly, to me, I have to make sure I test my food every day. I check if it's fresh. I check the rotation of the food. Is it fresh or not? If the employee doing their job, they're doing sanitation, they're cleaning, uh, they're serving the right food. The lunch. And you're doing that on each location every day? Almost every day. Wow. That's what I do. I start 9, 10 o'clock. I finish around 8, 9 o'clock at night. Even though I have a big family too. Now, man, that's, that's so, that's a big commitment. Yes. It's not spread out over three locations like that. To be successful, you have to be there.
For somebody watching that wants to get into the food truck business, what would your number one key to successfully launching, starting one be? What would you tell them right now?
Make sure you have enough cash to open a food cart and at least, uh, six months. Make sure you have some experience. Cooking experience. And work in a food cart for a while. A restaurant. Marketing. Know your numbers. Knows your suppliers. Knife skills. Hand, you know, all that. Sanitation. Uh, your books.
Sounds like you're saying go work for somebody first? See the 800 is 100. Go work for someone else. Go on a workforce. See how stressful or how stressful? Yeah. It's very stressful for real. And are you, are you, can you handle stress? Can you handle 50 people waiting online and they want food now, in one minute? How, how you can handle that?
What do you look for when you want to hire somebody? And what do you pay your current employees right now?
Experience. Uh, what the mouse. That's most of my employees when I get my employee, or the mouse. Okay. Experience. Sometimes I put ads. And it's not cheap, you know. Ad online, Craigslist, Facebook. And now as minimum wage is 14. I pay my employee about 17 bucks an hour. Okay. Plus tip. And make about 25 bucks an hour. That's, that's average employees.
Tips are about 25 an hour? No, about 10 bucks an hour. Oh, 10 bucks an hour? Right. Yeah. About 25. And I don't take the tip. I give my tip to my employees. I will never mess with my employee tip. That's to make my employer happy. You got to give them their tip. They earn it. That's their tip. It's not yours. For sure. For sure.
How many people do you have at this, uh, location and others?
Usually, I have two each in the winter. In the summer, I have four at the different locations. Yeah. The weather. Because you have to shift. You have, you have, uh, nine, 10, two to three, four. And then you have four, five, two, eight, nine o'clock. Sometimes we close at 10. It depends how busy. Yeah. Because we have, we have a bar here. Alcohol. People wanna stay late and eat food late. You have to stay open. And so we catch the last crowd. That's when you, when you make the money.
How much are you spending on advertising and through what platforms to bring new customers to your brand?
Here, I remember I spent on Yelp about 5,000 a year. 5,000 a year. A year on advertising. That's a monthly. Sometimes in Google, that you buy clicks. Yeah. And it's not cheap. It's expensive. And, um, gift cards. Um, clicks like on Square. You do programs like rewards. You know, if you get, if you spend, if you buy 10 sandwiches, the 11th sandwich is free. Let's bring customers back, right? Free soda, free baklava.
So if you're spending on Yelp 5 grand, I mean, obviously it's worth your investment?
Not always. Not only. Let's be honest. Not always, right? It depends where you are and what kind of, what kind of advertising you're doing. Because you have to target specific things. They don't like it. It's not generalized things. You have to be specific what you advertise. Okay.
Also, so let's see the four rings now. The delivery starts. Okay. People are ordering on the phone. Yeah. Online now. Square. People order, they pay, they come pick it up. That's good business in the winter to have in Oregon. Gotcha.
So talking to you, it's clear that food quality is very important. Anything else you want to add in terms of what goes on your menu? What's the process like?
The main key is use fresh ingredients. Fresh garlic, fresh parsley. Don't. I use bar, build or garlic, or use like freeze herbs. Ingredients. Use fresh herbs. Use fresh or remain hard night. Iceberg. Fresh chicken, not frozen. Cut out your salt. Marinate it overnight. Fat. Fresh ingredients. Do not be cheap. Do not cut corners. That's why people not stupid. They will know. They find out. Customers are smart. They will know fresh from frozen. Just make sure your food cost is under 30, 25, 30. If it goes over 50, that's a red flag.
How do you delight your customers and stand out from all these other guys in this, uh, parking lot?
First one, no, knows your name. If you cannot, as this is the biggest smile. A discount once in a while. A free meal. If he doesn't have his wallet, give him a free meal. That's right. It's not McDonald's here. Give me a free meal. If he is short a dollar, give it to him. It's not a big deal. Yeah. Be friendly. Have a reward program. In Square or Clover, they have a discount. If you get, if you spend 11, you know, 10 is free. Or once in a while, once a month, you do that. Yes. People love that.
Can you describe more about that? Like, um, you know, the program? Is it a card? Is it a punch card that you give out? Or what you used to have?
Much card? Yeah. Click card. Uh, that's the only thing you have to be careful though. We had us the card, the punch card, like from Winco. And people stopped ringing card over and over. And even though, like in two days, I have a full card. And that didn't work. Yeah. I know what's going there. Has to be on Square, on a system. Has to be registered. Makes sense. No more punch card. That's not a good idea. Don't do that. Lots of free gyros after that. Yes. Yes. It destroyed me.
I'm going to put you on the spot. How much is your gyro cost? What is the cost for a gyro?
Gyro now with that inflation is going right? Well, at least five dollars. Really? Yes. Five bucks to make it. Yes. With all the ingredients. Yeah. Because now, every month it goes up. It goes up, goes up. It's non-stop. Yeah. And I'm afraid to raise my prices. But don't be afraid. If the customer like you, they'll come to you. Even if you raise your prices. Some people, they get like iffy the first week or two. Like, ah, a dollar. But after that, they come back to you and they forget about it. But please, don't be afraid to raise your prices. You need to make money to be there for them. There you go. A lot of them, 90. They will not say a word. They will say, "Good for you. Make money. I want you to be here. I want to come and eat my good gyros, good fish and chips." You know?
What are the most profitable locations? And give us a quick summary again.
Great questions. Neighborhood. Alcohol. Alcohol. Alcohol. Brewery. That really helps, huh? Heating. Okay. Fire pit. Tent. Good building. Because people is not going to sit outside in the cold and eat in the cold and heat in the summer. They have to be somewhere to eat warm or or cold in the summer. This way, they can be comfortable. That's the location. And parking. Very important for the customers. Look after these things, right? Okay. Yeah. Alcohol. Parking. Um, place. Kids. Dog allowed. You know, all this. Make a key, key point for location success. Look, a successful location. Okay. Keep note of that, you guys. And check out our blog, upflip.com/blog, where you can find step-by-step instructions on how to start and operate a successful food truck business. Check it out right now.
How do you, as a business owner, find the best deal for your supplies, your food, etc.? Give us the specifics on what you do.
Do good research. Cash and carry. Restaurant depot. Local suppliers. A farmer's market. If you have, if you get organic products, which is best to resolve your, uh, products. Just call around. Call correspondable. Cash and carry. Talk to friends. Make sure you know what's out there. Good prices, good quality, good products. You know, you have to work hard to get the products to your cart to be successful owner. And cheap with the cheap prices. But again, cheap and good, not cheap and bad, right?
How important are customer reviews in your business? And what are some tips and tricks to get those reviews?
Oh boy, very, very important. Sometimes you got to pay to get those. Like pay Yelp to put ads, right? Which is politics. Google. You got to get those reviews. A lot of customers, they will do it without telling you. They just appreciate you and they give you reviews, right? And some customers, they're unhappy, they'll give you bad review. But you need to talk to these customers when they come back and fix that review and get their food back or their lunch or their money back. This way, they're satisfied. But the reviews are really, really important. Very important.
Do you have a system in place that you use to ask for reviews? Or well, I'm not at this point. I don't. Okay. But you should have, um, at least talk to them. Tell them. I remind them. You know, some people have a text. They text their customer. They have their phone, right? Emails. You know, they have programs. If you let me, you know, Yelp doesn't like that sometimes. If you tell customers to leave reviews, they don't like you. Take it down. No. Which happened to me many times. They accused me of telling my customer and they removed stars. Five-star reviews, 15, 25 star reviews. Why? I don't know. But they leave the bad ones.
Say, let's talk about your first food truck. Can you break down for our viewers the cost? So if you spent 10 grand, how did you spend it? And where can our viewers get the best deal on a food truck?
My first food truck, I bought at 1963 at Camper. Was an old truck and cost me about 10, 15,000 dollars just for the truck. Just the food truck. Okay. And fully built? Fully built out about around 18,000 dollars. My first food truck in 2003. Okay. After that, my other truck is brand new. It was about 28 to 30,000 dollars. Then now about 50,000 dollars. And a good food truck about 50 grand at least. 50,000 dollars. Okay.
How would you source the right one? I mean, go buy used or go buy new? I mean, I don't, I know it all depends on budget, but where can we find the medium?
Well, it depends what budget you have. I mean, I prefer to buy used and good shape and it's quick. You can open a week later. But it's about 25 to 30,000 used. A new one about 50 grand. Like this over here. 50 grand at least.
I want to follow up on that one hack. What's another thing that you would share with our food truck enthusiasts on what they can do to have a game-changing business? Be specific. One, either menu is a great idea. Now, one item. Don't be afraid. One item. A small menu? No. Never. I have example. I have whole bowl, Kamen Kai. They are the most successful business in Oregon right now. One item. Just one. Rice ball. Whole bowl. Kamen Kai. Chicken and rice.
So having 20 items on the menu is not necessarily a good thing?
No, not always. Sometimes. But not only.
What are some tips that you can share with us in terms of prep efficiency and so forth? What do you do?
Do you do a festival? You have to be equipped. Festival is a game-changer. You have to have a kitchen, commercially kitchen. And you have to have a B bowl. And you have to have a prep for at least a thousand people. Wow. You got to be ready. Because some festivals, you do 500 customers in four hours.
So what's different about prep for a festival versus an average day for you? Is it 200 customers a day in the summer? Okay. Instead of 1000 customers in the same time manner. So what would you do at that point?
Would you have more people? More people. You have to have seasonal high schoolers. A lot of. I hire seasonal people. I talk to charities. I try to hire people as much as I can. So you have enough staff to cover the festival? You have to have seven people on a food truck on a festival, at least five people. You have two cashiers, two cooks, two backup. You know, you have to have enough people to be able to serve that 50-people line. When you see that 50-people line, you got to keep up.
What software do you or systems do you use on a day-to-day operation of your business? Cause you showed me something off camera. Can you mention that? Like where you can monitor three locations at the same time? Well, through what system is that? iPhone? Okay. iPad, laptop. You got to see your Square. You got to see your register. What's happening? Where is busy? Where it's not busy. It makes you feel good when you see like this location is busy. And when you see there's no business, you stress out. You get stressed out. You know, like you have your camera, security camera on the phone. You can watch it from everywhere you are.
Is that a subscription that you pay for? What is the cost?
Yeah, I don't. I found a good sense. Then I don't have to be. I got a law system. What kind of system is it? It's called Air Law. Air Lock. Okay. And good to have security camera. Very important for theft, for employee, for accidents. Some people like, "Oh, I flip and fall. Oh, I'm suing you." Right. It's good to have it. Yeah. But even customers, they accuse you of something they have not done. Especially these days. You should have it. Yeah.
So events are obviously a good thing for business. Yeah. Does it cost to get in them? And what does that do for the business in terms of profits?
Some festivals, you do great money. You do about 5,000 dollars to 10,000 dollars. Wow. They take 10% cut. Okay. So they take about 10%. Yeah. Some, uh, summer festivals, you lose money. Why? Because they brought too many trailers. They became, they got greedy. They charge you too much to be there. And also the weather. I see. Okay. If it's rainy and cold and people do not show up. Or they charge like in the door. If they charge like fee, like entrant fee, people so how's ready to show up?
How do I know that it's the right choice for me then, as a food truck owner watching this right now, learning? I've got 10 events to choose from. How do I know one is a winner and the other's a flop?
Do your homework. Look in YouTube. See if it's really that festival. It's really that busy. You mean like previous years? Yes. But it's years. You see. Ask them about numbers. Ask questions about. Ask who's the vendor was last year. Talk to that vendor. Okay. Did you have a good point? Did you get sold out of food? Yeah. Like I did. The event on a Hood River, uh, last year. It's called, like, Camper, like van, the sprinter van. And I was ready to go. And I made 5, 5 grand that day.
All right, you guys, blitz time with Say. Let's jump into it. 10 seconds to 15 on each question. This is from our fans. Thank you guys for submitting your questions. June asked, "How do you decide what goes on the menu?"
You have to do research and look around. See what you're good at. Play around with it. Play around with it. Have a customer test. Have a friend over. Okay.
Mario asked, "How do you keep the food consistently good at all locations?"
If you have more than one cart, you have the kitchen and cook. Same recipe. To cook all for the cart. Like make sure the same recipe goes on all for the cart. Monitor your recipes because some people will change your recipe without telling you. I catch people doing that to me.
Mahad asked, "How do you prevent your employees from stealing from you? Is that even a valid question? Does that happen?"
In the last 10 years, I caught over 12 people taking my money. Two of them managers. Wow. How do you prevent that? I have security cameras 24 hours over their heads.
This is from Edu Crespo. Um, "Do you need to know how to cook the food yourself?" I mean, probably an obvious answer, but...
Oh boy, yes sir. You have to know how to cook the food very well. Or you can just hire somebody? Not. I don't recommend that. You got to know what you're doing. If you hurt somebody and if you throw the abra at you, what are you going to do? Close your business.
All right, and the last question from JJ Lee. Uh, "Is how do you protect your business or food truck mobile from crime?"
Security cameras. Good locks. Don't be cheap on the lock. Bad lock. Like, like good metal. You know, make sure you secure your window from one side. Don't have just a glass window. And you want people to not steal your car.
What about common mistakes that food truck owners make? What comes to mind?
Try to be as, as open to customers. Sometimes you have to. Their problem, they'll tell you about their problem. The divorce stories. If you have time, listen to them. That's one of the main keys I do. So the mistake is just, what? Don't make a mistake. Don't be just about money only. Okay. Like I have friends, 20 years ago. I still friends with them. My customers, they said, "Come back to me." They became friends. They came to my house. We eat dinner with me sometimes. Wow. That's awesome. Yeah. That's how you build a relation. You know, be like, almost they come home. They want to eat. They feel home. They know they're going to say to eat lunch. It's like home. So the mistake that I'm sort of interpreting with your answer is they're not focused on building a relationship with their customers? Yes. Here's again, money, money, money. Yeah. Here's, here's your food. Give me the money. I don't, I don't know you. Exactly. And, and make sure people see how clean you are. Make sure you have your gloves on. Make sure, make sure. Don't eat while you're talking. Make sure your mouth is clean. Your teeth clean. Don't have parsley. Make sure your food is the same. Customer sees. Custom seeds. Consistency. Because even a regular customer, if they come once and twice and the food is like, every time it's different. Yeah. Oh boy. They wanna come back. That's true. And guess what? Every time you lose a customer, they will take with them 25 customers. Wow. And let's take a long time. That's a big. In the office, it's 25 employees. Certainly. They, you talk, they will talk. "He gave me a gyro with hair on it today." Wow.
How often do you get repeat customers? And how do you bring them back?
Good question. Quality questions. Good food. They come back. I have customers come almost three times a week. Okay. For the last 10, 15 years. I'm like, "Whoa, you didn't get tired of it?" Makes you come back, which is like, great. Appreciate it. They love it. Nice. Okay. So consistency, obviously. Good rewards. Good food. Rewards. Good smile. You know, they come back to you. The basics. Does it sound like rocket science? Yeah. Exactly. Easy.
What's your favorite business book, if any? And up, we love wrapping up interviews by asking that question.
Not specific. I use whenever I need something, I go to Google. I use, yeah, Yelp. Uh, and I'm sorry, uh, YouTube. Very honest to you. So no books, but YouTube and Google is your. That's my favorite. Yeah. Whenever I need it, I go and I find many books and many ideas, many recipes. And anywhere, right? Managing, tax, insurance, plumber. You can find anything. Yeah. But I do everything almost myself. I do blogging. I'm the plumber. I'm an electrician. I'm the handyman. I'm the. I do a lot of things myself. So I save money. Okay.
Well, this has been great, Sayed. I appreciate it. We want to show our audience more about how you guys make and prep your food. So why don't we do that? Before we wrap it up, check out our podcast, you guys. It is an incredible podcast that I guarantee you stands out from all the rest. Upflip.com/podcast. We talk to people like Sayed. Ask more specific questions. Incredible content there for you. Check it out. Well, I hope you guys enjoyed this episode with Sayed, the owner of Able Grill. Incredible food, incredible story, lots of experience. I hope you guys take some advice and execute on it today. Thank you so much for watching this episode. Take another second, like the video, subscribe to our channel, and hit that bell so that you don't miss any of our content. We greatly appreciate you guys.