Now that we have shown you some of the key requirements to open your own food truck, it is important not to lose focus. In order to maximise your income, it is very important to have a detailed plan of how you want to conduct your business in mind. In general, 6 steps should be performed in order to visualise the realisation strategy of a certain business, including all requirements, plans and actions.
The aim of these 6 steps is to analyse your own ideas and make them more concrete, control progress and develop a compass for the next few years of your business.
6 steps to running a successful food truck business
1. The Business
Within this category, examine the profile of the business and determine concrete targets. A detailed idea of how your business shall look like and how exactly you want to earn money is key for founding a successful food truck. Try to find the right niche and offer something people will chase you around town for.
In general, first, you need to decide whether you want to open a food truck which is mobile on wheels, which is only useful for a small number of servings. Or whether you want a food trailer, which is like a food truck without the ability to move on its own. Together with this decision you also need to decide if you want to serve drinks, sweets, warm food or fruits from your food truck. Other food truckers in the KL region, for example, serve “grab-and-go” meals like paninis, pasta, burgers, burritos, coffee, ice cream, or smoothies – a large variety. Think about the benefit you want to offer to your customer and how you can prevent others from copying you. For example, you could include a secret ingredient/special sauce/special way of making your food, so your competitors won’t find out how you achieve your uniqueness. However, make sure not to get lost in too many details.
2. The Menu
This is one of the most important things to consider as this is the chapter where the menu is defined. A well-planned menu will enable you to build a competitive advantage and attract customers. Within this step, it is important to define your unique selling proposition, what will make your food truck better than others; this could be your service, your food, the design of your food truck or other aspects. When creating your menu, keep in mind that the number of different meals you would like to offer is dependent on the size of your kitchen (which is not very big in a food truck). Smaller menus can be managed more easily and allow you some space for offering occasional specials. Plus: it allows you to adapt your menu every few months to fit your customers’ expectations. Additionally, large menus mean a lot of preparation time and a risk of inconsistencies of food quality. Therefore, you should try to keep it “short & simple”, which will make you and your customers happy. A short menu will also help your customers to remember you. It is much easier to say “Oh, let’s go to the food truck, that had those awesome milkshakes”, than “Let’s visit that food truck that served soup, noodles, burgers and cakes”.
3. The Market
In this chapter, the focus is on potential customers, suppliers and competitors. It is important to get a good feel for every single group as they influence your business dramatically. You should consider the business outlook for the whole sector as well as trends in the food truck market. Additionally, you should analyse what your competitors do, how they do it and what you can do, to be better than them. One approach to get a better understanding of the market and your own food truck is to first have a look at yourself by writing down the strengths (for example, very good quality of food) and weaknesses (for example: long preparation time). Additionally, you should think about opportunities (for example, this food truck is not operating in this area anymore) and threats (for example: the price for a specific ingredient could increase strongly due to a long period of heat).
4. Marketing
Another important aspect, which needs to be considered is marketing, as this gives you access to your preferred market and helps you to get traction within that market. You need to also take into account how many servings you target per day/week/month so that you are able to plan accordingly. Additionally, you need to think about how you can get in touch with your customers. How will people find you and know about you? Would you like to use Twitter or Facebook? Instagram? Or all three? You would need to set up an account and care for it properly. A poorly managed Facebook page does more harm than good.
5. Watch your finances
This step deals with all financial aspects you have to look out for. After having calculated all expected incomes and costs make sure to double check any offers that are being made to you as they might not be the best for you. Additionally, you might also consider a credit card for financing your expenses in terms of regular groceries. One possibility for finding a credit card that suits your needs best is through our CompareHero.my comparison tool.
6. Chances and risks
Last but not least, it is important to analyse your chances and risks. Ensure not to draw an overly optimistic picture and try to be as objective as possible as this is the way to prevent yourself from building castles in the clouds.
While at first glance it might seem exhausting to consider all these different steps in detail, it has been proven by many other founders, that these 6 steps help to build a successful business. By going through each step you will get a better and deeper understanding of your business, which will enable you to succeed. After having built such a strong foundation, now you can start looking for your individual financing.
No comments:
Post a Comment