Since necessity is the mother of invention, savvy businesses know that innovation is one way to survive — and even thrive — during tough economies.
Scotch Tape was invented during the Great Depression as a way to mend items so they could be reused. The telegraph was introduced during a steep recession in the 1840s, becoming popular among speculators as a way to quickly share commodity news with an elite and wealthy network. During the crippling stagflation of the 1970s, the personal computer was launched, revolutionizing everyday tasks for millions of people through word processing, graphic design, and programming.
In a similar way, food trucks emerged during the Great Recession, a severe, two-year economic downturn between 2007 and 2009, during which 8.6 million people lost their jobs, and 1.8 million small businesses failed. Fueled by a bubble in the U.S. housing market and amplified by a global financial crisis, consumers sharply cut back on spending — and eating out, in particular.
Food trucks became a low-cost alternative to dining at restaurants because of their lower overhead costs: They occupy less space, have lower rent, and require fewer pieces of equipment than a restaurant, which, in turn, allowed food truck owners to offer more affordable prices to their customers. Their sheer mobility allowed them to easily travel to reach their potential customers.
This paired well with the advent of social media, which enabled food trucks to engage with their customers and establish a presence nearly anywhere they parked — fast-forward a few years, and food trucks simply became unstoppable.
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Food truck fast facts
Food trucks represent a $1.2 billion market in the U.S. — and that is a lot of tacos. If you’re interested in starting your own food truck business, these facts are sure to whet your appetite:
- There are currently between 35,000 and 40,000 food trucks parked along America’s streets, the greatest concentration of which can be found on the West Coast, with 1,000 food trucks in California alone.
- According to Straits Research, there’s even more room to run for food trucks: The industry is expected to grow 6.7% per year between 2023 and 2031.
- Around 40% of food trucks make it past the three-year mark, which is about a 10% higher success rate than restaurants.
- Because food trucks have considerably lower startup costs than a restaurant (more on this below), most can be expected to turn a profit within two years.
- According to Toast, which provides point-of-sale products to the industry, food trucks can make between $24,000 and $153,000 per year, with the owner’s salary comprising less than half of the profit.
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What are the most popular food trucks?
According to Restaurantify, the most popular culinary niches for food trucks in 2024 are street food, gourmet food, fast food, desserts, vegan food, and BBQ.
Toast breaks this list down further, saying that these trendy bites are surefire hits on any food truck's menu:
- Tacos
- Grilled cheese
- Ice cream
- Coffee
- New fusion food combinations like the Phoritto (Pho + burrito)
- Regional specialties
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Are food trucks more profitable than restaurants?
While most people know that food trucks can be a great proving ground for menu concepts before a business takes the plunge and becomes a full-fledged brick-and-mortar restaurant, food trucks can also serve as an additional income stream that can help a restaurant reach more customers.
For instance, since 2012, Chick-fil-A has used its popular food truck program as a way to introduce new menu items to its customers. Local news stations in small towns across America, from Wausau, Wisconsin to Rochester, New York, breathlessly alert their viewers where the trucks are heading next, so they can plan their time to stand in line for the brand’s tasty chicken sandwiches and waffle fries.
Curiously enough, some people will even wait for hours — even when there are brick-and-mortar stores nearby — because that’s how appealing a food truck can be.
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How much does a food truck cost?
So, you’ve decided to start a food truck business — congratulations are in order, but a lot of questions remain. So much depends on where you live (in terms of costs and licenses), what you are planning on serving, and how big you are planning your food truck operation to be.
However, you can figure ballpark estimates for starting a food truck business to generally range between $70,000 and $130,000 — that’s 2 to 5 times lower than opening a restaurant, by the way.
Here’s a breakdown comparison:
Startup costs: Basic food truck vs. restaurant
| Expense | Food truck | Restaurant |
|---|---|---|
Cost to own |
$50,000–$180,000 |
$160–$200 per square foot |
Cost to rent |
$500–$1,000/month |
$3,000–$6,000 per month |
Permits and licenses |
$1,500–$12,000 |
$5,000–$20,000 |
Food cost |
Variable: Fewer menu items than a restaurant |
Variable but higher |
Staffing |
Variable: Fewer people |
Variable but higher |
Ability to obtain liquor license |
Specific to events |
Full-time use |
Average total startup cost |
$50,000–$400,000 |
$100,000–$2,000,000 |
What equipment do food trucks need?
The most important part of a food truck business is the food itself, but you’ll certainly need a vehicle to transport the food to your target customers, and your truck will need a kitchen where you create your culinary masterpieces. The kitchen will need to have plumbing and wiring for electricity, and you’ll need a generator to power your operation.
The price of a food truck also depends on whether you decide to rent it or buy it outright. Legion Food Trucks, which manufactures a range of customizable food truck vehicles from trailer attachments to 14-, 16-, and 20-foot trucks, estimates the cost of a new food truck to range between $50,000 and $180,000.
But food trucks can also be purchased used — and the advantage here is that they may come with kitchen equipment. You can find a host of options online in your area through websites like Craigslist and eBay, name-brand food truck websites, and at industry trade shows like the National Food Truck Expo.
Other factors you’ll want to consider when pricing a food truck include your desired layout and cooking capacity (i.e., how much room will there be for grills, stoves, ovens, and ventilation systems), the size of your prep and storage spaces, including refrigeration space, and what you’ll need in terms of cooking supplies and sanitary equipment. One great thing about food trucks is that they maximize virtually every square inch of space, from overhead storage to under-counter cabinets.
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You will also want to factor in the customer-facing side of your food truck: It needs to have a window where you can serve and interact with customers as well as a cash register or other point-of-sale device — these days banking apps and other point-of-sale providers make running your small business as easy as using your phone, but you must also remember there are fixed fees and transaction costs to account for, too.
Finally, you should think of your truck as a mobile advertisement for your business, wherever you roam, so it will need to look clean at all times and have eye-catching signage or a logo. You can commission an artist to use the side of your vehicle as their creative canvas — or you can purchase exterior acrylic paints and auto body coatings and do-it-yourself.
How much does it cost to operate a food truck?
These are more costs you’ll need to figure into your budget as you begin your food truck business:
Staffing
You’ll need to hire and train cooks to work the grill and staff to ring up orders and hand out food—and you’ll need to pay them according to the minimum wage laws in your state.
Permits
The size of your staff also impacts the cost of your food truck permits, which can range from $100 to $1,000. In order to prep and store food, many states require that food trucks also serve as commissary spaces. This can tack on an additional $1,500, and there is often a waiting list.
Parking
Factor in where your truck will be parked at night and during times when you’re not open. If you don’t have private property on which to park, you could rent a monthly parking space through your commissary.
Licenses
There are a host of licenses you’ll need to obtain to legally run your food truck business, from establishing an Employer Identification Number (EIN) so you can file taxes to obtaining a vehicle license. You’ll also need appropriate licenses from your health department, a fire permit, vendor permits, and vendor ID badges, to name a few.
Unlike a restaurant, most states do not allow food trucks to obtain a full liquor license, but they can apply for short-term licenses to use during specific events. Toast surveyed food trucks across three U.S. cities and found the average cost of these licenses to total between $800 and $1,400.
Marketing and advertising
You’ll also need a website in order to establish an online presence so that customers can access your menu, hours, and contact info. You’ll want to establish a presence on social media so that your customers will know when you’ll be in their area.
There are many free website builders out there, like WordPress and Squarespace, and website hosting plans typically start around $10 per month. You can grow your fans organically (at no cost) by consistently posting quality, intriguing content on your social media pages, or you could pay a platform, like Instagram, to run advertisements that send traffic to you.
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How to finance your food truck
When it comes to funding your food truck business, options abound: From using your savings or profits from another business to hosting a crowdfunding campaign where you receive donations from your friends and peer network to help you get off the ground.
In addition, the U.S. Small Business Association offers low-interest loans of up to $5 million for small businesses. Known as the 7(a) loan program, these loans help a business with general expenses and allow up to 25 years for the loan to be repaid.
Or you could assemble a group of investors who, in return for their startup funds, will receive a return on their investment.
The best and worst cities for a food truck business
Using a unique, data-driven approach utilizing Google Trends, Yelp, and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Clever Real Estate came up with its list of best and worst American cities for food trucks in 2022.
The best cities had the “perfect storm” of a higher-than-average ratio of food trucks per resident, low sales tax, an interested audience (as evidenced by their search trends on Google), and the least amount of administrative red tape. The top five are:
- Portland Ore.
- Raleigh, N.C.
- Salt Lake City
- Austin, Texas
- Orlando, Fla.
The worst cities feature restrictive zoning laws that make it more difficult for food trucks to operate — and some even had yet to introduce specific regulations to the now decades-old food truck industry. As a result, at the time of publication, Virginia Beach, VA only had 28 food trucks, while Los Angeles, a friendlier city to food trucks, had 78.
These are five of the most difficult U.S. cities to run a food truck out of:
- Virginia Beach, Va.
- Chicago
- Detroit
- Dallas
- Riverside, Calif.
Rich Polk/Getty Images for Oscar Mayer
A brief history of food trucks
The New York Times credits a man by the name of Walter Scott for inventing the first food truck in 1872: He parked his wagon outside of a newspaper building in Providence, RI, and sold sandwiches, coffee, and pastries to workers. The Oscar Mayer Wienermobile was next to gain acclaim — the distinctive, hot-dog-shaped advertisement on wheels began crisscrossing the country in 1936 and basically hasn’t stopped since.
Roy Choi is credited with fueling the modern food truck craze in 2008 when, along with his partner, Mark Manguera, he came up with the novel idea to fill taco shells with barbecued Korean short ribs — this fusion fast food was met with instant success.
Choi, a Culinary Institute of America-trained chef, was unable to get a small business loan from a bank due to restrictive lending practices during the Financial Crisis of 2007–2008, so he and Manguera resorted to selling their $2 tacos out of a refurbished 1980s catering truck. Named Kogi, their food truck grossed $2 million in its first year alone; they now own a fleet of 65 trucks.
Food trucks enjoyed steady, double-digit growth between 2013 and 2019 — their only threat was competition from their growing ranks. This actually helped fuel the food truck movement, as it motivated food truck owners to come up with ever-more delicious and creative menu offerings and continue to offer consistently reasonable prices to their customers.
Food trucks started parking outside big events (like concerts, sporting events, and festivals) and forged partnerships with other established businesses, like breweries, which often had limited menus. Some cities, like Portland, Oregon, even set aside vacant land for gatherings of food trucks, known as “pods,” where food trucks themselves became the main attraction.
As a testament to their mainstream appeal, The Food Network even launched a reality show, “The Great Food Truck Race,” which was hosted by celebrity chef Tyler Florence and aired for 17 seasons from 2010 through 2024.
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Did the COVID-19 pandemic affect food trucks?
Even the COVID-19 pandemic couldn’t put the brakes on food trucks since they were based outside and were naturally “to-go” operations, allowing less direct contact with customers than indoor restaurants. In fact, The New York Times reported that food trucks were one of the few industries that found success during the global health crisis.
And since food trucks are a naturally flexible operation, their businesses are more prone to embracing new technology, such as apps that let customers place and pay for orders online, which has allowed them innovate during tough times — and reap some very lucrative rewards.
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