Skip to main content

Foodtrucks and Compromise

By

Count me as one of the fans of the exploding gourmet food truck revolution: the quality of these lunch or light dinner bites, combined with the short term availability, make them a compelling draw for me. Here in SF, we have amazing choices, like the Bacon Bacon truck, the Rib Whip, and An The Go, among dozens of others. One of my favorite parts of the summer was the Friday night Food Truck Crush at the Larkspur Ferry building: 5 or so of the region's finest, lined up to tantalize me with their offerings as I disembarked from the City. Delicious.


Recently, the food truck phenomenon is getting a little uglier. Traditional restaurants, paying rent for fixed space in a desirable location, are seeing their customers siphoned off by trucks parked just outside. Free economy, right? Sure, but these trucks are sometimes coming to the same spot daily, staying for hours, and taking up parking and commerce spots, in some cases obscuring the storefronts of their competition. Restaurants are fighting back, calling police to tow the offenders, or, in some cases, taking matters in to their own hands. And food truckers are not all so thrilled either: as their business booms, the shared prep space they use to whip up these morsels is getting more crowded and some are moving into fixed storefronts, if only to have a little breathing room.

Now, today there is a heated debate in Sacramento: legislation is being considered to restrict the trucks. Among the restrictions are having to move every 30 minutes (a law on the books now). As predicted, there is a backlash from food truck aficionados, the truck owners, and festival organizers; the petition in Sacramento seems to focus on the fact that, if the ordinance is enforced, it would stop festivals and the like. And I find myself torn. One one side, I LOVE the tasty treats, and the endless variety, and I want to see them flourish. On the other, it does seem that they are often turning a food truck into a temporary restaurant, and impacting the businesses that have paid good money to be in high traffic areas. It's only going to get worse, as more trucks compete for the dining dollar. 

My suggestions:
  • Yes, these trucks are trucks. They should have to move...unless they are parked at either a vacant location, with the permission of the property owner; a public location that does not offer regulated parking (i.e. meters, garage, etc.); or with a permit from the city (for festivals, etc.). 
  • The trucks should have a portion of their license fee be designated for a fund for fixed restaurants within 1 city block of the truck's locations. The Trucks should have to report their locations and times, or fund a monitored GPS that will do the same (maybe an app?); the city should have to write a check, monthly, based on the amount of time the business was in their area, to the nearby restaurants.
  • Smart local restaurants should turn the tables: offer the use of their facilities to the truck owners in certain times, in return for a small fee and a guarantee that the truck will not impact their business by selling nearby. First mover's advantage.
I hope the balance can be met, as I want to see the cities turn their urban blight (abandoned areas, closed buildings) into thriving food centers, without harming the hardworking restaurants.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Loyalty Review: Kohl's Yes2You

By
 As some of you know, I've spent over 15 years in the customer loyalty space. So, when I come across a new retail loyalty program, I can't help but see the pluses and minuses. After this many years, it's kind of ingrained. Periodically, I'll share my thoughts with you. Today, it's Kohl's turn under the scope. Let's have a look, shall we? I've divided the review up into three sections: what's good about the program, what's bad about the program, and what I'd change about it. That last one has some actual value: I charged hundreds of dollars per hour for loyalty program consulting, and had over a dozen clients, before I moved to JustAnswer FT. But, being a pandemic and all, I'm giving it away for free here. Kohl's, you're welcome. Here we go! The Good Sign up is opt in Seems odd to praise Kohl's for this, but in department store loyalty, this is a rarity, and a smart one. It means the customers who are opted in are already prime
1 comment
Read more

The Icarus Effect

By
This morning's news started with the latest grim proof of overdevelopment in a tough sector: SkyBus Airlines shut down , less than year from when it started. Never heard of Skybus? Not surprising; they chose to focus on trips from Ohio to the West Coast for ridiculously low fares. Yes, you read that right: the airlines' unique niche was that they focused on trips from Ohio . Was air travel such an amazingly profitable business that we needed that much segmentation and focus? Of course not. A year ago, when Skybus was just getting off the ground (har har), fuel costs were at an all time high. United was still in bankruptcy; Delta, a fellow airline with a major hub in Ohio, was just exiting Chapter 11. And yet, "irrational exuberance" led investors like Nationwide Mutual Capital, Huntington Capital Investment Co., and Battelle Services Co. to ignore the obvious signs of risk, and dive into what was a dubious investment. Today, they, and the passengers who were lured by
Post a Comment
Read more

2020 CV19 Lockdown: Winners and Losers

By
It is said that in any time in history, the winners and losers are determined when a unique set of circumstances arises the requires an unprecedented response. How a company responds to those conditions can often propel them to new heights, or sentence them to an ignominious end. This post is meant to be an ongoing and often updated list of those that may come out of the Great 2020 Covid19 Lockdown as champs...or chumps. Winners Zoom How is it that, with all of the video conferencing choices in the market, a relatively obscure one (and a freemium one, to boot!) ran away with the title? Think of it: you had entrenched competitors like Skype and Facebook, as well as work-focused like Microsoft Teams , Google Hangouts , and Amazon Chime , any one of which had far greater reach than Zoom . Yet Zoom won, to the point that they achieved the exalted state of having their product/platform become a verb ("I'll Zoom you later"). More amazingly, they even continued their gro
Post a Comment
Read more