Buying Your Hot Dog Cart

1) Check you local county health departments requirements for operating a mobile food stand, remember that there may be different rules for "hot dog only carts" vs those mobile food stands that prepare a much higher risk product such as raw meats and fish.

2) Check with your city zoning and make sure that there are no obstacles in obtaining a general transient permit for street vending. If you have served in the military then chances are this is free to you for your lifetime. My husband is a proud former Marine and so proud to carry his lifetime transient/vendor permit.

3) Compile a simple business plan. When and where do you plan to operate? What will your menu items be, make it simple. Start out as a street vendor just to get some practice in and then find out where in your area you could make the most money. Likely someone out there will have valuable advice for you about your area. Usually those who do not take the risk of being a small business owner have endless amounts of advice for your business success. Some is worth millions little do they know.

4) Set up your suppliers, who will you purchase your product from and how much will it cost you? Do they have a rebate program. Will a family owned meat market trade commissary privledges as long as you purchase all of your meat products from them, or a bakery store? This will save you precious funds if you can barter these services.

5) Do a comprehensive product cost analysis so that you can plan a menu. Find out what your cost is and how much you will make off each product. Determine how many of those units you need to sell each day to stay in the black. This prevents you from thinking that you can sell quality hot dogs at $1.00 each and still make a living.

6) Now determine how much you are willing to spend on your start up business and what type of unit you will need to produce your menu items in a comfortable timely manner. Remember, start your hot dog business simple. You can always complicate things later, you will wish you didn't.

7) Use this formula to calculate how much to allocate for each item. 35 % for food product cost, 35% for your overhead or business start up cost, and the remaining 30% goes into your pocket as pay. Now, later on you can reduce these to 25% for food cost, 25% labor cost to hire someone, 25% overhead cost and 25% goes back into your pocket. Quite alot if you are not operating your own business.

8) Look for your cart, make sure that they can provide you with schematics to submit to the health department for approval. check the following manufacturers... I will list my site first because this is my blog. lol

www.hotdogcarts.com
www.worldsbesthotdogcarts.com
www.willydogs.com
www.allamericanhotdogcarts.com
www.americandreamhotdogcarts.com

Remember when looking for a hot dog cart these things are most important:

All stainless easy to clean exterior and interior design, no porous materials such as wood that you would need to treat year after year. Bacteria can be easily absorbed into wood.

pressurized water system, 12 volt is good make sure that they include your battery and charger because this could cost you as much as $100.00 additional.

If you are going to move from place to place, make sure it is highway grade and towable, with a working light kit.

For hot dogs only you will require a 3 pan steamtable. For an extended menu, you will need more room for product.

Make sure that the manufacturer offers a warranty, ask for references and read about them on the web. Anyone can have problems with a hot dog cart but if the manufacturer cares about it's customers they will try to do their best to help their customers.

Last but not least, make sure that they are there for you after the sale. No, not to go to dinner but to support you in your adventure. Mine was. He was and is still there for me and always answered all of the questions I had about the hot dog cart business. If you have any questions please comment and I will be happy to respond in my next blog... Good luck and until next time.

Keep doggin IT out there.