To be fair, I’d pay $5 for 5 grilled cheese sandwiches and eat them all in one setting.
Ah, a restaurant run by the head chef and the head chef alone
“Cash only. I don’t have Venmo because I’m not some teenage asshole who vapes”
That part got me haha
My gf and her friends are in their late twenties and vape, how old is this post?
2019
It’s definitely poking fun at the fact that people who vape are younger on average than those who smoke cigs, not supposing literally only teens vape.
Sort of like how lots of old people also use venmo, but it’s particularly popular among the young.
Very.
2019
Very old
Zoomer genocide when
Zenocide?
I’m stealing that
I’m middle aged and vape. A lot of us old-heads switched from cigarettes a long time ago.
Id love to see food trucks that were dirt cheap and just did 1 food. Please park this grilled cheese truck outside my house
I went to a food truck festival a few weeks ago, and holy shit the prices of stuff. I don’t think there was a single item you could get for less than $18, and that was like the price of three french fries.
In Colorado, that has been my experience for over a decade. Food truck food was never cheap here. In Portland, just this year, I managed a few great and cheap meals from their food carts.
Yes but they were artisanal french fries
Yeah that’s how it is here. Food trucks are only at events and event food costs a fortune for some reason. You’d think that having 1000s of hungry people in one place would allow the to drop the price a bit but nah gotta squeeze us for everything.
TBF food trucks are insanely expensive (like, $80K+ expensive) so I don’t really blame owners for charging whatever people will pay. I’m just amazed people pay that much.
for some reason.
Because useful idiots are proud to pay for it then complain they don’t have enough money.
Yeah classic food truck venue here is an event at a brewery where they’re legally required to serve food. So you buy tickets and then provide to the vendors, but if you work out the prices it ends up being insane with super small quantities. They always have to make the food weird too, sometimes it’s cool but sometimes you just want normal shitfood.
I wanna do one where it’s like simple lowbrow stoner food done just a little fancy. Like grilled PB&J, but the peanut butter is the good stuff and the jam has the full berries in it, sourdough bread that can really take a heavy fry in some salted butter. The kind of stuff that’s dirt simple to make but really shines with a bit of extra love.
You’d think that having 1000s of hungry people in one place would allow the to drop the price a bit
That’s the sound of market demand going up, baby!
Trucks that do 1 or 2 foods are not that uncommon. We have a fish and chip truck and a glazed donut truck. But none are cheap.
But none are cheap.
This is the real kicker. Businesses charge what people are willing to pay, not what stuff costs to produce.
In my city: there was two stoners who ran around making three types of ramen - vegan, non-vegan (their broth is a different), and regular (they crack an egg).
It was like $6-7.
I loved those guys and used to follow them around.
Imagine paying $6 for noodles.
They probably loved you, lol.
A ramen groupie
There would be a line around the block. This is the grilled cheese of everyone’s childhood. Add a sprinkle of salt or use salted butter when cooking on the skillet and I would be in line with everyone else holding a fiver.
Salt? That’s it, your head’s going on the griddle.
Really? A very light sprinkle of salt when the sandwich is on the buttered griddle is the shit, especially if you’re using a cheese that is lower in salt. Get that nice crust on the bread with a savory pop. Combine that with a tomato soup and it’s the bomb.
Don’t knock it until you try it.
Edit: bloody purists. Gonna turn this into a melt/grilled cheese thing aren’t you.
(in case you never got it, read the right side of the food truck.)
But I didn’t say anything about a tomato!
(Yeah, I missed it)
Tomato soup? Gonna have to flip your head over on the griddle. This is embarrassing for you.
Use a thin layer of mayonnaise instead of butter before putting it on the pan for a commercial-worthy grilled cheese.
You’re really asking for it, huh.
Man, I’m so embarrassed for them.
Americans are putting tomato slices on grilled cheese sandos? Fack man, just when I thought y’all couldn’t sink any lower…
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That is not a grilled cheese that is a melt their is a very fucking distinct difference
It’s fucking good.
People are actually in this thread discussing how feasible this is as if it were a real plan down to calculating specific costs and supporting them with URLs.
Never change, Lemmy.
Many of us do have this fantasy.
I’m sick of seeing $6 for a bag of fries and $12 for a basic ass sandwich.
I mean, it’s a bummer when the bougie burger places do this, but when the taco trucks and teriyaki shops near me started costing more than $2 a taco or $10 for a plate of yakisoba, I knew shit was getting hard out there.
Here in Canada we’ve got trucks selling 3 tacos for like $18. People here are out of their minds
My god. I mean, it’s probably a fair price to pay for no mass shootings and universal health care, but still wild.
$10 yakisoba???
I live in a small town in Oregon. A few years ago, it was $7. Now it’s $10.
Gaslamp district in San Diego had a cafeteria like this years ago, guessing it’s no longer a thing, but simple cheap menu would have steady customers, maybe profitable, it’s the business development people who would oppose.
A few years back in HollandN(UTRECHT) one shop actually ONLY sold sandwiches (not grilled) for a buck or so. They had LINES. Then shit got renod
None of this sentence makes any sense at all man
Just saying the concept works, ppl DO want a simply Sammy for a buck and the ingredients are less as 30% of sales price even with some real decent toppings. But renovation (and extreme rent) only allows multi nationals to compete at busy places like city central stations etc.
There was one in metro vancouver area, it was a store front. but it was just cheap grilled cheese nothing else. like costco hot dog pricing
It still there? I’m in downtown but go through metro enough it’d be worth knowing about
Makes me wonder what people are paying for bread, Kraft cheese (or a knockoff of the same) and butter/margarine.
Seriously, a single grilled cheese shouldn’t be more than $1, it should be much less… At least in materials… The cost of grilling it and cleaning up and whatnot should still be really cheap. Even if you wrap the sandwiches in wax/parchment paper or whatever and serve it, you should still be able to make a profit per sandwich. Whether you would be better off doing this rather than getting a job at McDonald’s or whatever… That will depend on how popular the food truck is…
There used to be a vending machine in a hosiptal near me that would heat up a premade grilled cheese sandwich for £2. Being a vending machine in a hospital, they had to be making at least enough to cover the costs plus wastage. I’d say that somewhere with high footfall, especially on a cold day, you could make at least some profit from this.
Selling hot coffee to prostitutes on the street in winter at night
SOURCE: Xitter, June 7, 2019
https://twitter.com/tinymediaempire/status/1136992675742269440
The number of replies and follow-ups to this is amazing. It’s a brilliant read.
I think I have to register to read the thread. not sure it’s worth it. ludditism intensifies.
please copy and paste it or screenshot it for those of us who abhor Twitter
Sprinkle a little garlic powder in there and it’s like eating a grilled cheese and garlic bread at the same time
None of that artisan bullshit, read the truck
I realize this is a joke but how could this be profitable? The ingredients alone are more than a dollar.
Umm… what? 2 slices of white bread, 1 slice of American cheese, and some butter is not more than a dollar.
You must be one of those people who complains about not having enough money when you spend it like an idiot.
Where are you where it would cost more than $1. Buying product in bulk would be very cheap.
Because I have no life, I looked it up.
Bread in Finland is about 0.1 usd per slice Low quality cheese is about 8 usd / kg, assuming you need about 20g/portion that’s 0.16 usd. Total is about 36c per portion.
If we assume power consumption of 5kw for the whole operation and power cost of 20c/kWh, that’s 1usd/h
Assuming sales of 60 units per hour -one per minute, thats 60 usd of revenue per hour and 22.6 usd of non labor cost, it leaves 37.4e for labor, taxes, permits, tools, fuel.
It’s at least only feasible in high volume locations.
When allocating food cost (in your costs) 36% is around where you want it-30% would be more ideal, but you can get that through sales, bulk discount etc. So, regardless of volume food cost % is basically where it should be.
Some numbers in spain: slice cheese .19/slice bread .08/ slice (.16) Margarine (because: costs!) .04/10g .39
To get closer to a feasible food cost you’d have to sell at 1.25
I was with you until you suggested it would use 5kWh every hour. That’s an insane amount of power even if they were using an electric griddle, which is unlikely. A small generator would be enough to power the lighting and refrigeration and then the griddle would run on gas, which is way cheaper than electricity (or the petrol for the electric generator).
I’d imagine energy costs would be a fraction of what you’ve calculated, and would scale up along with any increase in sales volume.
I make 37.4$ per hour? But what if I save on these 1$ per hour electricity costs
Depends on where you are, gas use is very rare here. Anyway the energy cost is a negligible part, you can halve or double it and it won’t change the business case.
I live on earth. Even if you’re buying bulk, it will still be more than a dollar to make. The bread alone bought in bulk would still be around $0.25 per slice. That’s 50 percent of the cost right there.
You’re getting ripped off.
Who’s your bread guy?
Indeed. I can grab a loaf of cheap white bread from my local grocery store for under $2 which is cut into 22 slices.
You are getting 22 slices? What brand are you getting? I feel like 16 is the standard but about 50% of the time I’m fairly certain it’s only 15 or 17.
Meijer and Walmart store brands of cheap ass white bread are 22 slices, Kroger is 21, and for a name brand example Sunbeam is 22. Nicer bread like Pepperidge Farm or Brownberry/Oroweat tends to be in the range of 16 slices per loaf (baring the thin sliced stuff) though.
Cut those in half again and double your profit!
I would love to see your source. I don’t buy bread in bulk but I have a friend who owns a local restaurant in my town. I know how much he pays for the bread he serves for breakfast and it doesn’t get cheaper than that.
I fight seagulls for it.
Youth these days think you buy everything and don’t understand a little labour goes a long way.
I imagine fighting the seagulls would be like living in a post-apocalyptic future scavenging for food.
It’s great practice to keep my katana skills sharp.
I don’t buy in bulk, and I pay under $2usd for a loaf of basic white bread from any supermarket. After taxes, to be clear.
If I were to bulk buy / business discount, it would be less.
https://www.safeway.com/shop/product-details.960013141.html
This is not the cheapest, you can get better pricing than this with a Costco business account. Your friend is probably not serving the lowest price bulk bread available, they probably have some self respect.
Well even with that bread you are still spending about $0.25 per sandwich on bread. I still don’t see how that’s profitable after adding cheese and butter. You could do it by drastically reducing the amount of cheese and butter but is it really a grilled cheese when you put a single shred of cheese on it?
Honestly the cheese and butter together will probably cost less that $0.25 bulk cheese is cheap as hell and you’re using almost no butter per sandwich
I’ll take your word for it. I’m not a member so it doesn’t show me the price. Looking forward to all the profitable $1 grilled cheese trucks coming soon.
You might be right about the profitability of the grilled cheese truck but it’s okay to admit you were wrong on the bread.
It’s the internet, not one really cares if you are wrong.
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25¢ per slice.
You’re paying ~$5usd for a loaf of basic white bread? Wow.
Where I live, it’s currently $4Cdn for a loaf of basic white Wonder bread, it’s $8.50Cdn for a stick of salted butter, and $5.50Cdn for a pack of 22 slices of processed cheese (not the thick slice type). My country is currently going through a bit of a cost of living crisis because shelter, heating, food costs are becoming insane. How much are those things where you live? I think it’s interesting the differences based on where we all are. 1$ for an entire grilled cheese sandwich in Canada would be considered an incredible deal for takeout food pricing.
In the UK I can currently buy an 800g loaf of bread for 45p (£0.45), a 500g tub of soft spread butter substitute for 99p (£0.99), and a 200g pack of 10 cheese slices for 65p (£0.65).
Each sandwich would cost about 12p (£0.12) to make, excluding the energy costs.
Doubling up on the cheese, or using higher quality cheese would still keep it under 20p per sandwich, and that’s off the shelf costs, no bulk discounts.
Excuse me while I write up a business plan…
(presuming you mean $CAD for Canadian dollars, not cdn)
$4cad = $2.90usd = 13.2c/slice
$5.50cad = $4usd = 18.2c/slice
That’s 44.5c each.
That’s 125% profit. Given that a common margin aimed for is 100%, this is a good deal with your over priced products. And I don’t believe you can’t get basic white bread for less than $4cad in Canada.
Also, $1usd is $1.37cad
Here’s bread from Walmart for about $0.06 per slice.
Here’s cheese for $0.10 per slice
https://www.walmart.com/ip/Great-Value-Sweet-Cream-Salted-Butter-16-oz/132893363?athbdg=L1200
And butter for about $0.25 per ounce (you might use .5 oz per sandwich.) EDIT: checked my butter in my fridge, you’re probably using 1/4 of an ounce per sandwich if that.
And none of these are in bulk, you can probably cut the cost in half or less buying even more generic products in bulk.
I think this meme is older than COVID, so it might’ve been slightly profitable back when it was first photoshopped?
July 7, 2019 - so yep.
But still profitable after 4 years.
Would make more money renting the food truck out as capsule sleeping for 6 people though, these days.
I just priced it out from ingredients bought from Sam’s club. 33 cents for two slices of bread, one slice of American cheese, and I added an extra 5 cents for butter substitute.
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Labor for a single grilled cheese is super easy. If you’re selling a lot of them this could be decently profitable.
Gas for the generator is where it would kill you. Your best bet is to make all the grilled cheese as fast as possible to save on gas and dispense them throughout the day.
It doesn’t seem too unreasonable. Based on some quick searches, bulk cheese breaks down to about $.19 a slice, two pieces of bread is about $.10, butter is wobbly here because I don’t know exactly how much they’d be using, but let’s say half an ounce/1 Tbsp is about $.25? Probably not a whole lot of profit after the cart and rent for the space, but you could probably get close to breaking even if you sold enough and/or had a better bulk supplier than what I can see with 5 minutes of research.
Yes, it’s profitable. They lose money on each sale, but make up for it in volume.
He did the math
He did the melty math
no pepper. no hot sauce. no dippin that in a fryer. no fresh tomato slices. the only point of this being an entire food truck is to cover it in angry words.
None of those things you mentioned are ingredients in grilled cheese. The purpose of the food truck is to make grilled cheese.
if you want to read the original thread, check this: https://nitter.net/tinymediaempire/status/1136992675742269440#m
10/10 dark af 1/10 sandwiches are rubbbery
Oh shit I thought it was a shopped picture just for the concept
it is, the designer/illustrator Daniel Danger did a render of both sides
Yeah after looking again I noticed that 😅
If I were drunk, I’d probably get 300$ out of the ATM and laugh the entire hour or whatever it took…
Then eat like 10 and give the rest away to people.
Put this outside a good number of pubs in the UK and you’ll make an absolute killing. It would have to offer a £1 toastie, of course, but the principle is the same.
ACAB, my good chap.
Ew
