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<p><!-- Make sure you modify the 4Cast title in this section -->
<span style="font-size: 20px; font-weight: bold;
color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: arial;
line-height: 110%;">OPLIN 4cast #384: Lessons
from food trucks</span><br>
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<span style="font-size: 11px; font-weight: normal;
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font-family: arial;">May 7th, 2014</span></p>
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<p style="text-align: justify;font-size: 16px;
font-family: arial; line-height: 110%;"><img
src="cid:part4.04020603.05000708@oplin.org"
alt="food truck" align="left" height="75"
width="140">If you spend much time in a city,
you are familiar with food trucks, the colorful
mobile restaurants that seem to be everywhere from
mid-morning to midnight. The parking lot of our
office building hosts a different food truck a
couple of days a week, and we've noticed that
people drive to our building just to find their
favorite food truck for lunch. So if "foodmobiles"
are so popular, why do bookmobiles seem to be a
slowly dying breed? Sure, food is more popular
than books (for most people, anyway), but we know
books are not exactly unpopular. Maybe libraries
can learn something from the food trucks.
</p>
<div> </div>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li style="text-align: justify; font-size: 16px;
font-family: arial; line-height: 110%;"><a
href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-seo/food-trucks_b_3721730.html">The
new cool kid on the block: How food trucks
evolved from roach coaches to cultural
phenomena</a> (The Huffington Post/Jane Seo)
"With their relatively low marketing and
operational costs, food trucks proved to be
extremely prosperous; within a couple of years,
the business solidified as a lucrative venture
that chefs lauded as being more rewarding and
financially feasible than maintaining
brick-and-mortar restaurants. But economics only
partly explain the transformation of the food
truck business. Perhaps an even bigger factor is
the change in its customer base, which can be
noted by the type of food served in these food
trucks as well as the role of social media in
spreading their popularity."</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; font-size: 16px;
font-family: arial; line-height: 110%;"><a
href="https://economics.columbian.gwu.edu/sites/economics.columbian.gwu.edu/files/downloads/Micro%20-%20ak_foodtruck_2014_mar_submit.pdf">How
smartphones and social media dialed up the
food truck boom and increased access to food
variety</a> [pdf] (The George Washington
University/Elliot Anenberg and Edward Kung)
"Figure 1 shows that food truck revenues started
growing very rapidly in 2007, achieving almost a
50% growth in revenue over 5 years and reaching
$1.5 billion in 2012. Figure 1 also shows that
2007 was the year that the iPhone, one of the
first popular smartphones capable of accessing
the internet from anywhere, was released. We
will present evidence that this was no
coincidence, as new mobile technology resolves
an information friction complicating the entire
food truck business model. In this way, we will
show how mobile technology can facilitate a new
mode of economic activity that was largely not
profitable before."</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; font-size: 16px;
font-family: arial; line-height: 110%;"><a
href="http://www.pammarketingnut.com/2013/10/social-media-tips-for-food-trucks/">20
social media tips for food trucks</a> (Pam
Moore, "The Marketing Nut") "Your greatest
opportunity to engage with visiting customers to
your food truck is immediately after they
experienced your food. It is then they still
remember the smells and tastes within their
mouth. Be sure to check your social profiles
daily for comments, new fans. Engage with them,
talk to them like human beings. Let them know
you appreciate them. Invest in doing some social
listening to know what customers are saying
about your brand."</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; font-size: 16px;
font-family: arial; line-height: 110%;"><a
href="http://215marketing.com/uncategorized/hello-world/">7
marketing lessons from a food truck</a>
(215Marketing) "You can have the best product or
service, but if your consumer perceives it as
low quality, you'll quickly find yourself out of
business. Food Trucks are a great example of
this and I find myself completely disregarding
the trucks with poor design, rusty bumpers, or
lazy presentation for the more fancy trucks with
graphic vinyl wrapping and creative food
choices. Perception can be everything in most
industries and is the main reason companies form
strong brands."</li>
</ul>
<div style="text-align: left;"> </div>
<p style="text-align: left; font-size: 20px;
font-family: arial; line-height: 110%;"><small><strong><em>Alternative
fact:</em></strong></small><br>
</p>
<div style="text-align: justify; font-size: 16px;
font-family: arial; line-height: 110%;">Research
conducted by the National Restaurant Association
last year <a
href="http://www.restaurant.org/Manage-My-Restaurant/Operations/Alternative-venues/Food-trucks-the-wheel-deal">indicated</a>
that 19% of "fast casual restaurants" planned to
start operating a food truck as an alternative
venue to their brick-and-mortar operations.
</div>
<div style="text-align: left;"> </div>
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