Independent Operators

Lessons learned from food truck competition come in handy

Photo by istock.com

April 30, 2021

Chef Marie Yniguez is putting good use to lessons learned during her time as a competitor on "The Great American Food Truck Race," a Food Network program.

The Albuquerque, New Mexico resident had a food truck strategy all set before appearing on the show, but the plan changed once the competition was over.

First off, she decided to not do a truck, but go with a trailer, according to a KRQE report.

She turned a 5-foot-by-8-foot trailer into a truck, called Smokin' Freds 46, with no motor, but with a smoker, to fulfill her business vision and it took four months to complete.

"When you are in a kitchen and you are in your position and when you're where you are supposed to be in that kitchen you have to have a box and I literally built a box," Yniguez told the news outlet.

The truck launches the second weekend in May near the Wells Fargo building in the city's downtown.