Vero's Blog #1:
Why la Calaca? and Why a Food Truck?
So here we go! A long time coming is the story of the La Calaca and the idea behind our Food Truck!
It is no secret that being an Entrepreneur was a goal of mine since the beginning of life. I have been a girl who has explored many avenues but never quite found anything that I loved more than food. So let's travel back to 2003. Freshman year of highschool. There I am, on my first day of class and I get ready to go to my first period! First off I have no idea where I am! Nor do I know what i'm supposed to be doing but I go about my new adventure and try to figure it all out! First class, Culinary Arts, LOL here I was thinking I signed up for some kind of drawing class! Boy was I soo sooo wrong. I get to this classroom and I walk in, and in it I find the most magical place I could have ever imagined! A room full of desks and a white board but most importantly a kitchen! a real reality type kitchen before my eyes! A place with ovens, prep tables, three compartment sinks, and coolers so big that I had no idea even existed! O.K. O.K. I guess that says a lot about my childhood LOL but it's true this state of the art type equipment was something I had never even thought existed.
In to the class comes this short lady with the loudest voice ever, I was immediately lost in her command! She walks to her desk and says, "Hello I'm Chef Kerger and you are my new culinary team. Here you will learn kitchen skills, culinary arts, and most importantly discipline!" She handed out our huge culinary books and said "these will help you learn what you need to succeed in the Culinary world but I will teach you what you need to learn to survive in the kitchens!" and so it began. The education piece of it, learning knife skills, food safety, kitchen etiquette, food surface cleaning, uniforms, and most importantly "COLLEGE" and how this program could help us get there! As I type this I get nostalgia just remembering both the excitement and the fear!
Now Chef K will have a whole blog on her own because it's well deserved! but, seeing a small WOMAN with such a HUGE position and such a Huge stance was my first sign that maybe, just maybe I could make it in this world. That maybe I wouldn't be confined to just a small part of the world and that I wouldn't just be another number in a crowd but rather carry on a legacy and leave behind more for my future family, now my son of-course!
So I carry out my 4 years of Culinary Arts, We travel, We compete, We win, and I get to go to College on a Scholarship and NOW I feel like I made it! but little did I know it had all just began! Now it's all too real! Our education was No-where near what it needed to be. I got to college with no laptop, no idea how to use excel, fairly behind in my math skills, hated reading, and had a car that was basically falling apart. I remember getting to college course day 1 and thinking , "How am I supposed to survive this?" How am I supposed to make it here! Everyone was so well dressed, walking in with their Starbucks, Mac Laptops, Fancy cars, and they read for fun LOL. Basically I was screwed! So I came home and I remember I went to see my dad (Lino) and before I could say anything, he looked at me with his sparkly eyes and he said, "I'm so proud of you mija, you made it!" and I said daddy I didn't make it, i'm scared. He looked right at me and said you want to be a someone in life, use that fear and get out there and do this! Not for me, or for anyone else but because, one day you will write about these days and you will be reminded of why you deserve a spot in the world! He said, "Let the fear guide you, everything good is worth fighting for and that goes for everything in life" Back then I was like "whatever dad!" but today I know how much value his words had behind them!
Flash forward to one of the worst days of my life. I get a call that says my father had passed away. I was in shock, I was so hurt, and genuinely at a place of loss. I didnt know what to do. I had never lost anyone in my family. We literally didn't' even know the steps to follow, it was like losing all that we stood for. My family was devastated. We scraped up the finances we had to bury our dad, and I promised myself that I would never be in that type of financial position again. That I would work so hard that my family would never have to fear being financially lost for a family loss. We learned quickly as a unit that life is short, and that what you love can very quickly be taken away. So I dedicated my life to working super hard, late nights, weekends, days, holidays, just about anytime I could work, I did because I knew life would catch up and time is of the essence.
So one day at my job I start to think how do these hot shots do it? How do they create these brands? How do they generate so much following? How do they create marketing plans? How do they truly train their people? How do they get finances? HOW this? HOW that? and I decided I'm going to figure it out! Now if you've read up to this point you should be warned that I still have not made it LOL but i'm manifesting that I will and when I do I want to have this blog as a reference to when it all started. So I said i'm going to open a bar, chased that short lived dream only to be shut down by every avenue I explored, so I drop that and say O.K. i'm going to open a restaurant only to realize you need a shit load of money LOL or you need to get into a lot of debt which is just not my pot of tea! So I'm sitting down drinking my cafecito and it hits me! VERO....... do a food truck! and I remember laughing and thinking, i'm going to be "VERO LA TRAILERA" Lmaooooo but anyways I finished my coffee and said nahhhhhhhh. Why should I even try. My husband looks at me and says why not? What if it works? What if that truck helps us work backwards, first the truck, then the brick and mortar, and then the bar? and I looked at him and laughed and said "you're crazy, I need you to shut down my dumb ideas, not encourage them!" so he says ok but that just means you won't ever do anything you really want! So I sleep on it and then it hits me, like really hits me and I say ok but if I start a truck it has to be in honor of my dad, he's my inspiration and seeing him cook just brought the most amazing memories, plus if its for my dad I won't ever give up, so he says WHATEVER! LOL just do something and stop dreaming about it.
So now I know my food-truck has to happen so I start investigating and looking and everything is sooooo expensive, banks wouldn't finance a food truck so easily, and I was flat out, out of ideas on what to do! So I said alright if everything points to me not doing this business I have to figure out what to do! So we began to work, I did side hustles every-time that I could, I worked super hard to make bonuses at my job, I stopped my expensive habits (well kinda LOL), saved my taxes, and forced my husband to help! Which brings me to July 4th 2022 We find a truck on Facebook Marketplace and we run, when I say we run, we run! I see her and I instantly FELL IN LOVE! she was not pretty, sure as hell was not ready to work to my standards, and was not anywhere near my dream truck, but no one was going to STOP ME! My husband said she's the one! We both knew she was going to be a disaster to work with but all that mattered was she was going to be ours, and let it be known ,that we know how to make things pretty! Guess the many hustles taught us to be DIY masters! Wait till the reveal of what she looks like now! She's a beauty!
So now we name her La Calaca LLC, why? because La Calaca in spanish is the skeleton. We wanted to take a spin on a traditional day of the dead to honor the many family members we have lost in the time we have come to develop this idea! So we thought what better than to introduce them to the world and let it be known that they were a big part of who we are today! One of my blogs will truly break down the relationship I had with each of our people and what they meant to us! We will feature their favorite foods on their birthdays and we will celebrate their life instead of mourn their departure!
Cheers to my very first blog :)
Vero (La Trailera) LMAO ahhh no not yet right? LOL
LOL Remember when I said we ran! I meant it!
Shoutout to @Bellastacos who sold us their baby so we could start our dream!
Vero's Blog #2:
So you feel ready? Where do you start? and what to do if you DON'T have the $ to get it going!
Alrighty, Week 2 closer to opening day and I want to break down how this all started and perhaps you're in the same boat I was once and maybe just maybe these few paragraphs could help encourage you to take a leap of faith.
Starting in the restaurant industry is definitely not for the weak of heart! This takes a lot of hard work, long hours, and most importantly discipline. The road to starting your own thing can many times feel lonely. People will tell you thousands of times to remain in your comfort zone, to take the easy road. Lots of people will question why you want to leave something you are doing well in. However, here is the bottom line and the stone cold truth, there will come a point in your life where you will question your very existence! Normal things that seemed extraordinary once, no longer fuel your fire. You will wake up and wonder if what you're currently doing is truly your calling. It happened to me! I had a few challenging months and moments where because of special circumstances I found myself doing things that were far and away from my values. I don't plan on finding culprits ever! but I knew in my heart that the cost of doing business for others was at points breaking me. The very things I once stood for were somehow crumbling before my eyes! Not, that I didn't have a voice because I always did, but I realized I could do something for the restaurant industry that not many others have accomplished. That is giving 100% to the team and letting them be my voice. Letting the people talk about who I am rather than stuffing them with false hope and lack of follow up. So I said ENOUGH! If I truly want to prove my theory then it has to be on my dime and no-one else's!
So it began the fascination for food trucks. I started looking online, adding myself to Facebook pages about food trucks, following some of my favorites, and reading books like, "How to start a foodtruck, for Dummies" LOL. Which by the way really helped pave the way for my search. I very quickly found myself in quite the dilemma. I DID NOT HAVE the finances to get started. So I put my dream on the back burner and started saving. I literally changed as many habits about myself as I could. Now I must emphasize that my husband is a huge part of what we have done, because he's always been one clever, clever man. But I sacrificed things like hanging out, going on expensive trips (because on my timeline I should have traveled the world by now LOL), no name brand things for me :( and if I could do it myself then I must. This might seem strange but very quickly I learned that money comes and goes but if you have a goal in mind you can accomplish anything. Every single year I made a promise to myself and saved a specific amount. I knew that if I truly wanted to get where I needed to be I needed to be as cautious as possible. Now don't get me wrong, don't go nuts and waste your life, simply adjust and watch the numbers work in your favor. I saved all of my taxes, which btw if I could share with you from my acountants advice always file 0 dependants and single. You will get Max $ taken from your check but if you think of it as a forced savings account you will be surprised to see the results! This was a very sweet deal for me at-least!
I quickly started to try and find financing only to find out banks require sales data from your current business (Which I obviously did not have), good credit, and a business plan. Things seemed so backwards, I needed money to start a new business, but they required an already operating business to give me the money, YUCK I felt stuck. So my husband said, "well it looks like were going to have to buy a used truck and go from the bottom up!" So I said ok well let's start looking. So we go on a crazy search, find beautiful trucks that are crazy expensive, find ugly trucks that are cheap, but need so much work. Until finally my baby came up, now this was not after 1 month this was after 2-3 years looking for her!
We go check her out and buy her! I did not want to spend another minute without this truck in my posession. So now what? Time for the upkeep of the truck! We need License Plates, City Stickers, Plate Stickers, New Title, and Insurance. So right off the bat, our truck needs money and that is with nothing to do with the food truck part of it. So we get all of that settled, and now its time to see what we have to work with. My little truck needed hella work! From the outside in I would have to figure it out little by little. So now Its time to park her, I am fortunate enough to have an empty lot to put her in but she didn't' fit. So very important to remember that food trucks are upwards of 12 feet high so they wont fit just anywhere they are very special and carry equipment that you don't expect out of a normal car so keep that in mind. So now we have to find a welder to take down my fence and adjust it to the proper height! That took me out almost $1k and that's just to be able to house her in my lot :(!
Next up is figuring out space inside the truck, was it going to be enough to live up to our menu expectations? The answer was No! This little truck had been geared up to do something completely different! A menu not created by restaurant people rather a different industry! Think of it as I worked in restaurants my whole life but went to build your house! Trust me it's not a great plan lol. So I stand inside the truck and realize I simply need more space, I need new equipment, and I need it to be food safe, and health department ready, so we decide to tear it all out, and start again! At this point im realizing why those other beautiful trucks are so expensive! I found a local guy named Ivan who's contact i'm happy to share because he did an outstanding job, who said alright I have an idea and lets get it done. Once again I find myself in a situation where I have to build out things slowly because finances are tight and I still haven't even started the business! So a couple months later I get her back and she is DEVINE! all new, fresh design, exactly what I need for my menu and NOW it's time to look into the business structure.
I decide to start an LLC. Limited Liability Company WHY? Because I'm a scary cat LOL and I have the memory of a fish, all I remember hearing was do an LLC and don't risk losing your personal belongings in case you make a mistake somewhere down the line! So that's what I stuck to. I set up my business in person downtown. 69 W. Washington St. Suite 1240. Chicago IL 60602. Waited a few weeks to obtain my acceptance letter and then proceeded to get my FEIN number online https://www.irs.gov/business/smallbusiness-self-employed/employer-id-numbers.com. Followed that with my Illinois Business Tax Number online as well at https://www.illinios.gov/rev/pages/default.aspx 55 W. Monroe Suite 1100 ChicagoIL 60602. Followed by your business license in Chicago Department of Business Affairs & Licensing www.cityofchicago.org/businessaffairs.com 121 N. LaSalle St. City Hall, Room 800 Chicago IL 60602. (bare in mind food trucks need other things like a preliminary health inspection, fire safety class, gps system, business insurance, commissary kitchen, amongst other things before obtaining the full business license.)
All of these requirements also have fees attached to them the final one being the business license which is $1000. So you need to have a nice chunk of change ready to take on these costs so that you don't get delayed in the process due to finances. So my best advice is to have at a minimum $20-$25k to start and keep yourself operating. Having more would be incredible, having less I would say would be a gamble, especially if you plan and you should, to do things the right way. The city puts all of these limitations but keep in mind they are only trying to protect you from making very costly mistakes. In my next blog I will talk about all things marketing/setting up!
-POS Systems
-Menu Building
-Social Media Accounts
-Content etc.
-Commissary Kitchens and fees
-Payroll
I will take you along my journey as I climb this very steep mountain and hopefully get across successfully and learn enough to help you get across both faster and smarter :) In the meantime enjoy some pictures of our work and how proud we are also some helpful tools that were shared with me :) Catch you guys on the flipside!
Cheers,
Vero
Checklist of Steps to start!
All Set Up and Designed for us
She's Back and She's Ours
Painting Her The First Time
Stay tuned to learn how this actually hurt us and we had to redo it LOL. One of the mistakes we learned from fairly quickly! Can't wait to see her all wrapped and share my final pics on here! Such a long process! But we're almost there!
Vero's Blog # 3: Weekly, Biweekly, Monthly , and Quarterly Expenses. (How to prepare and what to be aware of)
Alright, so we got to the point where maybe you've figured out the physical truck but what are some of the costs you have to consider to make this dream come true?
-Personal life expenses- Most business will not be profitable for a while. The real key here is if you are not financially ready to take the leap continue to work and supply your company. Things add up so quickly and it is extremely difficult to pull this off if you are not prepared. The worst thing you can do is think you have a plan and then start to fall behind on your life bills. I'd say at least a solid 3-6 months of savings to pay for your immediate needs is a good idea, obviously if you can get away with a loan or find resources through grants in your community you should aim to fill out those applications prior to departing your paying job.
-So let's start with Fuel. A full tank of gas on a Food Truck in not like your normal car you can sometimes double or even triple the cost of a full tank of regular gas in a car.
-Next up Propane Tanks, if you don't already have them you have to look at the supplier and find out what new tanks cost and how much they cost full. Depending on your cooking equipment you may need to refill these more ofter, also check with your health department and make sure you are running the right capacity as there are limitations to how much propane gas you can carry at one time.
-Now to operate legally you will need to find a Commissary Kitchen in Chicago. I am going to go with The Hatchery located at 135 N Kedzie Ave, Chicago, IL 60612. You can look them up and email them to get a tour of the location. Bare in mind this process can be lengthy so you want to get ahead of this at least 2 months before your planned opening date. I took a vitual tour and found myself needing to provide documentation that for some may take longer such as the Managers Food Safety Certificate. Fortunately I have this readily available but if you don't please jump on this and get to it because it is absolutely crucial. You will need to obtain a Letter of Intent all of this to be able to qualify for an inspection on your truck.
-Business Insurance - you will have to pay for the whole year beginning premium and need to pay for the remaining balance monthly. This is actually fairly Affordable but you will need a COI for the commissary kitchen so make sure you have your person draw this up for you first thing! I went with Progressive for this.
-Regular Car Insurance and Truck Costs- Title, City Sticker, plate stickers basically the same as a car but pricing is definitely higher since this is a larger vehicle used for commercial service.
-GPS The City will need to have an active GPS locator set up to track your parking locations and times of service. This is to make sure you are following standing rules and zoning! So this is a must for the Health Department Inspection.
-WIFI This will become critical on the truck to operate your POS system and make sure you have accessibility at all times to collect payment and obviously to keep track of any online ordering if you are going that route!
-Mechanic 90 Day Updates- You need to keep an active record of your truck being inspected every 90 days and that it is in good standing with the city expectations.
-Pest Control- You will need to have an active pest control program to make sure you can bring this with to your health department inspection as well.
-Hood Vent/Fire Safety: Updates every 6 months
-POS SYSTEM: I am using the Clover Flex which cost me just under $600 and is going to have a fee of $14.95 monthly for its operational use, apps, taxes, etc. Now tack on a total of about 3% fee per transaction. This can very very quickly dig into your profitability so you absolutely have to be prepared!
Other Costs: Business License $250, Fire Department Inspection $300, Health Department Inspection $1,000
and then obviously other expenses, repairs, and food cost which is crucial to your success as a Food Truck Operator. Last but certainly not least is all of the cosmetic repairs if your truck is not set up you will find yourself digging into your pockets more often than anticipated, but if you're smart and you carry some of this cost and knowledge with you, you can hopefully be ahead of the game and prepare for whats to come!
The key here is to Plan the Work and Work the Plan! Don't let any of this take you by surprise! Be ready!
Cheers to writing this BLOG which was not my favorite LOL,
Vero
Vero's Blog #4: Now the Fun and Exciting Stuff (Menu Building/ Logo Design/ Bringing it all to life!)
I have to be honest and say this is the blog I have been most invested in, I have been trying to get to it since I started this whole process :). Why? you may ask! It's because this is the part that althoughs somewhat costly really starts to turn the wheels! This is all about how you put your ideas on paper, how you get the logo designed, and how does it all tie back to your truck. t
My tip is grab some colored pencils and sketch this out! No need to be picasso but remember NO ONE can see your thoughts! If you can put it on paper you can help a designer understand where you are going with this! My Logo brought me to tears when I saw it finalized I tried so many different peolple who just did not get what I wanted. So I reached out to cartoonist on Instagram who happened to be doing some free-lance work. She said she could cartoonize my family using pictures and her turnaround was magnificent. So huge shout out to @anitapartyartist on instagram who did an incredible job! So I had the main picture for everything social media but the LOGO still needed to be created. This is where my good friend Roberson came in. He focuses on doing business design and truck wraps. He came over one day and we just chatted about what I saw as a finished product and he said I think I got it! Couple days later he send over a prototype that I fell in love with, we did a few tweaks here and there and before I knew it! We were up and running. His contact is (773) 272-6443 The LOGO was finalized and I had what I needed to make it happen on all social media. So now we move onto the production of the truck wrap. Remember in my second blog how I said it was a bad idea to paint my truck, well we used the incorrect base which made it and impossible format for the wrap to go on my truck. So we had to strip all the paint off and purchase real car paint and reset the surface so that the vinyl could stick with no issues! So now we are doing a partial wrap with individual designs to allow the wrap to truly stick on properly and prevent a full lyft from the surface! .............tbc.