Getting Pushy

Carts mobilize operations and minimize menus to maximize sales and profits

By Margaret Sheridan, Senior Editor -- Restaurants & Institutions, 9/15/2003

Carts put temptation on wheels. They bring food to nontraditional locations and court potential customers with impulse items. Mobile platforms support big business in airport corridors, hospital and office lobbies, school cafeterias and sports arenas.

Ranging in style, price and complexity, carts can be equipped with warmers, refrigerators, grills, beverage dispensers, and plumbing and electrical hookups. Appropriate for chains and independents, fine dining and noncommercial, mobile foodservice allows operators to adapt menus to suit most locations and price points.

“Carts appeal to the consumer desire for immediacy and convenience,’’ says Bill Van San, a former coffee cart operator turned cart designer and manufacturer from City of Industry, Calif. “Using a cart is cheaper than adding a $500,000 extension to your restaurant, but it requires the flair for selling and the business acumen of a retailer.”

Splendid isolation
At sports arenas, carts serve to separate an operation’s products from competing foods at concession stands. For consumers, the convenience of not having to fight long lines compensates for the limited menu available at most carts, says Jack Hertenstein, director of operations, Eastern region, for Buffalo, N.Y.-based Sportservice Corp., a subsidiary of Delaware North Companies. Sportservice recently stocked 30 carts in Philadelphia’s new Lincoln Financial Field, home to the NFL Eagles. Used for dessert service in private suites, the carts also sell snacks and beverages in public areas.

Profitability is determined by the right location and strict cost controls, says Sandra Fletcher, president and CEO of Simco Group, a San Francisco-based operator of five restaurants and three carts (hot dogs, coffee, beverages) at Pier 39 in San Francisco. The high-traffic location for the coffee cart generates up to $200 a day in summer weekday sales and as much as $850 a day on summer weekends. Simco’s labor cost are minimal, and the custom-designed carts the company bought for $40,000 to $60,000 have a lifespan of 10 years.

Carts raise safety and security issues, says Fletcher, who installed surveillance cameras on each cart at Pier 39. Managers inventory before and after each shift to control shrinkage. “We count everything, including every hot dog bun,’’ she adds.

Lessons Learned
There are no tables or chairs at the A La Cart Café in the Olin Science Building at University of Denver. Yet the Sodexho USA operation—actually three carts on the main floor of a classroom/lab building—serves hundreds of customers daily.

“Olin is on the south part of campus, far from any retail,’’ says Neil Krauss, assistant vice chancellor for business and finance. Stocked with snacks, beverages, coffee, sandwiches and sushi, the carts generate impressive sales for Gaithersburg, Md.-based Sodexho. In February alone, they garnered 2,400 transactions, for total sales of $6,528 and a check average of $2.72. The operation requires only one full-time employee, and casters allow it to be repositioned easily. “It turned an empty space into a profit-making center,’’ Krauss says.

Adding grab-and-go items to a breakfast cart and bringing food to students increased meal sales at Roosevelt Middle School in Albuquerque, N.M. Participation jumped from 44 students to 105 when the school district replaced traditional service with carts, according to Gabriela Pacheco, a registered dietician for the district.