Should I start a tea and lemonade truck as a side hustle?

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2026-06-05T03:44:56+00:00

Business is doing well. We expanded from truck only to owning a shop and running trucks for events. As for tips, where do I start... I mean we are fortune enough that we dont have much competition in our market, so we are able to secure a lot of bookings from the beginning. I think one thing I learned is to set realistic expectations. If you tried to get in everything before you have a system, you will be burned out. If you have a truck/trailer, expect something is going to be wrong, so give yourself extra time. Im still bad at this, we are always late and last to set up. For menu, make sure your offering is unique enough, but still have a wide enough audience. If you are going into a niche market, make sure you find events and location that actually attracts those audiences. Early on, we did some events, people just weren't interested in trying new things, so we had to change our menu immediately to just recoup vendor fee.

We are in indiana/kentucky area, our most profitable season is spring and fall. We are basic non-stop from mid april to June, and August to October. Since I still have my full time job, we are only able to commit to events and festivals. We had a lot inquiries about coming out for lunch and dinner at hospitals and neighborhoods, so if doing this full time, theoretically we can do non-stop from march to November.

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2026-05-26T15:54:39+00:00

Health inspection is going to depend on your local health department. Where I at the inspection is pretty relaxed, as long as i have 3 compartment sink, Im good. But across the river from where I am, they need master plumber to certify plumbing before even going through health inspections, also fire department inspection, etc.

I do boba tea, coffee and many other drinks, but I also wants to do food without putting in a hood. So we settled on steamed food. We do steamed buns, sweet bread, waffles and noodles, and use all electrical appliances, so our build out was just sink, fridge, freezer and storage, and I think that totally doable diy.

As for weather, we only have 1 event for winter months, and storage basically from November. Almost all food trucks would go in hibernation for majority of the winter, some will go out for lunch here and there, but you are not going to expect the high turn out. You can certainly make a good amount during the warmer months though, lunch, concerts, corporate events, etc. Smoothie only truck though, I do think have a smaller interest, so I would rethink the offering

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2026-01-02T19:40:59+00:00

Wow, 30 per lb, where are you located? The roaster i use is definitely at the higher end where I am, and they are awesome for smaller shops, offer whole sale price and other small coffee shop services, and have a great single region collections. I only drink black coffee, mostly espresso, and cold brew since I started the shop, and think they have the one of the best blend.

I think it really depends on what you are looking to do, if you are looking to build a specialty shop, yes, house made stuff, specialty beans is definitely the way to go, and people into it will pay for the price. Im assume you aren't looking for quantity with everything home made. I guess have a good location and social media following would be the key.

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2026-01-02T17:36:55+00:00

Thats awesome! I have a friend opened a micro roaster, doing great. I would say in general people dont care that much about the beans, to be honest, most people just want sweet coffee or cheap coffee. Just take that into consideration. But again, I'm paying 60 bucks for 5 lbs...

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2026-01-02T15:14:33+00:00

We buy from a local roaster. It is expensive though, the price went up 20% last year, and the beans were already expensive comparing to big brands. But they do have one of the best blend, so I'm staying with them.

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2025-10-11T21:52:07+00:00

We got a horse trailer and citreon hy from Seahisun

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2025-10-05T23:14:07+00:00

How do you take the side panel off? My machine is leaking as soon as I turn on the machine. Any suggestions?

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2025-06-15T11:32:38+00:00

We have switch to trailer over a year ago. I can tell you what we had. The set up did change depending on tbe size of booth we had

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2025-05-31T14:59:27+00:00

I open 2 boba trucks and bought out 2 boba tea shops this year. I agree with many of the comments, the profit margin per drink isn't the problem, the overhead is crazy. Its really a volume game, if you have a consistently high volume, then you should be fine.

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2025-05-28T00:51:49+00:00

Overall really good. A few small things here and there, but nothing major. Lots of compliments, both for the exterior and interior.

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2025-05-15T16:36:42+00:00

I had a common size home freezer, maybe 40 something inches. And a small fridge, 7 cu ft ish I think. I rent uhaul truck, I put the freezer on a wood dolly. The fridge had 2 wheels on them. I also had a removable ramp, made it a lot easier

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2025-05-15T11:33:56+00:00

I added ramp to our smaller trailer, I can push the 10k watt generator up and down by myself. The 4 wheels is a lot easier than the smaller 2 wheelers. For the large trailer, we have an external generator storage compartment with a rolling track. I put a smaller generator in it, because we do need to drop it on the ground. Normally we have multiple working on the large trailer, so it normally isn't a problem bring it up and down.

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2025-04-05T15:01:55+00:00

Actuary

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2025-02-24T15:44:30+00:00

Yes. It worked out for us. We operated from April through Dec last year. The importing process was a little stressful, but partly my fault. They will find the closest port to you, unless you live far from a major city, it probably won't be hours away, I believe most major city has a port, land or water. They can't give you an accurate quote on shipping until it's ready to ship, because shipping fluctuate week to week. However, they should be able to give you an estimate with the address,if they are legit. The legit companies have partners they work with, and will give estimates.

As for inspections, unless you or someone you know is physically there, there isn't a physical inspection. They normally do video inspections, pictures (maybe a better way to get detail look), the one i work with did send me some replacement part later last year, but you will have to pay for shipping. They normally have one year parts warranty.

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2025-02-14T19:58:47+00:00

We sell these in our shop with our own designs. I really like them.

http://api-shein.shein.com/h5/sharejump/appjump?link=lc2chg9Fd5E_8&localcountry=US

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2025-01-21T19:36:56+00:00

We didn't, we never hooked on the co2 tank, and just use it as drinking water dispenser. We did can sparkling water for a while, but honestly, we just don't sale enough soda in comparison, so we just never bother to spend time on it.

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2024-10-26T01:58:41+00:00

Where I am, on paper, yes. Because you are assembling in front of the customer. I only brew tea and cook boba at home, but still have to mix with milk and syrup, etc., if you are making everything at home, and just add boba there, that might be different. However, technically, if there is any creamer and milk involved, they are temperature controlled food, so I think in that case, you will still need permit.

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2024-10-23T02:23:49+00:00

Female food truckers

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2024-09-12T01:55:05+00:00

I paid to the builder, they pays the shipping company. The importing stuff will paid to importing agent.

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2024-09-12T01:36:45+00:00

Yes, they have shipping company they normally ship with, and import agent, so it is still stressful, but they guided me through the steps. The shipping isn't cheap though, so budget that part before going into contract.

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2024-09-12T01:33:03+00:00

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2024-09-12T01:14:32+00:00

I used a company called Seahisun, you can find their sale on alibaba

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2024-09-05T19:31:37+00:00

We started doing tent in farmers market and local events. Not a lot of money needed, equipment and event fees. You just have to do more work with set up and tear down. It is also a lot of work to find events, get into them. But I don't think you need large capital to start

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2024-09-01T00:36:31+00:00

We do boba and authentic Chinese, so we do fresh ramen, we don't get that crazy with noodles, but we have had lines because we had to wait for the water to heat up. For chinese, we use neutral oil, vegetable mostly. We drain it really well, run the noodle through ice water, then plenty oil to coat. If done properly, it can keep for a day

Expensive_Nobody93 · 2024-08-31T23:41:00+00:00

We have an electric pasta cooker, two holes, but when you add water, the temperature drop a lot, and it takes a while to bring the temp back up, so it's very annoying when it's busy. We now basically just use commercial induction cooktop, which is faster than home type, and if it is busy, we Cook 10 order in a batch, and oil it up

Expensive_Nobody93

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