"vendors" news and stories

A New York food cart. Photo: jasonlam/Flickr

Call it the Summer of the Street Vendor: Food trucks and carts are, it seems, this season's version of artisanal pickles or pastured meats. Whether you live in Los Angeles, Portland or New York, each day seems to spawn a new vendor -- and they're not selling your granddad's dirty-water dogs.

Words like "organic," "natural" and "handmade" are being slapped on everything from burritos to burgers, giving street meat an almost saintly aura and the occupation of street vendor a previously unheard of cachet. Street cart fever has spawned all sorts of coverage, from city-specific blogs to nationwide podcasts like VendrTV.

As with other low-profile aspects of the food industry that have suddenly found themselves ready for their close-ups, the sudden glamour of the street vendor trade obscures the everyday challenges -- some small, some overwhelming -- that come with selling food (no matter how pedigreed) from a big metal box on wheels.

Interviews with two vendors and a call to Slashfoodies to help us find great American street vendors after the jump.

We don't usually hear or read too much about food cart vendors. You know the ones - everyone has grabbed lunch from them at some time or another - whether in an unfamiliar city with no immediate restaurant choices, on a quick break from a long meeting, food cart meals are the original "go-to meals," before the term "go-to meal" even existed.

But the anonymity of vendors has changed this week, as articles appeared in both The New York Times and The Washington Post about the food carts and the businesspeople who run them.

In New York, Latin food vendors who have served the players and fans at Brooklyn's Red Hook soccer fields for the past 33 years faced being ousted from their spots if the Department of Parks and Recreation succeeded in "regulating" its permit process. In the end, the vendors were all allowed to stay and were issued a new six-year permit. But despite vendor fees remaining about the same (about $10,500 per year), reps of the vendors worry that the permit's new rule of standardizing equipment will mean vendors paying hefty fees for updated ovens and plumbing.

In D.C., vendors are feeling similar pressure, but for a different reason: instead of cutting back, D.C. wants to expand, but not among the current food options. Instead, citing surveys of citizens who say they want a larger food selection, the city is opening up the market to companies like Zipcar, an electric car company that wants to expand into gourmet and healthy food vending.

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AriZona Beverage Co., which produces a line of popular iced teas, is experimenting with some new advertising techniques. The company already uses bright, eye-catching labels and graphics and is now experimenting with adding scent to its packaging. AriZona is working on embedding the smell of its products inside the cap of its bottles, but other companies are using other technologies to appeal to consumers, like scented inks. The Washington Post reports that the sales industry is frantically trying to come up with new ways to lure shoppers into trying their products, as television ads are shown to be increasingly less effective.

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