Question about festival vending

[bobaftt]

how did you make out on the second festival?

 

[CUTigerQ]

how did you make out on the second festival?

Please tell..Im seriously considering this option as well as catering. I just need to get started.

 

[Dr_KY]

Well this concessions sure has it's highs and lows. I've been on a three day high and I have been here planning this coming weekend (a larger festival). Turns out that my costs for supplies and labor are almost exactly what my profit was this past weekend. So I guess I still have not made any money yet :shock:. Could go to this one and flop and be a wasted 2 weeks of work. The gut wrenching knife in my stomach has started to turn again. I think I like the catering better, I know who I am cooking for, when, where, how much to cook and how much I'm making and all up front.

Congrats on the event. That feeling you are having is another reason why we have turned mostly to catering. Last year we did some vending and made a nice sack of cash only to turn around two weeks later spending it on the next event and ending up in the red.

 

[PorkQPine]

Well this concessions sure has it's highs and lows. I've been on a three day high and I have been here planning this coming weekend (a larger festival). Turns out that my costs for supplies and labor are almost exactly what my profit was this past weekend. So I guess I still have not made any money yet :shock:. Could go to this one and flop and be a wasted 2 weeks of work. The gut wrenching knife in my stomach has started to turn again. I think I like the catering better, I know who I am cooking for, when, where, how much to cook and how much I'm making and all up front.

If I am reading this correctly you broke even after all the work I would re-think the pricing and brisket. I would drop the brisket, and add a dollar to the price for sandwiches, drop the dinners and add 50cents to the drink price. I would also add smoked hot dogs and hot links since they can be done on-site and cook quickly.

 

[Gowan]

Well this concessions sure has it's highs and lows. I've been on a three day high and I have been here planning this coming weekend (a larger festival). Turns out that my costs for supplies and labor are almost exactly what my profit was this past weekend. So I guess I still have not made any money yet :shock:. Could go to this one and flop and be a wasted 2 weeks of work. The gut wrenching knife in my stomach has started to turn again. I think I like the catering better, I know who I am cooking for, when, where, how much to cook and how much I'm making and all up front.

Congratulations on grasping that reality quickly ~ I wish I could say we learned that lesson before wasting a lot more time and money. If the purpose of vending is to make money, then BBQ is just about the worst possible food item you could choose.

You bust your ass for three days to make a third of the profit the hot dog guy earns for a single day's easy labor. No thank you! The only vending jobs we do any more are charity gigs that we take for PR purposes.

 

[chopshop]

i think you undercharged for everything. i get $7-8 for a sandwich, depending on where i am. i dont do sandwich dinners, i just sell the sides and i get $3 a side. I do 1,2 and 3 meat dinners. teasers,1/3, 1/2 and full racks and i usually sell full racks for $22-$26. i know the prices are high but so are my fees for the event and people never have a problem paying. I also sell pig candy and i get $3 for 2 sciles and ill go through 90 lb of bacon in a day. oh yeah pork and brisket $16 a pound. believe me people will pay you just gotta have the balls to ask them. balls are what make the difference in whether you make money or not, that and the weather.

 

[Dr_KY]

Wow I wish I could get that over here! Great BBQ isn't appreciated simply because burger and kebab vans are all over the place thus they accept that as good food. People here also work on the pint rule. If they are paying more than the price of a pint of lager or cider then they would rather buy the drink. Sad but true.
There are some people that have turned the corner locally but it's taken time to do so.

As for festivals I looked for those that didn't allow food in and had a captive audience for at least two days. Some of the music festivals here are more on the hippie side thus substance abuse is the norm and you know those people tend not to eat as much.

 

[jestridge]

If some of you vendors live close by , this is a huge event for 4 days/nights, never have seen any bbq there
www.chickenfestival.com

 

[HBMTN]

PorkQPine, my cost for the 2nd (larger) event was arounf what my profit from the 1st festival was. It was a Fri, Sat, Sun on the 2nd event. My cost for the 2nd event ended up a little higher coming in around $1900 I ended up paying out more in wages because I needed help longer than I had expectedm which was a good thing. We ended up grossing $4200 at the second event, $900 on Fri, $2100 on Sat and $1200 on Sun. All in all we cleared about $3700 for the two events. But I will say that all the stars lined up for us both weekends and everything went right. I can definatly see there is a lot of risk. All it would have taken was a little rain on two Saturdays and I could have lost my A$$. Not to mention how many hours of labor my wife and I put into both weekends. Hope this helps people by being an example of what you can make and what the risks can be and how much work is involves. I love BBQ and can work it 100 hours and not feel like a job so if you are not like that then don't consider doing it.

 

[PorkQPine]

I thought you were saying that your expenses were what your gross was, gald to hear that you were in the black after two events. It is hard work but rewarding. I still would raise my prices and I always worry about vending brisket since it costs so much. I have done some benefit vending where people shared a hot dog so I know the economy hurts a lot of people but you can't give your food away. A lot of us use the 3x or 4x cost rule when pricing.

 

[chopshop]

see here in this are we sell as much brisket as we do pork. when i head down to virginia, especially south west virginia i wont even bother bringing brisket with me. its funny i still have it on the sign and i can honestly say that not one person asks for it. pork is king for those guys. remember one thing, you can only sell as much food as you can handle. depending on what kind of equipment you have and the amount of people you have working you might only be able to heat so much food and sell so many meals or sandwich per hour. besides the amount of people at an event alot of people forget the biggest factor and thats what you can actually handle. it took me about 6 events to realize what my maximum amount of food i could handle. 50,000 is great but if you have a small smoker and no other way to heat the food then it really wouldnt matter if there was only 10,000. figure out what you could really handle with your equipment then shoot for events that fit your needs. i do an event in DC that draws 250,000 people and the cost of everything is through the roof. you have to be able to move some product just to be able to break even. if you cant move what you need to break even then there is no point of going.