Homeschool Project Business Ideas

Three of my teens want to start their own businesses.  We are exploring various ideas they have and I thought I would share some of them.

One idea they are putting a lot of thought into is running a catering food cart business.  We thought it might be interesting to share a few different types of simple food carts we found on the internet and some basic business plans in case there are other families wanting to check into this too.

Food Cart Business

We found a variety of food cart business examples online.  There are so many different kinds of “mobile kitchens” .  Some are built into carts, onto trailers, and others are vehicles.  Most of these mobile kitchens specialize in selling a specific food or foods, and they have specific equipment set up for that specific food type.

Mobile Kitchen Carts range in price from $1,000 to $10,000.  These can be push carts, bike carts, or pull carts pulled by ATV, electric bikes, or small cars.  Carts are great for a single type of food such as hot dogs, or burgers, coffee cafe, or lemonade shake ups, shaved ice snow cones.  These carts handle smaller crowds.

Mobile Kitchen Trailers range in price from 5,000 to 100,000.  These kitchens are great for cooking and selling multiple items.  These are great for pizza shops, ice cream shops, fried food shops, and even bbq smokers and catering large events.

Mobile Kitchen Vehicles (usually trucks or vans) range in price from 12,000 to 150,000.  The advantage of a kitchen on a truck is that you don’t need to pull a trailer, so you won’t need as much space to park your business.  Like the trailer, these kitchens are able to handle multiple items and large volume crowds.

Since they would be starting with a small budget, the kids are looking into buying a Mobile Kitchen Cart.  One of the boys wants to sell coffee, and another boy wants to sell hotdogs.   My daughter has also shared that she would like to run a bakery cart to sell cupcakes and cookies.

Shop Trailer

This most versatile set up we found was the Shop Trailer.  It is basically a “blank” canvas to start a mobile food cart business of any kind.  This would work for food and non-food types of retail.  A Shop Trailer could be used outdoors and indoors and would be a great simple set up for “expos” and conventions, churches, fairs, farmer’s markets, as well as just vending along the street in various locations.

Wheely’s Cafe

This Wheelys Cafe is my favorite mobile coffee shop.  They are set up with solar power and wind power making them totally independent for power. You can get them set up to serve various kind of coffee that each require a different type of brewing system.  You can also serve smoothies or have a juice bar.  They also have retail cases for pastries, fruits, sandwiches, etc. and you can get an add on trailer for specialty items too.  One option is a living mobile greenhouse trailer that allows you to serve fresh herbs or greens.

 

We are still exploring more Food Cart ideas as well as other potential business ideas.  The plan is for the kids to run through a hypothetical company with spread sheets for inventory and expenses and profits etc, before they would actually open a real business someday.   This will be an invaluable learning experience.  I am sure they will gain insights and skills that will last them long into their adult life.