A lot goes into running a small business — from inspections and licensing to funding, safety and so much more. Fortunately, local entrepreneurs will have the opportunity to do it all at a “one-stop shop” event hosted by the cities of Las Vegas, Henderson and North Las Vegas, the Southern Nevada Health District and Clark County.

The “Get Your Business Rolling Small Business and Food Truck Expo,” which will include business licensing and consultations, grant funding opportunities, on-site inspections and more — kicks off 8 a.m. today at World Market Center.

Anthony Vogel, a management analyst in the Las Vegas Department of Community Development’s business licensing division, said the mark of sustainability in any market is small business.

“There’s way more small business than there are casinos. There’s way more small business than there are nightclubs and everything else,” Vogel said. “And the turnover rate for small businesses is really high. So, we’re trying to identify why that is and what resources can be applied there.”

The event is Las Vegas’ third Small Business and Food Truck Expo, Vogel said, noting that more than 400 people attended the last one in November 2022.

The expo was created following the COVID-19 pandemic, when many small businesses closed their brick-and-mortar locations in favor of the food-truck format, Vogel said. Updated regulations — particularly related to fire, health and gas inspections — were put into place and many businesses couldn’t afford to upgrade their food trucks to the new standard.

The city then applied for and was awarded a $1 million grant to help businesses upgrade their food trucks with the appropriate safety, health and gas equipment, Vogel said. The expo and the city’s grant program helps food trucks fund compliance with different jurisdictional standards, so they can also spend more on things like marketing, he said.

“So, that’s how the expo came about,” he said. “We needed a way to bring everybody together and have the inspections all done in one place rather than have someone take their truck all over town, getting inspection after inspection.”

Officials then decided to not only host the expo for food truck operators, Vogel said, but small business owners as well.

According to a press release, this year’s event will involve on-site fire and health inspections — as well as Nevada Board for the Regulation of Liquefied Petroleum Gas inspections — exhibitors and vendors, local chambers of commerce and financial institutions and more.

“So, that’s the idea of the expo, … to kind of be the source for everything anybody needs for developing a business,” Vogel said.

He added that people who are failing their health, fire or gas inspections can apply for grant funding to get their food trucks up to the standard, and — as long as they maintain their business license for two years afterward — do not have to pay anything back.

“It’s a grant. It’s free money,” he said. “So, we’ve already spent a little over $170,000 on retrofitting food trucks and ice cream trucks to get them up to health standards.”

The event, which is slated to last until 4 p.m., has gained a lot of traction in the last few years. Vogel noted that more government agencies, including at the federal level, have become involved in the expo over time.

Ultimately, Vogel said, the agencies at the expo want to help small business and food truck owners by providing them with the resources and education they need to grow.

“We need to look at the people we haven’t looked at before,” he said. “We need to reach out to the small businesses, and we need to get growth in that area and not just the big industries that come into town.”