Opinion | 7 food truck operators’ best ideas to save downtown D.C.

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What happened to D.C.’s food trucks? Lunch downtown used to be a mobile, multicultural feast thanks to the trucks that regularly packed Franklin Square, Farragut Square, Union Station and other gathering spots. Office workers lined up for their favorites and texted colleagues to join them.

Then the pandemic wiped out this beloved sector. Today, trucks are back on the National Mall serving hot dogs for tourists. But the gourmet operations dishing up barbecue, Thai, Indonesian, Salvadoran and soul food are still missing downtown.

There is perhaps no better vital sign of how D.C.’s recovery is going than the story of speciality food trucks. They follow the people. And they adapt fast. Many are operating again — in the suburbs. Instead of serving office workers lunch, many have found lucrative gigs dishing out dinner at weddings, block parties and other events. Instead of parking downtown, they’re hanging out at housing developments in Arlington, Alexandria and Bethesda, according to an analysis of Roaming Hunger data on where trucks are located.

We talked with seven food trucks owners. Five have left the city.

The Editorial Board has been on a year-long campaign to help revive downtown. Plus, now that we are back in the office ourselves, we miss having a bounty of mouthwatering options at our doorstep. So we decided to ask some truck owners: Where are you now? What would it take to get you back downtown? What advice do you have for Democratic Mayor Muriel E. Bowser?

Many said they had thought about returning to former hot spots but were heavily dissuaded by the city’s hefty fees (close to $2,000 for all the licenses and permits) and aggressive ticketing. If D.C. wants its downtown vibe back, dropping food truck fees is a smart place to start.

But there is so much more that can be done. Here are seven food truck operators’ best ideas for the city:

1

Urban Poutine

Bring federal workers back to the office (at least part-time)

Eric Gordon’s Urban Poutine food truck set up for dinner clientele in Camden Dulles Station Apartments on Aug. 9. (Hector Emanuel for The Washington Post)

Eric Gordon, owner of Urban Poutine, used to make 75 percent of his revenue from the downtown lunch crowd. “D.C. is still a ghost town for lunch,” he said. Gordon realized he had two options: join the crowds on the Mall or head to apartment complexes and private events in the suburbs. He opted for the latter. He hasn’t renewed his D.C. license since covid began, calling the city’s fees “ungodly expensive” compared with those of every other jurisdiction in the area.

Business has steadily returned in the suburbs. Gordon’s main advice isn’t for D.C. officials; it’s for President Biden and his Cabinet: “As soon as the federal government forces everybody back, then everything else will come.”

2

Lattimore’s Funnel Cakes

Lower fees and increase special events

Iris Lattimore, owner of Lattimore’s Funnel Cakes food truck, works at the National Museum of African American History and Culture’s Hip-Hop Block Party in D.C. on Aug. 12. (Hector Emanuel for The Washington Post)

Iris Lattimore, owner of Lattimore’s Funnel Cakes, used to love parking outside the National Museum of Natural History — a perfect spot to draw tourists and some federal office workers from across the street. The spot was part of D.C.’s food truck lottery, which she entered for $25 a month pre-covid. (Trucks also have to pay $1,076 in licensing fees to be eligible for the lottery.)

She hasn’t entered the lottery since the pandemic. Now she thrives on events. She’s booked regularly for corporate events in the suburbs or the National Cherry Blossom Festival (run in part by the National Park Service). It would take a lot more people downtown — and lower fees — for her to do regular business in the city again.

“Give me reasons why I would want to move downtown,” Lattimore said. “They need to do different events like movie nights in D.C. … or food truck night every two weeks.”

3

PhoWheels

Take a page from the competition

Tuan Vo, owner of PhoWheels, poses with his food truck in Silver Spring on Aug. 11. (Hector Emanuel for The Washington Post)

Tuan Vo, owner of PhoWheels, still serves out of the truck he bought more than a decade ago. But nearly everything else about his business has changed. Instead of serving lunch to office workers in downtown D.C., PhoWheels mainly does dinners at community events, breweries, weddings and movie nights in the Virginia and Maryland suburbs.

“Food truck dinners never existed before the pandemic. Now there’s high demand. People love us coming to pools and apartment complexes,” he said.

Vo has wondered whether he should try returning to some lunch spots downtown, but he said “D.C. is so hard to figure out right now. Are people coming to work? Are they not?” He doesn’t like fighting other trucks for the tourist spots on the Mall. Friends tell him they make only $700 in other parts of the city. He can make double that with the suburban dinner crowd. He hasn’t renewed his D.C. license since the pandemic.

His future is in the National Landing area of Northern Virginia. Vo is among the minority vendors invited by developer JBG Smith to have a stall in an outdoor market that’s part of a new plaza with a water park. He wonders why D.C. isn’t doing similar projects.

4

Jerks of the Caribbean

Downtown needs seven-day-a-week crowds

Brothers Anthony and Roger Brown working lunch in their restaurant, Jerks of the Caribbean Cafe in Southwest D.C., on Aug. 8. (Hector Emanuel for The Washington Post)

Anthony Brown, co-owner of Jerks of the Caribbean, is a master of seasonings — and reinvention. When the pandemic changed office work, probably forever, he started doing takeout orders for DoorDash, Uber Eats and other platforms.

As parts of the city struggled to revive, he saw an opportunity as rents dropped. “Covid opened up a whole new avenue for us to get back into the city,” Brown said.

In July, he opened a brick-and-mortar restaurant at 409 Third St. SW by the Federal Center SW Metro station. He picked Southwest, not downtown, for his restaurant because that’s where the city’s heartbeat is now. Even some law firms have relocated from downtown to the Wharf in Southwest. Brown called it a “seven-day-a-week kind of area” the perfect spot to serve tourists from the Mall, federal office workers at NASA and other spots nearby, as well as the many new residents who have flocked to Southwest D.C.

Meanwhile, he sees other “signs of hope.” In June, the Giant National Capital Barbecue Battle, a food and music festival on Pennsylvania Avenue NW, was close to the size and energy of its pre-covid days. And catered lunch orders at offices are picking up.

The mayor has the right plan to convert offices to apartments downtown, Brown said. He has reason to believe that revival can happen. His father opened a restaurant on the edge of Chinatown in 1996 when many were afraid to venture there. (Caribbean Delite Cafe was featured in The Post in 1997.) There was almost no night or weekend traffic. Changing that was key then — and even more so now.

5

Roro’s Modern Lebanese

Guarantee food vendors will meet their minimums at events

Roro Asmar, owner of Roro’s Modern Lebanese, poses in his deli in Alexandria, Va., on Aug. 11. (Hector Emanuel for The Washington Post)

In 2019, Washington City Paper readers voted Roro’s Modern Lebanese the best food truck in the city. Owner Roro Asmar loved serving lunch to government workers in D.C. But he “took a hard look at the books” when the pandemic arrived and decided to leave his truck behind. He went all in on a commissary kitchen in Alexandria called Asmar’s. He has seen a jump in catering requests recently for graduation parties, birthdays and summer festivals, but his main businesses now is selling his family’s hummus in honor of his mother, who died of breast cancer. Asmar’s hummus can be found at local Whole Foods and Harris Teeter grocery stores.

From what he hears from friends and the event bookers who still call him, “the beating heart is coming back a little bit in the food truck industry,” Asmar said. His advice to D.C.? Plan more events — and ensure vendors make a minimum.

“A lot of times with events and farmer markets, they offer space for food trucks and food vendors,” he said. “But we wonder: Is it worth the fees?” The crowds can still be hit-or-miss. Cutting fees or ensuring vendors make at least a minimum to cover their costs is necessary for a while.

6

Sweet Chili

A $1,000 license is too much

Painted barriers stand where food trucks used to set up for business in D.C.’s Farragut Square on Aug. 8. (Hector Emanuel for The Washington Post)

Triana Dewi ran an Indonesian food truck called Galanga before the pandemic. She would often park downtown in Franklin Square or Farragut Square.

Then the coronavirus shutdowns struck. “We were about to renew our D.C. license for $2,000 for two years,” she said. “We don’t think about renewing it now.” (A D.C. mobile vending license costs more than $1,000 for two years. Food trucks are also required to pay fees totaling at least $800 for health and safety inspections, truck inspection, business registration and a propane operation permit.)

Unemployment benefits got her through the worst of the pandemic. Then a friend told her to try Annapolis near the U.S. Naval Academy. She changed her truck’s name to Sweet Chili and started serving Asian favorites such as teriyaki, bulgogi and spring rolls. She now has a contract with the Naval Academy for the school year.

“I just got lucky,” Dewi said. Many of her friends fight for spots on the Mall. She heard Franklin Square was trying to use a third-party app to get food trucks to come back. She won’t be among them. Spending $1,000 a year for a D.C. license seems like too much of a gamble.

7

Captain Cookie & the Milkman

End the food truck lottery

Angel Young, assistant district manager of Captain Cookie, in one of the company’s trucks, in D.C. on Aug. 13. (Hector Emanuel for The Washington Post)

Juliann Francis and her husband, Kirk, have run Captain Cookie since 2012. Their food truck was a fan favorite in Foggy Bottom and Franklin Square, but they have not been back to vend there during lunch hours since covid.

Now, the vast majority of their business is private events. They do ice cream and cookie parties for bar mitzvahs, teacher appreciation days and other events. They also own several brick-and-mortar locations, so they know foot traffic remains slow most days of the week downtown.

Their advice to the city is simple: End the food truck lottery. It started in 2013, when there were so many food trucks that people were sabotaging each other for the best parking spots around the city. The lottery helped put some rules in place and generate some revenue for D.C. But the opposite dynamic exists now: The city wants and needs food trucks to come back.

“If D.C. really wanted to encourage food trucks to return, they should end the lottery and let us park wherever we want,” Juliann Francis said. “Is it really a good use of taxpayer money to run the lottery — or enforce it — right now?”

In other words, it’s time for the city to recognize that covid has opened up new opportunities for food truck operators, even as it has destroyed the old business model. If D.C. wants them back — and it should — it’s going to have to make it worthwhile for them to make a bet on downtown’s future.



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