Online shop for food trucks: online pre-ordering, with no queue

Quarter past twelve, on a business park. A queue of twenty people is growing in front of your truck, and half of them are looking at their watches. Some leave before they have even ordered, hungry and a little cross. It isn’t your cooking that’s the problem, it’s the wait.

With an online shop, your regulars order and pay from their desk, then come and pick up their meal. Here is how 123Ventes answers the questions that come with running a food truck.

Pre-ordering, with no commission

The idea is simple: the customer chooses on their phone, pays online and comes to collect their meal from the truck. They don’t queue to order, only to collect. You prepare the orders in sequence, without taking them on the fly.

Ordering and delivery apps take a commission on every order. Your shop costs a fixed subscription, whether you sell ten meals or a hundred.

A short menu, just like the blackboard

A food truck rarely offers fifty dishes, and that’s a good thing. You create a few categories: mains, sides, desserts, drinks. Each dish has its photo, its description and its price. Feature the dish of the day, and it appears first.

Your menu changes with the seasons? The site collection lets you prepare a summer version and a winter version, and switch from one to the other when the time comes.

Options and meal deals

On each dish, you offer lists of options: a choice of sauce, extra cheese for 1 €, “no onions”. The price adjusts automatically. Meal deals are built the same way: main + drink, or main + dessert, with the extra for the deal added to the price.

You receive a complete order, written down and paid for. No more “was that without coriander?” just as you hand over the tray.

Limited quantities: today’s stock

You set off in the morning with forty portions of curry. Enter 40 in stock. When the last one is ordered, the dish can no longer be chosen online. You avoid a paid order for a dish that no longer exists, and the apologies that go with it.

The next day, you update the stock from your phone before setting off.

Today’s pitch, on the home page

Monday at the market, Tuesday at the business park, Friday evening on the village square: your customers need to know where to find you. Your shop’s home page can hold blocks of text and images. Use them to show your weekly schedule and the address of each pitch.

Collection is handled with the click and collect option: the customer pays online and picks up their meal at the truck. The shop doesn’t let customers choose a pick-up time, but they can leave a note with their order, such as “I’ll come by at 12:30”.

Orders open only during service

You enter your time slots day by day, in the shop’s settings. Tuesday from 11:30 am to 2 pm, Friday from 6 pm to 10 pm. Outside these hours, customers can look at the menu, but they can’t confirm an order: a message tells them when to come back. Nobody orders a burger from you at midnight on a Sunday, while the truck is asleep in the garage.

In the truck: alert and order slip

Each new order sets off a sound alert in your dashboard, which works on a phone or tablet. You see the dish, the options and the customer’s note. If you have a printer, a button prints the order slip in large type. 123Ventes isn’t kitchen software, but it is easy to read between the griddle and the fryer.

Orders are already paid for, and the invoice is created as a PDF. For what happens next, see order management.

Regulations and loyalty

Selling online doesn’t change the rules for food trucks: hygiene, allergen information, permits for your pitches. List the allergens in the description of each dish, before purchase. For pitches, check with each town hall or each landowner. For everything else, your local food safety authority (in France, the DDPP of your département), your chamber of trades or your chamber of commerce (in France, the CCI) can advise you.

To bring your customers back, the customer file keeps their orders, and promotion rules give a free dessert after a certain number of orders. A newsletter announces your schedule or your new menu. Text messages are available as an option, handy for letting people know you have changed pitch. See customer relations.

How much it costs

The subscription costs 29 € a month or 319 € a year, with hosting and the security certificate included. 123Ventes takes no commission on your orders: only your payment provider’s fees apply, about 0.55 € on a 20 € order paid by card. If you would rather stay behind the counter, the turnkey set-up costs 400 €. The details are on the pricing page.

Your questions

Do I need internet in the truck?

You need a connection to receive orders: your phone’s is enough. The dashboard opens in the browser of a phone or tablet.

Can my customers pay on the spot?

Orders placed in the shop are paid online, by card or PayPal. Payment on collection is not available. Customers who would rather pay at the truck simply order at the hatch, as usual.

Can I deliver as well?

Yes, with the “your own delivery” option: you choose the towns you serve and a price for each zone. Most food trucks stick to collection, which is simpler during service.

How long does it take to put my menu online?

The shop is created in a minute. For a menu of ten dishes, with photos and options, allow half a day. After that, the weekly schedule takes just a few minutes to update.