photos fixed Jan 3, 2015
The base post lies at Espresso and Pizza on October 7, 2014 on The Truth About Cars.
I don’t normally post about vehicles themselves, but I am endlessly
fascinated by the industry, and constantly surprised to learn of new
niches. On the finance side, I’m amazed at the variety of vendors that
show up at conferences such as those sponsored by Auto Finance News. One of these years I’ll make it to SEMA (the Speciality Equipment Market Association),
which by reputation has both the credible and the incredible. But back
to my topic: once in a while I do find products – or rather niches, I’m
not a “car guy” – that intrigue.
I have fond memories of the local Good Humor trucks, which once made
the rounds of Detroit. Then there was the lunch truck at the Chrysler
Mack Stamping plant, where I worked some decades ago. Perhaps they’re
still in business, but of late I see few such. Yes, the funnel cake van
is a fixture at community festivals here in rural Virginia, and at least
one of the local BBQs sell their pulled pork from a truck. The vendors
of sausages and gyros unload everything from a trailer to set up under a
tent, while the Ruritans sell hot dogs and burgers from a modified
trailer. Other than the huge step vans on Constitution Avenue in DC,
today I seldom see truck-based vendors, and the ones I do see are very
utilitarian in their setup.
In Japan the historic model is the pushcart vendor (yatai
屋台). Going back to the 1800s, the Tokyo (Edo-mae) variety of sushi
started out that way, a snack food sold on the streets, low not high
cuisine. Into the 1970s (but now largely vanished) you could find yatai
in the evening outside train stations, selling noodles or yaki-imo
(sweet potatoes kept in hot gravel) or tako-yaki (octopus “donut
holes”). It was in Tokyo that the phrase “chestnuts roasting on an open
fire” first took on meaning for me, because that was another staple of
street food. Such are not unknown in the US; you still find pushcarts in
Central Park and elsewhere in New York [by which I of course mean
Manhattan]. When I worked on Wall Street (well, actually Pine Street) I
was fond of hot pretzels. But in Japan the modern version of the
pushcart vendor is likewise relegated to the grounds of the local shrine
during community festivals (matsuri).
Then I spent a year in suburban Japan. There you encounter a modern version of the yatai
of old, imaginative and entrepreneurial. These are (often) young
couples in “kei” trucks (mini minivans) fitted out to be one or another
sort of mobile restaurant. You encounter them in suburban parks and
other places families frequent, or in urban plazas. [In most of Japan
parking along the street is not an option. In the areas I frequented the
police made no exception in the late evening, when streets were only
occupied by the occasional taxi and by drunk sarariman tipsying towards their train home.]
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| Here and below are photos by Smitka |
Entrepreneurial, imaginative. First, the imaginative. To be
practical, imagination must be constrained, not given free rein. Keeping
things small(er) is one such constraint, pushing creativity in much of
the world in directions irrelevant to the US environment. In Japan you
find many adaptations to narrow streets and small lots. There are the
local restaurant delivery services. At one time that would have been a
Chinese restaurant or sushi shop, but tastes have changed and now that
niche is dominated by contemporary sorts of foods. In the US delivery is
done by employees in their own car. Not so in Japan – it’s by company
scooter. In Chiba (a city of 900,000 just east of Tokyo) that might be
the local Pizza Hut franchise. [I was never tempted to sample their
fare...] Similarly, the backhoe that as I write is digging a trench to
improve my driveway’s drainage is small, but it’s a monster compared to
the construction equipment at sites in urban Japan.
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So I should not have been surprised at vendors in their “kei” minivans,
laid out to take advantage of every cubic centimeter. I unfortunately
don’t have a photo of my favorite, a “kei” that a couple fitted with a
wood-burning oven appropriate for two small pizzas. Not a viable
business? Actually, it was about right – they didn’t have much workspace to toss the dough and lay on the toppings, and with the very thin crust they used – something I’ve seen in Milan and Tokyo but not the US – a
“pie” didn’t take long to bake. The wait wasn’t bad. Theirs was a
one-off, a personal project, but it looked something like this:
My most recent encounter was with a mobile coffee shop. I had a
chance to chat with the owner/barrista in between customers. He had
designed the layout himself, and helped do the fitting. Water, propane
for heat, a grinder, an espresso machine, a sink, a fridge … the whole
works, and he roasted his own beans [his logo proclaims that: 自家焙煎]. He
wasn’t however in the suburbs but instead near Tokyo Station, taking
advantage of real estate laws that set fairly restrictive floor-area
ratios forcing newer office buildings to include an off-street plaza. He
had a rotating schedule of such locations where he’d negotiated access
(presumably for a fee). While he had an awning and some seating, most of
his business was take-out. That sultry summer day he was busy enough,
though he’s inclined to take the day off in truly inclement weather.
Here is the van, with the “master” at work. (Click to enlarge!)
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| Home Roasted Beans | Master at Work | Service Counter |
In my experience restauranteurs are quite finicky about their setup.
This entrepreneur may have been willing and able to take a hand in
finishing off his creation (see his 大月珈琲店
Facebook page for photos). However, welding and fitting are not part of
the typical Japanese skill set, where “do-it-yourself” does not include
even the most basic of household repairs. So with a little bit of
digging I found several companies that specialize in such, including ZECC, Maku, Aian Cook ["Iron Cook"], and (winner of the best name) Mobil Cafe Mom’s: Production of Customized Car.
The used car page on GooNet lists 104 “mobile retail” vehicles for
sale, with prices from around $12,500 for a used truck to $25,000 for a
brand new one, albeit none of these have appliances. An example from carsensor.net
lists one with already equipped with sinks, plumbing and exhaust fan at
$17,000. Yahoo Auctions Japan likewise lists numerous vehicles, so it
appears to be an active segment. (I didn’t check Rakuten; in Japan eBay
botched its initial entry and is not a player.)
Now I’m sure there are similar specialized firms in the US, and maybe
on the West Coast mobile vending remains a lively business model. Yes,
there are unusual promotional vehicles, such as the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile
– there’s one on permanent display at the Henry Ford Museum in
Dearborn. But I’ve not seen such whimsical “mobile kitchens” outside of
Japan.
Links to (Japanese) pages with photographs:- Pizza Boccheno
- ZECC, which specializes in making “mobile retail” vehicles. Lots of photos.
- Pizza Ci Vediamo [note the Coleman brand tent!]
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