The truck was parked in the parking lot of a store called Wine Expo. This location seemed like a bad choice because there was hardly anyone walking by on the sidewalk and, even if there had been, the truck was parked up close to the store hidden by the cars and poorly lit.
The whole time we were there, we only saw one other customer. The Wine Expo store didn't seem to have much traffic either.
There was one up side to the way they parked their truck though. The lighting from the shopping center made for a well lit area in front of the order and pick up windows for the customers.
The truck's employees were friendly and the truck had the usual homey food truck feel with hand written signs in the window and a tip jar.
The food was packaging was very green and non wasteful, though it lacked aesthetics.
To print the No Jodas logo or character on the packaging would help the aesthetics of the packaging.
The food itself was bad all around. Flavor was lacking in all of our sandwiches. The bread on the vegetarian sandwich was overly sweet. Butch actually regretted eating the food.
The bread on Earl's chicken sandwich was completely flavorless and reminiscent of the pizza crust on a mini microwavable frozen pizza. He ended up taking the chicken out and throwing the bread away.
As for the ambiance of the eating environment, there was no music. Cars drove by and halogen lights buzzed loudly.
Amenities were lacking for the most part. There were no tables, no benches, and the only wall to sit on was pretty high and thin. They did offer a trash can as part of the truck, which was very convenient.
The Wine Expo did have bathrooms, though the food truck did not have a bathroom contract with the store. When I asked the food truck employee about restrooms, he said he didn't know if we could use the Wine Expo's restroom, but we should just walk in casually and quickly and just go. The environment of the Wine House was highly contrasting to the parking lot. Soft music was playing and people were dressed nicely. I stuck out like a sore thumb walking through the crowd in my t-shirt and shorts. It was definitely a change of environment. I didn't take photos because when I entered one employee confronted me with a somewhat unwelcoming "Hello", which I guesses was because of my attire. I didn't want to get kicked out. The bathrooms themselves were spacious, clean, and well stocked though.
As for design opportunities, we came up with a food bus. The food bus would have all the space that the food truck has for the kitchen and then some. In the extra space, there would be room for booths for the customers with comfortable seating and tables. This idea would not replace food trucks, it would just be another option for situations where the location offers nothing for the customers. In the Wine Expo's parking lot, there were no tables or chairs, and very limited wall space to sit on. Despite the lack of amenities for the customers, No Jodas still wanted to come park here. If they had a food bus, they would be able to bring it out to locations like this one and offer more amenities to their customers in places that don't already have them.
No comments:
Post a Comment