It’s coming – the season of higher profits and lower temperatures.

When folks ask me if they should stay open during the winter months I always say. “Sure – if you like cold weather.”

You can usually make as much if not more money in the winter as you can in the summer. As a matter of fact, you will probably sell more in November than you did in August because hot food just plain sells better when it’s cold out.

Your competitors may pack it in for the winter, but the customers still need to eat. Let’s do some high level math here…

Same number of customers + half as many hot dog carts = 2 X sales for you. (Yeah, I’m a rocket surgeon.)

This is your opportunity to treat them right, show them what they’ve been missing all summer, and turn them into YOUR customers all year ’round.

Yes, it’s financially worth it to stay open in cold weather.

OK, that’s the good. Now for the bad. Cold weather is…COLD!

How to deal with it.

People always ask what effect the cold will have on their cart, or their meat, or their sodas. They forget the most important thing. Themselves.

Your feet are the first thing to go in cold weather. Standing in one spot slows the circulation and your toesies will be the first to feel it. Get the best snowmobile boots you can afford.

If your feet are freezing, you’re not going to last out there, and you’re sure not going to be as pleasant to your customers as you usually are.

The rest is common sense. Long undies, good coat, hat, and face protection (90 percent of your body heat is lost through your head).

Get some thin gloves and cut the finger tips off the right hand, if you are right handed. Bulky gloves will keep your hands warmer but you’ll drop everything you touch. This is a trade off situation. Keep your hands in your pockets as much as you can. Those chemical pocket warmer thingies are good too.

You can also warm your hands by the air vents on your cart, but don’t use steam. Your gloves will become soaked and useless in under a minute and your fingers will turn into popsicles.

Cart Issues

Most of the time you won’t have to worry about your water lines or tanks freezing – as long as the fire is on, the interior of the cart will stay above freezing. Where you can run into trouble is if you store your cart in an unheated location during the off hours.

If you are storing the cart for an extended period, drain your tanks and blow out your water lines. Simple.

If you are using your cart every day, draining the tanks is a pain. It’s best to have a storage space that stays above freezing but if you don’t, try this trick:

Get a portable drop light with a 100 watt bulb and put it inside your cart as close to the tanks and water lines as possible (without melting anything of course) and drape a blanket over the cart. This should keep the inside of the cart above freezing.

Meat and Soda

What do you call that thing that you you put your meat and soda into? A cooler, right? Well that’s actually a misnomer. You should call it a “thermal insulator” instead. But then people would look at you funny. (Welcome to my world…)

Coolers try their best to maintain the temperature of what ever is inside them. If you put a hot Thanksgiving turkey in a cooler and set it outside in snowbank, that turkey would still be pretty warm three hours later. Of course there are factors that affect how efficiently this works.

The most important factor is the amount of air inside the cooler. The “fuller” you can fill it, the less air you have and the better the cooler will maintain the temperature of it’s contents. So fill that sucker up, or get a smaller one.

Your sodas and dogs shouldn’t freeze as long as they are in a cooler.

Gimme Shelter

If you can get out of the wind it can be downright pleasant, even in January. Let’s look at the options:

Here’s the ultimate ticket! A stand in cart is the ultimate for winter dog slingin’. The trade off of course is price, but this is an investment. If you can vend all year ’round it may be worth it. You’ll need to crunch your own numbers on this one.

Some cart manufacturers offer a tarp system to get you out of the elements. Or you could make your own.

I used a 10′ X 10′ pop up tent with walls when it got cold outside. It was really quite comfortable, especially on sunny days, but next time I’d buy one of those white pop up canopy tents that caterers use – the kind with plastic windows.

We had extra room inside so we set up some folding chairs and our customers had fun eating and chatting in the tent.

It was a great experience – something fun and different that put a smile on their face. Who doesn’t like playing in a tent?

The downside was the time it took to set up and tear down. It added about a half hour total to my day, but it was worth it. Another drawback is lack of visibility. Make sure you have good signage outside so people know you’re in there.

Just Say No

When the weather gets tough, the tough get…

Indoors.

Check out this story from the Hot Dog Cart News archives: Tired of Winter? Move Your Hot Dog Cart Indoors

Laurie Booth has it good!

Need More Info?

If you’d like to find out more about how to start and run your own profitable hot dog cart business, go to www.HotDogBiz101.com.  I’ll see you there!

Now It’s Your Turn

OK all you grizzled veterans – time to share your own cold weather doggin’ tips and tricks in the comments below.  And let’s stay warm out there!

-Steve