A commissary kitchen is a licensed kitchen that serves as the base for food trucks and carts: where they park overnight, fill their fresh water, empty their gray water and grease, wash their equipment, store food and prep. Health departments commonly require a truck to have one, so a commissary sells something trucks need to stay permitted, by the month, plus kitchen time and shelves. The plan is mostly real estate and plumbing: a lot with truck pads, water and power hookups, a dump station, and a kitchen. In the example below, a food truck commissary in Alabama signs trucks before it opens, loses about $28,200 in its first year on $261,500 of sales, and makes about $4,500 each month once it has 24 trucks. Below is each part of the plan, the first year month by month, the startup budget, and a free template.
The short version
- Sell truck memberships by the month: a parking pad, water, gray water and grease disposal, power.
- Add kitchen time by the hour and cooler and dry shelves by the month.
- Sign trucks before opening; they need a commissary letter to keep their permits.
- The lot matters: room to turn a truck, pads, hookups, a dump station, lighting and a gate.
- The kitchen holds its own permit; trucks hold theirs and name the commissary on their paperwork.
- Keep a visit log; health departments may ask how often each truck comes in.
- TaroStack keeps each truck's goods as theirs on your shelves. More below.
Part 1: the business description
Mobile Bay Commissary, a made-up food truck commissary in Mobile, Alabama, I use in these examples, writes:
Mobile Bay Commissary is a licensed commercial kitchen with 24 truck pads, water and power hookups, a gray water and grease dump station, a walk-in cooler and dry storage. Trucks pay a monthly membership for parking and services, book kitchen time by the hour, and rent storage shelves. In its first year it aims to have 24 member trucks.
Part 2: what the health department and trucks need
A food truck's permit commonly depends on a commissary: a letter or form from a licensed kitchen saying the truck fills water, disposes of waste and grease, cleans and stores food there, and how often it reports. The commissary's kitchen holds its own permit, and its plumbing, grease handling and waste disposal have to satisfy the health department, the plumbing code and the city. The commissary letter itself, with a template and a visit log, is set out alongside the costs trucks pay in commissary kitchen cost. This is general information, not legal advice.
Part 3: what each service earns
| Service | Price | Variable cost | Contribution | Margin | A month at full speed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Truck membership: parking, water, gray water and grease, power, per month | $650.00 | $90.00 | $560.00 | 86.2% | 24 |
| Kitchen time, per hour | $26.00 | $6.00 | $20.00 | 76.9% | 400 |
| Walk-in cooler shelf, per month | $85.00 | $15.00 | $70.00 | 82.4% | 30 |
| Dry storage shelf, per month | $50.00 | $5.00 | $45.00 | 90.0% | 30 |
A truck's $90 of monthly cost is water, power at the pad and the share of hauling its grease and waste. In a month at full speed, the memberships bring $13,440 of the $24,890 of contribution, more than half; kitchen time $8,000, cooler shelves $2,100 and dry shelves $1,350. The memberships are the steady income, because trucks can't skip a month and keep their permits.
Part 4: trucks and the lot
Twenty-four trucks coming and going at 6 a.m. and 11 p.m. need room to turn, numbered pads, hookups that don't trip breakers, a dump station that doesn't back up, lighting and a gate. An overnight attendant or cameras keep the trucks safe and the dump station clean. What a food truck's own plan looks like is in food truck business plan.
Part 5: the first year, month by month
Fixed costs are $20,400 every month: the lot and building lease ($7,500), utilities ($1,500), insurance ($900), a manager and overnight attendant ($6,500), the equipment loan ($1,800), maintenance ($800), the gate, cameras and lighting ($250), grease and waste hauling ($600), software and card fees ($250) and marketing ($300). With ten trucks signed before opening, the year starts at 40% of full speed:
| Month | Trucks | Kitchen hours | Cooler shelves | Dry shelves | Sales | Profit | Cash, year to date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 10 | 160 | 12 | 12 | $12,280 | −$10,220 | −$10,220 |
| 2 | 11 | 180 | 14 | 14 | $13,720 | −$9,030 | −$19,250 |
| 3 | 12 | 200 | 15 | 15 | $15,025 | −$7,955 | −$27,205 |
| 4 | 13 | 220 | 17 | 17 | $16,465 | −$6,765 | −$33,970 |
| 5 | 15 | 248 | 19 | 19 | $18,763 | −$4,855 | −$38,825 |
| 6 | 17 | 280 | 21 | 21 | $21,165 | −$2,865 | −$41,690 |
| 7 | 18 | 308 | 23 | 23 | $22,813 | −$1,515 | −$43,205 |
| 8 | 20 | 336 | 25 | 25 | $25,111 | $395 | −$42,810 |
| 9 | 22 | 360 | 27 | 27 | $27,305 | $2,225 | −$40,585 |
| 10 | 23 | 380 | 29 | 29 | $28,745 | $3,415 | −$37,170 |
| 11 | 24 | 400 | 30 | 30 | $30,050 | $4,490 | −$32,680 |
| 12 | 24 | 400 | 30 | 30 | $30,050 | $4,490 | −$28,190 |
The year's sales are $261,492 and it loses $28,190, with the lowest cash, −$43,205, in month 7, inside the $50,000 of working cash. With 24 trucks, the commissary makes about $4,490 each month, so the second year earns back the first year's loss.
Part 6: the startup budget
| Item | Example |
|---|---|
| Truck pads, water and power hookups, dump station | $48,000 |
| Kitchen build-out and permits | $40,000 |
| Lease deposit and first month | $15,000 |
| Shelving, carts and cleaning gear | $6,000 |
| Working cash | $50,000 |
| Total to start | $159,000 |
The kitchen equipment is financed, which is the $1,800 in the fixed costs.
Get the template
Download the commissary kitchen business plan workbook. Four sheets: your services with price, variable cost and a month at full speed; the first year, month by month, with sales, profit and cash; your fixed costs; and your startup budget with working cash. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers.
Where this stops working
Twenty-four trucks' food on thirty cooler shelves, trucks loading at dawn and unloading at midnight, and a truck that stops paying with three cases of brisket still in the walk-in. A spreadsheet of members and pads can't say what each truck keeps on your shelves, or what it took when it left.
How TaroStack does it
TaroStack keeps each truck's goods as theirs on your shelves.
Trucks' goods as theirs. With We make or keep goods for clients turned on, each truck is a client and its food on your shelves is its own: received at no cost to the commissary, kept apart, counted where it sits, and released when the truck loads up.
A statement each month. Each truck's monthly statement shows its goods you hold and how each moved, with the month's membership, hours and shelves typed onto its order.
The commissary's own supplies. Sanitizer, gloves and dump station supplies come up on the reorder list in days of cover. How a truck counts its own stock is in food truck inventory spreadsheet.
| The job | Spreadsheet | In TaroStack |
|---|---|---|
| A truck's food in the walk-in | A labeled shelf | Its goods, counted |
| What a truck loaded today | Not recorded | A release to it |
| The month's charges | A list | On its order and statement |
| A truck that left owing | Unknown what's left | Its goods, by lot |
Keeping trucks' goods, with releases and monthly statements, is on Standard at $99 a month. The first 30 days are free, with no credit card. If you'd like a hand setting up, ask, and we'll do it with you.