Destination Desserts: Street Sweets & Eats Utah

I am closing out 2012 with one of my favorite Destination Desserts features so far.  Street Sweets & Eats is a new dessert truck in Salt Lake City, Utah that is striving to make a name for themselves in the industry.  Making a mark shouldnt be too difficult since Street Sweets is the first dessert food truck in Salt Lake City.  And with cupcake flavors like chocolate pretzel and strawberry soda, the people should be lining up for long waits in no time!  The married co-owners, Stacey and Jake, decided to take a risk and make their dessert dreams come true one day, and I believe it will truly pay off.  I am in love with risk takers and dreamers because I know how hard something like that truly is.  I have nothing but absolute respect and admiration for them.  I hope you enjoy this feature as much as I did. 

Photo courtesy of Streets Sweets & Eats.  Co-owner Stacey second to right.

1.  What did you do before you started your food truck business?

My husband and I both still work full time. Jake is an operations analyst at a bank, and I am a full-time middle school teacher! I have always loved desserts and cupcakes and having our own little cupcake/dessert business has been a dream for a very long time. I am lucky that my husband has always had an entrepreneurial heart and has made a lot of my dreams his own as well.

 Photo courtesy of Street Sweets & Eats

2. What made you start a food truck business?

We started the business because we were tired of people holding us back from our dreams. We recently moved from Baltimore where I was teaching high school for 5 years and Jake was going to school and serving tables at night. We had two babies one year apart, no family around to help us, and a mortgage than continued to grow from taxes every year. We rarely even saw each other. We were just drowning.  We jumped on a job offer in Salt Lake City with the hope that we could turn things around here. We moved in with Jake's parents, and having family so close has been amazing!! Unfortunately, we rented our house to the world's worst tenant and needed a third job. Instead of going back to waiting tables for extra cash we thought.... let's just do this! We had a friend invest in getting us started and in just two months, we were up and running! We have only been in business for about three months now, so we are still babies in the food truck world! We are getting our name out there and love getting to know the communities around us!

3.  What is the hardest part of running a food truck?

The hardest part has been not being able to find the employees we need to operate the truck during the day. From the start, our plan was to hire an employee to help grow the business until we were in a position to leave our jobs and focus on the truck!  We just need that person that has "it"!  Jake and I are so busy with our jobs and our little ones that lately we have just been working hard on the weekends. We hope to have "our person" soon!! I also do all the baking with one other employee, so between my day job, doing the baking, getting the ingredients, and running the truck, I am pretty exhausted by the end of the week and can't wait for Sunday to spend with my two and three year old kids and stay in my PJ's as long as possible!!

                 

Photo courtesy of Street Sweets & Eats

4.  Why is it important to get desserts on the go? 

Desserts on the go are such a brilliant idea! Who wouldn't love a cupcake break during work with the supply right outside your door!  Being in Baltimore and seeing cupcake trucks all over the place there and in DC, we were surprised by the lack of them in Salt Lake City. I have always been inspired by Curbside Cupcakes in Downtown DC! She sells a zillion cupcakes a day. People still seem a bit confused by the concept here, and we are from what we understand is the first dessert truck in Salt Lake. There is one more cupcake truck that I know of in Salt Lake, but they have a brick and mortar location as well. We hope to have people embrace the concept in no time.  We would even love to see more cupcake trucks hitting the streets! 

Photo courtesy of Street Sweets & Eats 

5.  What famous person would you love to have order from your truck and why?   What menu item do you think they would order and why?

If any famous person was going to order from our truck I would have to go with Sarah Jessica Parker or.... Carrie Bradshaw from "Sex and the City".  The girl made cupcakes epic!  I don't care what she would order because whatever she did order, people would probably come running! haha. All in all.... we don't need famous people eating our cupcakes. We want the moms who need a break, the families celebrating birthdays, the co-workers who have been excited for weeks for the truck to come, and the men who aren't scared to eat a cupcake!  I can't tell you how many times I have celebrated friendship, hardship and life in general with a cupcake. And I don't just turn up my nose at the other cupcake makers in Utah. I love getting cupcakes from them all! 

To learn more about Street Sweets & Eats, visit them here