The Small Business Holiday

Posted on May 17, 2012 by the jabberwocky

We have spent the last two weeks in Cuba celebrating the fortuitous timing of two people, a registry office, some of our very dearest friends and an enormous amount of cheese. Having arranged for all the above to be in the right place at the right time we felt that a holiday was well deserved, what with it being quite traditional, and had treated ourselves to 2 weeks in Cuba, a country that hangs on the edge of change, waiting for things to never be the same again.

The resolve was to leave everything Jabberwocky and day-jobby behind, and to do something that involved sun, cocktails and laughable attempts at speaking Spanish. In essence that is what we did, setting the out of office response, wishing the Beast a happy few weeks and leaving what was left of Jabberwocky HQ after the wedding, to sort itself out.

Cuba was fantastic. The faded colonial façades, the vibrant street life, the thousands of diesel spewing, grumbling but magnificent 1950s cars and the almost endless sun were perfect, and the Jabberwocky was safely back in Leamington Spa, far away from our thoughts until I found myself drawing one on a restaurant wall in Trinidad. It would appear that while you may be able to put 5000 miles between yourself and your large green food truck, you can’t necessarily stop thinking about it. Precisely what the point of the drawing was I’m unsure, but if you ever do visit Bar Santander in Trinidad (the rabbit was the best Barny has ever eaten and my lamb was divine, so do drop by if you’re in the area), and the Wocky happens to still be there, make sure you get a picture.

I think in terms of advertising we were playing the long game on that one. I can’t see many Cubans holidaying in Warwickshire any time soon, but still we somehow got talking about it. And then again when we met Carlene and Jim at the resort in Santiago. And then again when Barny bought a Cuban pizza from a street food vendor and I had to take pictures for prosperity, just in case it was ever relevant. And then again when we were at a bar in Havana and I thought the surprisingly well-mannered feral dogs were just too cute for words and decided that the Soliloquy would want to see them too.

My point is that I don’t think we can ever stop doing this now. We have sent ourselves off down this entrepreneurial path and come what may we are sticking with the Jabberwocky. We couldn’t take a holiday from it completely, even if we wanted to, there is no such thing as a Small Business Holiday.

Thus it came about that after a 29 hour day with 2 hours of sleep and 13 hours of flights we found ourselves planning the Alcester Food Festival in the car on the last leg of the journey back to Leamington. It just seemed like a good idea at the time.

The forecast for the weekend isn’t rain, so if you are around Alcester, Warwickshire it would be great to see you. We’re serving Jabberwocky Street Food and would love to hear your opinion on our latest menu item, unseen outside the R&D Kitchen here at Jabberwocky HQ, which didn’t even try and tidy up in our absence.

See you Saturday!

Catering All Over Warwickshire and the Rest of the World

Posted on May 7, 2012 by the jabberwocky

As I write this the wedding is going to happen, and the rain is still set to come down, but by the time you read this, we will presumably have been hitched and will be taking a break from Jabberwockys, weddings, work and most other things. I will go ahead and assume that everything went beautifully and that the sun shined at exactly the right moments.

No only that, the speeches were a triumph, the food was amazing and everyone will be talking about the day for years to come. I look forward to that.

Go time is currently less than a few hours away, so I have been distracting myself with my current hobby, which is travelling the world with the Jabberwocky, so that despite his age and health he can go and see all those exciting places that really deserve to try Jabberwocky street food.

There, it’s go time. I leave you with the Jabberwocky in the Hamburg Harbour. Au revoir.

Rain

Posted on April 26, 2012 by the jabberwocky

What with the country currently officially having a drought it seems odd that the subject of rain should be on my mind at all, but thankfully the farmers can rejoice, because at least here in Leamington Spa, it’s raining. No only that, it is raining with the grim, forecast persistence that suggests it will be damned if it stops before the weekend and doubly damned if it misses my wedding. Luckily I’m reassured that everything will be just fine. Juuuust fine. It’s probably my frame of mind, but it puts me in mind a group of people inspecting a dent on a car or the partially functioning breaks on a roller coaster.

I had considered trying to keep away from the subject of the impending nuptials and let the wocky be a little island of calm in a stormy ocean of flowers, seating plans and inappropriate questions about who was actually invited, but it won’t work. I just checked the forecast for Warwick again. Google and the weather channel are both against me, but the dear old BBC is predicting cloud. I can totally live with cloud.

Annoyingly, rain is set to haunt me all year, even after the bit with the dress and the speeches. We have chosen ourselves a business where the weather can be the difference between a great day and a massive loss, and we can do nothing about it. It usually affects free festivals more than paid for ones, so Summer Sundae and Barefoot Festival should both be fine (17-19 Aug and 27-29 July respectively) while ones that rely on people showing up on the day like Alcester Food Festival on the 19th of May could well result in us serving tasty goodness to a grey, pessimistic sky full of rain.

There is not really a great deal of preparation that you can do to avoid rain as far as I can tell. Our hatch would happily shield an customers from the worst of the elements while they indulge in street food, and we have a hot menu which would certainly be important, but if there is no one there, they won’t buy the food. All you can do is stand there in your big white dress staring out at it and wondering why last April was so bloody sunny when it had no intention of doing so again.

Like I said, we really can’t keep the wedding out of things at the moment. It keeps waking me up at night to check that I’ve given the registry office the right information or to give me important dreams about arriving on the day wearing nothing but underwear. I really need to stop thinking. It will, of course, all be fine.

Things, and how they keep happening

Posted on April 19, 2012 by the jabberwocky

It’s been a while since the last post in the style of the good old days, back when I could celebrate having a working gas stove or an MOT. Things used to be so tangible in those days,so full of gosh-darn fixability. There was a problem, and we would tackle it with whatever means necessary until it was fixed, I would get to write a blog post that sang of achievement and general story-telling goodness.

Now the van starts, the pitches are lining up and we have almost everything sorted for the wedding. Actually that’s not true, we have loads left to do for the damn wedding, but we don’t have to cater for it, so it’s really not that difficult. In fact I literally just have to say two words in the right place and I can sign off for the day.

Unfortunately, while from a business point of view this all feels like cracking news, from a blog point of view it lacks narrative. The large green problems from last year have been wrestled into submission, leaving behind problems of a much more annoying and altogether less tangible kind. These days the problems are about marketing.

It’s mostly a dirty word, full of evil jargon-busting-new-speak like blue sky thinking, envisioneering and misson critical strategic brand management. On the other hand, no one ever sold anything by waiting for the customers to find it. The sad fact is that unless you spew marketing like sparkling rainbows of yummy care-cake, no one will even know you exist.

So without the international financial backing that people will, no doubt, one day queue up to pile upon us we have to attack in different ways. Specifically the free ones, all of which are hidden within the ad-infested bowels of the internet; where everyone will sell you anything and you innocents, you people who just pass through for ten minutes of entertainment, are nothing more than a product.

I have been trying to tap into this natural resource of humanity as it floats on the internet, and syphon some of it off onto the Jabberwocky, in the vague hope that these people might want to make a TV programme about street food or hire some excellent Warwickshire catering for their next party. It’s interesting to do, but the results seem a little lame because I’m still thinking like an internet grockle*.

As a grockle we like to see the funny cat pictures, but we hate the adverts. Most notably when people try and advertise to you on the sly, slipping a link in the comments or recommending you see their site for more details. Trying to get something for nothing. I will shamelessly dislike these people and not buy their products, but a part of the internet will follow that link, and thus the cycle continues.

The alternatives to this are far more time consuming, and involve trying to make people actually want to view your content and think that you are fun people to hang with. Luckily they’ve never met me before first-cup-of-tea or right after I’ve stubbed my toe, so all we need is interestingness, and all that takes is time. Endless, infinite and physically unrewarding – until you get a link or like or retweet or upvote or share or pin. Then suddenly it’s all worth while.

Our next festival, the Alcester Food Festival, is on the 19th of May – tangible problems are just around the corner again at last.

*grockle – as defined by my Dorset buddy Abby when she first taught me the word: Anyone “not from round these parts”. In this case I mean internet consumers, as opposed to folks who forage into the online world and stake a claim of their own.

Why Street Food is like Rock Music

Posted on April 12, 2012 by the jabberwocky

I would like to propose that music and street food are the same thing. They are a commodity that is bought and consumed, and then hopefully bought again. Of course with music you usually only have to buy a song once to have it with you forever, but I would also like to point out that you would starve, you and your song.

With street food, and probably many other businesses, the similarity to the music industry is eerie, so I will make my case on the grounds that if we treated entrepreneurs like rock stars, the economy would probably be fine. Before you query my logic, which at best is flighty and likes tangents, I will try and elaborate.

Many small businesses these days are based around one marvellous idea, something that will change the world and make it an altogether better place. The idea forms among a few like-minded people and they start a company with two basic, grand aims. No 1: to get this idea out into the world and make life better. No 2: To earn a living from it.

If you could do me a favour and re-read that paragraph, but replace “idea” with “sound” and “company” with “band”.

To make this happen you need some skills, and in our case you need to be able to create beautiful food. We’re passionate about our food, and try and share it, talk about it and give it to people as much as we possibly can. The goal is to become one of the best street food companies in the country, so that perhaps one day people will come and visit us, just to taste the food.

If you wouldn’t mind swapping “food” for “music” and “street food” for “rock music”.

The food industry is a pretty tough place to make a living in a recession, with everyone cutting back, but you can still get that big break. All it takes is to get spotted by the press and get a few plugs in the right places and you might even end up being renowned for what you do. You just have to do it right; not take too many drugs and make sure that the media don’t find something gross in your kitchen.

Just go ahead and remove the negatives on this one. Maybe replace “kitchen” with “past”, or possibly “bins”. Actually “trousers” would work here too.

Once you have made your mark in the online world you’re ready for the big time, and might be able to get on board with a local, independent street food collective so that you can reach more people and have a steady income. It would give you more time to work on getting the food just right. You might even get enough funds together to start you own restaurant.

Last one: if you could replace “local, independent street food collective” with “global record label” also “a steady income” with “anything you want” and “restaurant” with “religion”.

Conclusively proven you see; and we don’t need to worry about what we’re going to eat when we go to festivals. My only gripe is that we, the rock stars of food, will always be looked at down the nose of advertising. Meanwhile the rock stars of rock will be loved for even showing up. We need to support the little, crazy and different companies just like the folks who make the amazing music, otherwise we will end up with a world of washed up manufactured boy bands and mindless chain food.

Although for balance I should say that I’m sure they are both very valuable contributors to British society.

Providing they work together.

And don’t mess up my order.

Getting To Know You

Posted on April 5, 2012 by the jabberwocky

Well it’s been a while, I think we should get to know one another a little better if you’re comfortable with that. As I’m not entirely sure how many of you there are, or if you would get along with each other, it’s probably best if we meet in private, and it’s so much more romantic. I would like to propose an intimate little question and answer round, rather like speed dating without the wine. Or the other people nearby. Or the timed conversation. Or the awkward silences.

It’s probably more like a questionnaire. In fact I think we’re pretty safe in calling it that.

I had an epiphany a few days ago a little like the one with the carrot, when I suddenly realised that the internet is actually a big place, full of people, and that many of them are happy to share their opinions on stuff. It seems odd that I never thought of it before, being as I spend so much time playing with it, but I never did. Let’s move on.

The survey is to try and work out if we are heading in the right direction. There is great sagging question that we need and answer for, sooner rather than later, and it can be phrased like this: Are we doing it right?
There are lots of complicated answers, many of which involve levels of introspection that might cause permanent damage, but the bottom line is that if people will buy it, it’s right. I hasten to add that’s not the only factor, but no matter what else we do, we need to make money rather than lose it, and I’m almost certain people-buying-stuff is fairly critical to that process.

I have had a little think over some questions, we talked it through over dinner last night, and we have come up with some questions that will hopefully point us in the right direction. I’ve never written a survey before, and discovered it’s actually quite hard to come up with questions that don’t either limit the answer or point in one specific direction. Just as an example, one of the questions that I was planning to add, but eventually dropped in favour of something else was
What is your favourite street food?
I had then listed a couple,
hog roast
hotdog
chirros
And then rather lamely trailed of with the “Other – please state” box.
There are probably more types of street food than I’ve had hot dinners, and although it would be interesting to find out, I have no idea how we could use the information, as even if we surveyed a hundred people we might still not get more than a few percent of any one kind, in fact the list would just keep getting longer, and either way we don’t cook a random selection of those foods, we cook the Jabberwocky Street Food as seen only in Leamington Spa, Warwickshire. Sometimes also toasties.

So I have had a stab at it, and if you have nothing better to do it would be amazing if you could fill it in. It’s all clicking, no typing unless you really want to, because I have the attention span of a three year old and don’t blame anyone else for being the same. You can find the survey here, and don’t forget that if all of you want a free haiku, I will never get round to working out the results.

The Hidden Cost of Catering

Posted on March 28, 2012 by the jabberwocky

We always knew that the Jabberwocky would be a learning curve. Totally new and unexpected situations that do CV-boosting activities like throwing you “out of your comfort zone” or “in at the deep end” as well as requiring you to “think on your feet” and “remain positive despite setbacks” are all part of the usual start up process. Not only do they provide you with an excellent set of buzz-words for jobs that like blue sky thinking and people who would never spell team with an “I”, they are also quite interesting once you have peeled away the jargon an actually find out what on earth is going on.

The thing that took us by surprise, even though we were prepared for it by every jaded, bitter business owner who came into our lives, was the odd little cost of EVERYTHING. Magically, almost as soon as we started, things began to cost money. It’s a small business, so there wasn’t a massive amount of money, but luckily nothing costs very much. The strange thing was that every time you paid for something, another item moved into its place.

The van was our initial outgoing, and having bought the food van, we were committed to its well-being, and had to get it seen to, painted, taxed, cleaned, branded and, above all, working. Following that there was the kitchen in the belly of the Beast, which turned out to be neither legal nor functioning, and led to much money spending as well.

I could go on, but finance is dull and money is just a means to an end. A few days ago the Inland Revenue wrote to us with news that the year had ended, and that at some stage, many moons from now, we would need to prepare to return. The tax return won’t be fun, and will quite possibly involve all of the scrupulously collected data I have been gathering so far, like a numerically-crazed squirrel waiting for the Winter of Discontent.

It does mean that I have a full list of all the additional costs that are involved in making something out of nothing, and I can see why people don’t go in for it themselves. The health and safety inspections (gas and electricity along with food hygiene), the festival fees (hundreds of pounds per festival, paid up front) and the odd little bits and bobs that pop out of nowhere (a random decision one day to make a flag for example) have all had their slice.

In the dazed wake of all that expenditure we should probably be world renowned by now, but the problem is that every other business is in the same boat, rowing against the current and wondering about lunch. So we are hunting for an accountant to organise the finances we have, so that one day we can pitch up at the riverside and give everyone else a bite to eat.

The Small Triumphs

Posted on March 22, 2012 by the jabberwocky

The year is wearing on, and even though part of my mind still seems convinced it’s February and dates things accordingly, we are now almost a quarter of the way through the year. The Jabberwocky has picked up some events for the summer, which is excellent news, and I am in an excellent mood as a result of this. I think general Spring feelings also help, with Leamington Spa once more coated in blossom and the garden full of bare earth that might even turn into flowers.

The last few weeks have been spattered with good things, in many ways, and these have helped outweigh a certain amount of sadness that would otherwise have nested in the darker reaches of my mind. The good things haven’t been earth-shattering enough to warrant troubling the internet with, but they have all been better than a cold cup of tea.

Point 1, although it’s worth noting that my cranial filing system likes to sort these things pretty randomly.
My sudden skill in Photoshopping pictures has let to a brand new hobby, for all those moments that would otherwise probably be spent pretending I was doing research. We will take the Wocky around the world. Not only that, but it gives me something to do with Pinterest, which is apparently going to be the next big social media thing.

Point 2: The Beast passed his MOT. Old news if you follow us on twitter of course, but considering the all too magnificent failure last year I think it deserves an honorary mention at least.

Point 3: While our pitch applications are not currently yielding thousands of open doors and hungry punters, I feel like we are learning things. The static pitch is a big deal, so a no or six are to be expected, but we will keep trying.

Point 4: I have an odd feeling a if we are on the edge of getting something right. The various social channels that I’ve been working on might just suddenly make something good happen. I know that as Triumphs go this is a surprisingly lame one, but I feel like we are now almost in the same room as the guy who owns the book that you would have to be on the right page of. Rather than not even knowing that books were a good way of figuring it out. This is possibly the point that is giving me most satisfaction, because while Barny lives in the real world I have always rather liked the Jabberwocky’s virtual one.

Point 5: The key to every successful business is making money. I believe that’s the terribly brutal truth of it. Somewhere in this the government wanders over and has a cut, so we have finally started to take steps to find someone who can help us with that.

The best thing about a positive attitude is that you want to annoy everyone with it, so chin up folks, we’ll get through this.

I recommend tea.

Advertising is Fun

Posted on March 15, 2012 by the jabberwocky

The internet has made a commodity out of us all, with the that wonderfully hateful word “advertising” lurking around every corner, skittering into every picture, resource or spare square inch and screaming for your attention. The internet is nothing more than another platform to advertise on, and the product, in most cases, is you.

For example.
The Jabberwocky phone gets a call inviting us to purchase advertising space. The website in question has 14,000,000 unique visitors a month, all of whom would be exposed to our advertising until they submit and click on the link. That’s you, right there, being a product as you browse. You don’t get paid for it, because the website has already paid someone else to optimise their site so that you would want to come there in the first place. You have not fallen for a ploy or been duped, because chances are you genuinely want to be there and will find what you are looking for, but you are what we, as advertising customer, would be paying for. The exciting website and its equally excited sales rep go on to tell us that this exclusive offer is simply not to be missed, and that unless you buy this advertising space on this website NOW the world will probably turn on us fire-and-brimstone-style.

Barny then politely explains that if we had spare funds we wouldn’t spend it on that, and they usually eventually give up.

I imagine advertising must work, even if I don’t click on it much. When Google gave us £70 of Adwords credit people clicked through to us and had a look around, so somebody uses it. I think my problem is that advertising is taking the sportsmanship out of the whole business. There is no question of us both putting our product on the table, shaking hands and letting the best man/woman/Warwickshire-based-caterer win, instead the winner will be the one who can plough most cash into advertising.

Those are the rules of course, so the Jabberwocky will need to play by them too. Let’s face it, this website is entirely advertising, from the beautifully designed logo right through to the prose you are reading now. They are there to sell you the product on some level, because without the product, they wouldn’t be there.

Having established that I am the thing I find most dislikeable about the internet puts me in an uncomfortable position, because realistically I should remove myself from the loop and thus make the internet a better place. The Beast would rust into a little heap and I would have to find somewhere else to rant about feedback. My one saving grace is that the evil leviathan of Advertising is subdivided into many different subspecies, and not all of them deserve suffering and the withholding of kittens and tea.

While I admit that the blog is attached to the business, and therefore must be regarded as a form of advertising, my prime goal is to tell a story. I would argue that in that sense the blog is advertising in the same way that a book is an advert for the sequel. I’m not going to tell you you have to try it, I just hope it will be interesting enough for you to want more some time.

The Fourth Prong

Posted on March 9, 2012 by the jabberwocky

The Jabberwocky in Heroes' Square, Budapest.

All you have to do is find a pitch.

The Jabberwocky has three tried and tested ways of getting food out and into Warwickshire. We can swing by your locale, whip up a meal in your kitchen and then swing away again, we can bring food of many kinds on the Beast to a location of your choice and serve it from the Beast or we can park the Beast at a festival near you and give away free brownie until people notice us. These methods are all nicely entertaining, and as our reputation grows I’m confident that we will be able to reap some healthy rewards that will keep the Jabberwocky afloat in the turbid waters of recession.

But the Jabberwocky is not complete. We are a food van, born in the fires of needing better snacks and forged in the very sharp learning curve, and there is something that we are still missing.

We do not have the Regular Pitch. This is a place on Earth when you can bring your Beast to regularly, usually in a town centre or trading estate, and from there sell your fine provender directly to the customer, as they are passing. Not only that, you are also displaying the glorious Deep Brunswick Green of the Jabberwocky to anyone who just happens to be passing, and with green as fine as that I would be very surprised if they could resist not stepping over and treating themselves to several snacks.

That was me getting carried away again, but I imagine you get my point. A regular pitch would mean a steady source of income, regular exposure to potential customers and a chance for the Beast to roar around Leamington slowing down traffic in a lovable and investment-worthy way. It would also mean we could seriously compete in the growing wave of street food, which is gradually making its way out from London and down from the North.

Luckily, as with all things, there is more of a challenge to it than simply rocking up in the middle of the town, throwing open the hatch and selling food. Not least due to the fact that for health and safety reasons the hatch is never to be thrown anywhere. Instead you have to first find a pitch, somewhere that has enough people passing regularly that you can make a living but that does not put you in the firing line of roads. Complicated enough. Then you have to find out who that land belongs to and ask if you can ply your vital and culturally important trade there. Again, this is not a walk in the park. You then also have to convince the local authority that all this indulgence is well regulated and will cease at the appropriate time, so that they can also give you the go ahead.

Beyond that I would be disappointed if there were not a few more hurdles to come, but those first three are the ones to concentrate on, and maybe someday soon we will have our forth prong.

The Jabberwocky Soliloquy

Migratory thoughts about food and business