"The French Fry Mafia", "Kings of Burgers", "Gorilla Barbecue" or "Barbecue Master" - these are just a few catchy food truck names that get you interested and make you hungry at the same time. A good name has always been a key element of every successful business.
“The French Fry Mafia”, “Kings of Burgers”, “Gorilla Barbecue” or “Barbecue Master” – these are just a few catchy food truck names that get you interested and make you hungry at the same time. A good name has always been a key element of every successful business.
- Ideas for food truck names
- Step one – defining your target group!
- Step two – taking a closer look at your offer!
- Step three – paying attention to vocabulary!
- Step four – deleting anything that does not fit!
- Step five – supporting your creative thinking
- Step six – the final lifeline
- Step seven – making the final decision
Ideas for food truck names
You should consider the name much earlier than choosing the design or form of advertising, as it is not only important when designing your logo or website, but also for more down-to-earth aspects such as registering your company. Creative food truck names will define your approach to the design and sales strategy, so you should make sure you invest enough time in doing so. The following guide will help you come up with loads of cool names for a food truck. Follow our advice and your efforts will not be made in vain.
Step one – defining your target group!
Who are your customers? Are they a group of fans at the third day of a rock festival, people visiting a DIY store in a small town or business executives in the centre of a large capital city? Do you want to appeal to health-conscious vegans or satisfy the hunger of meat-lovers? Are you looking to serve starving guests looking for cheap fast food, or maybe those with a more discerning palate, offering them fresh salmon and champagne? Depending on your target group, food truck name ideas could have an international or regional feel, be quite direct or rather cordial, or maybe even include a pun (more on that below).
Step two – taking a closer look at your offer!
Clever food truck names should also reflect what’s on your food truck menu. Whether you’re serving Asian dumplings, Mexican street food or American burgers, the name should reflect the country of origin of the cuisine you offer. If your menu includes soups, sausage and potato dishes, or if you boast vegan specials or retro-style ice cream, you should choose a name that stands out as much as the items on your menu.
Step three – paying attention to vocabulary!
Start off with a with good brainstorm. Write down whatever comes to your mind. Ask family members and friends for connotations, browse through various dictionaries and check internet trends. If you haven’t got any ideas, try the ABC method – write down each letter of the alphabet one after another on a piece of paper, and try to think of words or phrases beginning with each letter that are somehow connected with your offer. This method should help you quickly come up with new and unusual ideas.
Step four – deleting anything that does not fit!
Once you have come up with enough words, it’s time to sort them out. Cross out any name that:
- doesn’t suit your food truck. It’s your business after all, and you should feel comfortable with it.
- is too long. It’s best to stick to around six letters or two / three syllables.
- sounds similar to names of other brands. This will help prevent any misunderstandings or potential disputes.
- has a pejorative meaning in another language. You can easily check this on translation websites like Google Translate or deepl.com.
- is already taken in other domain names. The website and company name should be identical or at least visibly similar.
- is a bit too closely related to current trends. You don’t want to change your company name every year!
- is complex and hard to remember. Only simple and easy names will be remembered by your customers.
In the best case scenario, your piece of paper will now have a handful of words competing for the name of your food truck. If, however, you still don’t have any ideas, try step five.
Step five – supporting your creative thinking
Don’t despair if, despite your best efforts, you still haven’t come up with any cool food truck names that you find worthy of your business. We know a few simple ways to solve this. Look at your food truck names list again and select a few potential favourites. Now try to find other words that rhyme with the ones you have selected. A dictionary of rhymes can come in useful here. Thanks to this you might just come up with the perfect pun or simply come up with some more great food truck names. However, you should be very careful with puns. Hair salons are a perfect example of this. Names of food trucks such as “Chippy Woman”, “The Wurst Food Truck” or “Grillin’ Me Softly” will not necessarily work for everyone, and some customers may even be left confused. You should therefore be careful with such “brilliant ideas”, as many puns have very short expiry dates.
Step six – the final lifeline
If you don’t like rhymes and struggling with similar-sounding words, we have one final lifeline for you. You can easily spice up commonly used names using additional words to describe your specific type of business. Your customers should know more or less what to expect based on the name of your food truck. A source of inspiration could be names of existing food trucks such as “Food so Good”, “The Taste Palette”, “American Style”, “Homemade Burgers and Hot Hogs”, “Health & Protein” or “Devilicious Hot Dogs”. Such names make it easy to give these food trucks a second life and tweak their names appropriately, depending on your offer.
Step seven – making the final decision
Have you checked the names of existing domains and competition? Is your chosen name short, easy to remember, and unique? Then it’s time to put your choice to the test! Ask friends and family if they like the name you have come up with, and also what each one makes them think of. Don’t worry if your “favourite” choice is not shared by others. Think about how much changing the name later on would cost. Or maybe you can come up with the perfect name for your food truck together?
If after all the in-depth research you feel that you still haven’t come up with an appropriate name, then maybe you should ask a professional for help? There are many agencies that specialise in developing brand names and slogans. Such agencies also analyse the competition or target groups, and help create the perfect logo. Budget-permitted, investing in the support of an agency could be a good choice in the long-run.
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