Trusted by brands like 7-Eleven, Van Houtte, and Mother Parkers, Cart-King coffee carts help entrepreneurs and national chains launch fast, serve premium brews, and grow revenue with branded, mobile café kiosks.
Do you need something larger? These specialty coffee carts are the ideal vending solution for growing businesses and even national brands. They can meet not only the requirements of a high-traffic mobile cafe, but also the extra requirements of a specialty coffee service. For example, special water tanks necessary for a quality espresso, a larger work area for equipment such as cappuccino and espresso machines, ice bins, pastry displays, fridges etc.
From $10598 - In stock
Customizing our mobile coffee carts to make them stand out from the crowd is easy! These models start off in a bare, powder-coated finish. You can customize it with our optional LED lighting or a vinyl graphics wrap.
Our commercial carts have a lot of available space to display your brand and image. A custom-printed graphics wrap is the most effective way of presenting your message. With our marketing and coffee experience, we can help you brand the cart with your message, logos and colors. Learn how it works.
Add an espresso kit to provide the quality water necessary for a premium coffee while you're on the move. Give increased visibility with LED lighting, drawing attention to your products and making them stand out. Secure your inventory and equipment with a zip-down security cover.
Custom vinyl graphics
from $899
LED Lighting
from $299
Zip-down cover
$599 each
Espresso Kit
$599 each
Cart-King Intl is an expert in the design and manufacture of custom coffee carts. We have developed that expertise designing and manufacturing many different portable solutions for indoor and outdoor applications.
We invite you to browse through some of our many commercial carts that we have built for restaurant chains, independent coffee vendors, hotels and resorts all across the United States.
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February 17, 2014 By Cart King in Coffee Carts
Mall Coffee Kiosk
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April 22, 2013 By Cart King in $20,001-30,000, Coffee Carts, Coffee Kiosks
Breakdown Coffee Kiosk
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By Cart King in $40,001-50,000, Coffee Carts, Coffee Kiosks
Hot Beverage Kiosks
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By Cart King in $1-10,000, Coffee Carts, Coffee Kiosks
Container-style coffee kiosks
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June 20, 2012 By Cart King in $20,001-30,000, Coffee Carts, Coffee Kiosks
Coffee Service Kiosk
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By Cart King in $1-10,000, Coffee Carts
Espresso Carts
One thing is for certain, it won't be a question of whether mobile java vending will pay for itself or whether there's any good spots to set up a pop-up café. There's no shortage of good locations to start a coffee business, just like there's no shortage of customers. Indoor shopping malls, gyms, food courts, parks and any outdoor venue with foot traffic will be excellent locations to sell espresso, artful lattes, cappuccino or a nice, cold brew.
However, there is a lot to consider when looking at any coffee carts for sale. Let's get into the details of how Cart-King's products can help you achieve your mobile coffee business dreams.
For a coffee cart to be considered a commercial vendor, it must be designed from the ground up with features necessary for high volume, continuous sales. Our mobile vendors offer these commercial-grade features:
Robust
Sturdy platforms on heavy-duty, industrial locking castors for ease of mobility.
Compliant
Food-safe countertops and surfaces that meet health department regulations.
Flexible
Fully adjustable shelving for a flexible arrangement of product or equipment placement.
Portable
Powder-coated aluminum and easily removable canopies for light-weight portability.
Commercial carts must have the features necessary for high volume, continuous sales. If you're vending pastries, muffins, cookies and cups of java, they must also be safe for food and beverage handling. That means being compliant with health and fire department regulations so you can get a business license to vend in public venues. Here's some of the key licenses and permits to consider and how our products comply with them:
Health Department compliance
In the United States, food and beverage vending is a regulated industry. A portable cart must meet strict food safety standards and pass annual inspections. The surfaces must be food-safe and have no deterioration, rust or anything else that could risk contaminating any food or beverage. Commercial portable sinks must have multiple basins, splash guards, and proper water handling to meet Health Department requirements.
Cart-King coffee carts use commercial-grade, food-safe, powder-coated aluminum for all surfaces so that they remain compliant, year after year. Our commercial sinks use NSF-specified components and meet or exceed Health Department requirements for food handling.
Fire Department inspection
Before you can get a business license to operate, your local fire department will inspect the cart and issue a license. The coffee makers, espresso machines, grinders or any other type of electrical equipment must satisfy electrical wiring regulations and have the proper certification. Electrical components used in Cart-King coffee carts and portable sinks are CSA and UL certified.
Government business licensing
If you plan on operating a coffee vendor cart in public spaces, your local government will need to issue you a business license. Of course, the whole reason you want to buy a cart to begin with is so that you can operate a coffee business in the public to expand your brick-and-mortar footprint or operate a pop-up mobile café.
To obtain a business license to operate a mobile cafe, your vending equipment will need to meet local and federal health, fire and electrical regulations.
Cart-King coffee carts and sinks comply with regulations
We understand your desire to make sure you're buying the products that help you achieve your business dreams. We have many commercial-grade carts, kiosks and portable sinks that meet regulatory compliance in the warehouse, ready for sale! We are happy to help you understand how our products meet regulatory compliance, helping to ensure you can get the licenses and permits you need to operate a successful mobile business.
The question "how much money can I make" is the first question on most entrepreneurial baristas' minds. The answer is that mobile carts can be excellent revenue generators. A Cart-King coffee cart is relatively low cost and is sure to pay for itself. Indeed, after expenses it is possible to generate between $30,000 and $90,000 USD in profits annually. A cup of coffee is roughly 75% profit. A more expensive cold brew or artistic latte can be as high as 90%.
Let's take a closer look at how you can achieve those kinds of results from using Cart-King's commercial carts.
Brick-and-mortar vs commercial cart
Up front, a brick-and-mortar coffee shop has very high startup costs which can soar past $1,000,000 USD if it's a franchise. That initial expense can pose a significant financial barrier to entry. Once they're operational, they have leases, wages, the cost of goods sold and in many of the most successful cases, high franchising fees. Many typically have a 3 to 15% profit margin after all their operating expenses. While they may seemingly make a lot of money, the take-home revenue per location is very little.
They also have a very limiting factor. They are fixed in place and rely on the customers to come to them. That can work well if they have a franchise brand like Starbucks backing them up, but it leaves a lot of gaps to fill and money on the table for an aspiring java connoisseur or independent cafe to capitalize on.
While a brick-and-mortar coffee shop has the limitation of needing to draw the customer to them, a high-impact commercial cart offers a whole different picture. After the minimal expense of buying everything you need to get started, the only ongoing expenses are basically your bean blends, whatever pastries, muffins and cookies you want to resell and your licensing. They have a low cost of entry and high margin potential if you can place your business in the right location.
Location, location, location
The reason you keep hearing the phrase "location, location, location" is because it's true. In the mobile coffee business, location makes all the difference in striking the balance between effort and results.
This matters, because in order to effectively capitalize on opportunities and gaps left by brick-and-mortar cafes, you need to be able to easily move into those prime vending locations. Those prime locations include high-traffic venues such as festivals, food and shopping markets, and transit terminals. Finding a few prime locations and delivering a top-notch coffee experience with latte art is an excellent recipe for generating loyal followers and consistent sales.
Of course you are not limited to that vending business model. There are different models you can try with our vendors, such as these three examples:
- Green Beans Coffee Co has taken our Quad Coffee Kiosks and placed them in international airports. Talk about heavy traffic and high sales volumes!
- Mother Parkers promoted their bean roasting with 350 units of our Modular Coffee Cart in grocery stores. There's an opportunity with a captive, receptive audience that is already there with the purpose of shopping.
- The University of Massachusetts placed one of our Quad Coffee Kiosks in the atrium at their Lowell campus. Thousands of hungry and thirsty on-the-go students and faculty pass by it for takeaway coffees and snacks every day.
Green Beans Coffee Co
Green Beans using a Quad Coffee Kiosk at the San Francisco International Airport
University of Massachusetts
UMass using a Quad Coffee Kiosk as a portable café
Needless to say, the mobile java business can generate some very profitable sales. A Cart-King commercial coffee cart is an ideal choice to help you capitalize on opportunities that brick-and-mortar coffee shops can't. They offer the robust, commercial-grade features you need, they are compliant with regulations, and they present a low cost of entry and overhead.
Low overhead, high profits and a potential annual revenue stream of 90,000 USD or more. Now that's a business model that all aspiring entrepreneurial baristas right up to national bean wholesalers can get behind!
When Mother Parkers, the largest OEM wholesaler of roasted coffee beans in North America, partnered with Winn Dixie grocery stores, they trusted Cart-King coffee carts for a large-scale mobile cart rollout.
Cart-King designed a unique coffee cart configuration that supported hot coffee service while promoting retail coffee products to a captive, ready-to-buy consumer. Each unit had built-in refrigerators, sinks, an eye-catching metal and glass canopy structure and hi-key lighting.
With all of us working together, we customized each cart with branding and colors which suited both Mother Parkers' coffee products and Winn Dixie's in-store look and feel.
After a prototype unit and custom packaging design was delivered and approved, Cart-King manufactured and delivered over 350 commercial coffee carts, on time and within budget.
You can trust us to help you get a quality Cart-King coffee cart that will be custom-tailored to your business and brand. Whether it's 1 cart or 350, your business matters to us and we're here to help you get your sales rolling.
