how to not succeed in business by really, really trying [part 2]

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so i'm in the car the other day and i flip over to a station where the host is interviewing some pioneer in the food truck craze currently sweeping the nation and as he congratulates the guy on his visionary genius, i shake my head and wonder what these hipster gourmets would think if they knew they'd been beaten to the punch a quarter-century ago.


and then i think, "i really need to get shitfaced and finish that post."

and if you have no idea what i'm talking about, go back and read part 1.

*     *     *     *     *

by late may in that fateful year of 1985, the die was cast--the agreements were signed, the money was in place, time was short and we had to move if we wanted to launch by fall.

we found the RV on the first saturday we looked, snatched it cheaply and ruthlessly outta the hands of the new widow whose dead husband had tended it so carefully for us all those years, and had it safely back in the parking lot outside beau's apartment by nightfall.

where we'd work on it all that long, hot summer--from dawn til midnight, all day, every day--until its transformation from common, plebian motorhome to mobile full-service restaurant was complete.

how beau managed to sweet-talk his apartment management (not to mention his neighbors) into enduring all that racket all summer long i'll never know, but then i'll never know how he managed half the shit he pulled off while i knew him.

gutting the thing was easy--we removed everything from the inside we didn't need (i.e.,  everything but the bathroom), while carefully leaving the exterior shell intact.

i remember as we ripped her apart we scoffed at how flimsy and lightweight the construction was, without taking even a moment to consider why.  we'd find out later when we took our twelve-ton, solidly 2x4-reconstructed behemoth out for her first swaying, tire-flattening, zero-to-60-in-two-minutes drive.  god, we could be so stupid.

but by god, we did it--into a cramped space scarcely larger than the sorta jail cell that'd make amnesty international blanch, we managed to fit (a) a custom high-heat three-wok cooktop; (b) a prep area; (c) a three-compartment sink [even though we'd never use it--and even now, 25 years later, may i just say fuck you very much for that little space-eating requirement, city of austin health department]; (d) a bathroom; (e) refrigerated undercounter food storage; (f) a huge noise-isolated generator; and, last but not least, (g) room enough for two people to move around each other and cook.  that motherfucker was an engineering marvel if i do say so myself--and this, largely thanks to beau.

but she was beautiful, too.  unlike the utilitarian food trucks of today, ours was open on three sides, thanks to the huge 3x5 horizontal-sliding windows i picked up at the home-improvement store [safety glass?  we dun' need no stinkin' safety glass], and her interior was a masterpiece of artfully illuminated resin-coated butcher-block and stainless steel.  we wanted people looking in (hell, i even designed a special ribbed-steel ceiling, knowing our customers would be slightly below us looking up).

and, of course, we pulled it off for next to nothing--whatever our differences, that's the way beau and i both rolled.

i'd give anything to have pictures of the thing; problem was, by the time we were finished, we were too exhausted for such niceties--all i've got to show for the effort are some of the promotional materials.

i don't remember exactly at what point our little walk-up chinese restaurant became "WokUp"--i'm pretty sure it happened early on--but once we had the name, the rest clicked together in my brain pretty quickly (because, for better or worse, i was the advertising and art department for this operation).

hell, our logo couldn't possibly be anything but a walking wok, right?

and yeah i know real woks don't have lids--just go with it, ok?

here's our first flyer (with a dollar-off coupon on the other side):

and the mock-up for our first print ad:

kinda cute, huh?  well, considering how bone-weary and brain-dead i was by the time my young, amateurish ass had to conjure all this shit into being, it coulda been a lot worse, trust me.

whatever--by late august and right on schedule, our mobile kitchen was a thing of beauty, our menu perfected and our ad campaign complete.  beau and mkf were finally ready to take their show on the road.

and as exhausted as we were, we were also exhilarated--i mean, having survived our summer-long trial by fire, it had to be smooth sailing ahead, right?  i mean seriously, how wrong could things go?

stay tuned:  in part 3 i'll count the ways.