By: Sarah Punderson
It all began for Tom McCusker on a motorcycle trip to Austin, Texas with two friends. There were food trucks, there were breakfast
tacos-and they were damn good.
McCusker, owner of Honest Tom’s Taco Shop at 261 S. 44th
Street in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in the western part of the city, was just
26. After graduating from Drexel University in 2004 he worked a string of
underwhelming jobs including delivering beer, cooking in restaurants and
grinding it out for his family’s Cider Mill Services demolition company. The newly minted hotel restaurant management
major was ready to follow his dream of opening a taco shop, something he had
been planning since college. When he got back to Philly, he quickly found a
food truck for sale and got to work.
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| Tom McCusker, owner of Honest Tom's Taco Shop. |
“When I was 20, I filled out a credit card application on
campus and said my annual income was $700, 000,” McCusker said, smiling. “The
company sent me a card with a $20,000 limit. I had the card for years; I’d use
it occasionally and pay it off right away. When I decided to start up the taco
truck, I took the whole thing out in cash.” At the Clark Park Farmer’s Market in West Philly, McCusker’s
truck, a specimen looking like it just arrived via travel by map from the
summer of love (although it was the summer of ’09), would park to sell his
tacos and burritos, sourcing the food close to home.
“I’d walk over to the farmers and use their produce as I
went and then I’d take some for the week too,” McCusker said.
McCusker currently gets his eggs weekly at Clark Park
year-round and as the growing season progresses, he expands his locally-sourced
produce accordingly. The truck was out
at the park a few times this spring, but McCusker decided to shift his focus. He
wanted to trade in his wheels for a brick and mortar shop.
On December 19th, 2011, Honest Tom’s Taco Shop
opened. McCusker’s vision wasn’t just limited to a food truck anymore, he now
had a storefront. Making the transition to a storefront was something McCusker
hoped would be more consistent year-round.
“Holidays, rainy days, cold days, hot days, just a lot of
days I couldn’t go out on the truck,” said McCusker. “It was so frustrating.”
Frustrating indeed- and McCusker’s got specks of gray hair
to prove it.
“I was a wreck for
about a year and a half,” McCusker said. “I went from not having anything to
worry about to being overwhelmed by taking on so much.”
“It was just too much,
doing both, I’m just doing the shop for now,” McCusker said.
As for starting the
business, McCusker just jumped in. His parents thought he might just do it for
a bit and then get back to real life.
“People would see my
truck, with long lines, and assume I was making a ton of money,” McCusker said.
“But over the winter, I wasn’t making any money. “I’d work 15 hour days all spring,
summer and fall and I was still losing money.”
Did he ever consider giving up?
“I used to think about it,” said McCusker. “The second winter I had the truck, I stopped and worked some odd jobs, and by the third winter I just did the truck on Saturdays at Clark Park. But I’d think about what I’d do if I closed it, and I couldn’t think of anything else so I kept working.”
“I used to think about it,” said McCusker. “The second winter I had the truck, I stopped and worked some odd jobs, and by the third winter I just did the truck on Saturdays at Clark Park. But I’d think about what I’d do if I closed it, and I couldn’t think of anything else so I kept working.”
Frugal by nature, McCusker’s fashion sense in West Philly has
been flannel shirts by necessity. He wears multiple layers of the stuff and
says he hasn’t worn a jacket in about 12 years.
“At the beginning of every winter I buy four or five
flannels at Forman Mills where they’re about three bucks,” McCusker said.
Financial issues have been some of the toughest that the
small business owners who spoke with Farm Office have encountered. For
McCusker, he went for three straight years without making any money. Any paper
he did make went right back into the business. As soon as McCusker became
profitable, he opened the storefront, which put him right back in the red.
“There have been many missed parties, weddings and family
events,” McCusker said of working in business for himself. “But it’s exhausting
in a good way. I’m constantly stimulated and the business feels like its
growing.”
However, McCusker does have some words of caution for
wanna-be food truckers:
“Everyone thinks lunch trucks are killing it right now,”
said McCusker. “It’s a great business, but some people have unrealistic
expectations of it. A lot of the people getting into the food truck business
don’t know the deal. Even with long lines, at the end of the day, it’s a lot of
work.”
McCusker remembers a conversation he had with a customer in
the first few weeks his truck was open. A gentleman was telling McCusker about his
brother who owned a pizza shop. The pizza shop had been open for five years and
was just starting to make money.
“In my head, I was like, what’s wrong with that guy, it took
him five years to get it together,” said McCusker. “I started out so busy, so I
thought it would only get better. But I had no idea the amount of work that
went into operating the business.”
Working for yourself can be great, as McCusker can attest
to, but going it alone was a struggle.
“I quickly learned I couldn’t blame anything on anyone but
myself,” McCusker said. “When you’re working for someone else you can walk
around and kick cans, saying ‘my boss sucks’ but that doesn’t do much when
you’re working for yourself.”
Lucky for sure, McCusker had a strong following from day
one. Word of mouth and social media are McCusker’s marketing tools. He updates
his own Facebook and Twitter pages, and he’s gotten more used to the idea of
it. In the beginning, pre-laptop or smart phone, he struggled to keep up with
customer queries.
“I’d post where we’d be for a few weeks in a row and then
assume people knew where we were so I wouldn’t have to do any of the social
media,” McCusker said. “Then I wouldn’t put it online and nobody would show up-
then I’d post again and a huge crowd would be there. Unless people see it,
they’re not going to think about it,” he cautioned.
As the el jefe at
Honest Tom’s, McCusker has seen his role change as he’s expanded. Just 30 years
old, McCusker has eight full-time employees including himself, with a handful
of part-timers rounding out his crew de once.
That’s eleven for you non-Spanish speaking math majors.
“My role’s been weird lately, since I’ve got my original
crew from the truck, the new hires that only know our business as the
restaurant, and my girlfriend now works in the shop. I’m learning everyday
about being a boss,” McCusker said.
With a chef that McCusker raves about in Aric Danz, business
at the shop has been constant. Honest Tom’s is open seven days a week and will
even bring a burrito to your casa-within a reasonable distance of course.
As for his team, McCusker has relied on a few key people for
business support. Brian Higgins from Powelton Pizza was his first go-to guy
when he started the food truck in 2009. Since then, he’s added lawyers and
accountants for formal support, as well as his parents who know all about
running a business.
With his team behind him, McCusker has some future plans for
Honest Tom’s Taco Shop.
“I turn down a lot of business right now for catering
private events, but I think I’m going to rent out the second floor of the store
and make it a separate catering floor,” McCusker said. “Two squads making food
on either floor, I think that’s pretty awesome.”
As for a second location?
“Maybe one day- in center city or Northern Liberties, or
maybe in a different city,” McCusker said.
He’s not too worried about that quite yet.
And an update on McCusker’s flannel formal, with an honest
twist:
“Lately I’ve been into crewneck sweatshirts,” McCusker said.
“But that could all change since I have some money now, maybe I’ll get real
fresh- suits, fedoras- really do it up,” he said with a smirk.
Before McCusker got up to leave, he had some final thoughts
for potential start-ups.
“Commit to it if you’re going to do it,” McCusker said. “The
goal of starting a small business should be to earn a paycheck, not to become a
millionaire. There’s a very good chance it’s never going to make you a
millionaire, so be content doing what you’re doing,” he said.
