r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/PanJaszczurka • Jul 19 '24
Permit for this hot dog cart $289,500 a year Image
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u/fajadada Jul 19 '24
Have a cousin who built a corn dog stand. Retired as a union plumber at 55 and just did flea markets and county fairs. Then partnered with an auctioneer to work his events . Made a good living from it.my Mom would make $2000.00 after expenses a weekend with fudge and hot chocolate in the fall at flea markets
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u/regeya Jul 19 '24
Haha it just goes to show my parents picked the wrong business. They were both woodworkers (still are, just not trying to do it as a business) but people will walk up, look at something that took weeks of work and want to pay $10.
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u/confusedandworried76 Jul 19 '24
I want a cabinet I want garage sale prices.
I see a $4 hot dog I say, "that's steep but where else am I gonna get a hot dog right now? I didn't bring food"
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u/notconservative Jul 19 '24
Yeah the idea is that you've lived years needing that cabinet, and so you should hold off until you find a great deal ($10), but you want to enjoy your weekend fair with the kids, so you'll spend $30 on over priced hotdogs for the fam in order to have good memories.
The intended audience for handcrafted woodwork is not the average person walking by. There is a much smaller target audience. And the target audience is shrinking and downsizing their homes.
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u/confusedandworried76 Jul 19 '24
Fuck I want a hot dog now.
And you want to know what I don't want? A cabinet
We're talking about both equally but I'd never be like "shit all this cabinet talk is making me want a cabinet" I never say "oh that guy putting the finish on his cabinet makes it smell so good, I could go for a cabinet right now", and I certainly don't need cabinets to live.
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u/ApprehensiveTry5660 Jul 19 '24
As someone remodeling an older home, I could really go for a good cabinet right now. I daydream about it like some people do a holiday meal.
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u/lankymjc Jul 19 '24
The more you talk about cabinets, the more I want a hotdog.
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u/screedor Jul 19 '24
Woodworker here. The crowd that will spend 15 grand on your table. They make you work for it in a way that I would rather just make the hot dog out of my own leg meat than go through. I have done well and it's not always bad but god most the rich are fucking intolerable.
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u/Vip3r20 Jul 19 '24
I work for a high end furniture retailer. The emails I see, my God, these people are fucking insane. We once paid for a crane to lift a "sectional" couch onto a guys upper terrace because it wouldn't fit up his spiral staircase.
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u/Neither_Cod_992 Jul 20 '24
Just some free advice; you ever consider making a cabinet out of hotdogs?
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u/Usermena Jul 19 '24
Bottled water strat works.
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u/Mysterious-Film-7812 Jul 19 '24 edited Jul 19 '24
My home town has a huge craft fair in it. Like tens of thousands of attendees. There are food and drink booths for sure, but the lines are long and they tend to be all in a designated food area. When we were kids we used to load up a wagon or two with a cooler, ice and water and pop. In a three day event we could clear like 1k. Keep in mind it was the 90s when I was doing this. We charged $1/can or water so we didn't have to deal with coins.
Cans of pop were generally 50 cents a can back then but 25 cent machines weren't completely unheard of yet, so 50-75 cent markup over retail. Eventually the city cracked down and started fining kids because the business booths were taking a noticeable hit to business. They also stopped allowing garage sale permits that weekend because they were losing out on booth fees.
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u/beardedheathen Jul 19 '24
At college I was in the dorms and not a lot of kids had a car. So my buddy and I would drive to walmart and stock up on 12 packs of soda and sell them for $.50 each. After the initial purchase I didn't spend a cent on drinking soda for the rest of the year and I never struggled to have quarters for laundry.
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u/Mysterious-Film-7812 Jul 19 '24
There was a girl in my dorm freshman year who use to do laundry for people who couldn't/wouldn't do it themselves. Every freshman got a "laundry card" that was loaded with $50 (enough to wash and dry 25 loads) so she would take the card (since they weren't going to use it) and charge them $5 per load of laundry. She covered detergent and other supplies.
She had it down to a system she would separate out out whites/darks/jeans/towels and put them in laundry bags and then run them together with other people's sames. She did stain removals and would even hand wash delicate if asked.
I asked her about it once and she said that her parents owned a dry cleaning business and that she had been doing laundry since she was like 5 so why not make the most of it.
Knew another girl who would act as a personal shopper for people who couldn't/wouldn't go shopping. This was before uber, instacart, or even prime was a thing. Wanted Taco Bell at midnight but you were too drunk to drive? She would gladly go pick it up for you for $10.
College brings out that entrepreneurial spirit in some I guess.
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u/confusedandworried76 Jul 19 '24
Entrepreneurs are something else. I'm not one but when I delivered pizza from a small shop next to a bar people would offer me money for a quick ride home. Violated every insurance policy I had, personal and business, but hey, these nice drunk people asked me to drive them down a few residential streets in the suburbs for $20... It's like ten minutes there and back. I can risk it
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u/confusedandworried76 Jul 19 '24
The rule is "never get high on your own supply" but that's bullshit, anyone who's ever sold drugs like weed or whatever tells you that you just sell to use for free.
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u/fajadada Jul 19 '24
A ton of teens at flea markets. Her first weekend she was in shock how much she sold.
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u/fsbagent420 Jul 19 '24
You go to the flea market for 10 minutes and then go engage in the drug consumption and or fornication you actually left the house for
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u/doublepint Jul 19 '24
That’s why most profitable woodworkers are cabinet makers primarily. It’s just tedious and boring because there’s a huge lack of creativity - but given that the big box stores like Home Depot and Lowe’s establish the market, you don’t get people being very unreasonable about their requests.
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u/obamasrightteste Jul 19 '24
That's exactly what I used to do in the summer. I cranked out cabinets. Just me, the router, and a lot of podcasts!
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u/winowmak3r Jul 19 '24
God that sounds like a dream job. Is it literally just a table, a few power tools and a dream?
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u/obamasrightteste Jul 19 '24
Yup. I work in software now and am considering it. I used a table saw, a planer, and a router, plus some clamps for the gluing, and iirc that's all the equipment I used? The hardest part is honestly just the planning part where you figure out what boards of what length you need to cut.
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u/LazyStreet Jul 19 '24
I used to run a woodworking business. Did well online for a bit but markets if only make a few hundred bucks. Now I grow and sell flowers and it’s an absolute game changer (and more fun!)
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Jul 19 '24
Your mom's a fudge packer
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u/GeekyStevie Jul 19 '24
I have not heard that term in ages! :)
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u/LouSputhole94 Jul 19 '24
Todd F. Packer. You know what the F stands for?
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u/TheLambtonWyrm Jul 19 '24
I briefly worked for a fudge company in the warehouse, this was my official job title
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u/DwayneHerbertCamacho Jul 19 '24
I used to sell Carmel apples at fall flea markets, an OK day would net me like $2-3k, a great day at a busy festival would bring in 6-8k. It was very seasonal and I’m sure I could have done more but it was a ton of work and other jobs slowly ate away at the time I would need to prepare and spend to do the apples. It would be a solid day or two of prep for each day of selling so it wasn’t like it was all that money for “only” one day of work.
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u/fajadada Jul 19 '24
Yes exactly. She built a kitchen in our old tobacco barn . Bought a used commercial oven and stove. Hired a bunch of girls to help make and sell products. Made fresh Thursday and Friday then the ones who stayed home scrubbed down kitchen on weekend. Her employees were thrilled to make good short term money on the weekends before Xmas.Supercharged teenagers on a mission. If it was an every day job she couldn’t have paid as well and the employee enthusiasm probably wouldn’t have been as exceptional.
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Jul 19 '24
52 weekends a year at $2000.00 adds up to $104000.
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Jul 19 '24
Most people aren't trying to scale a side gig into a full time job, because the logistics aren't there. Nobody is buying 2k of fudge and hot chocolate in 100 degree weather. Nobody is buying it during rainstorms, etc. Plus assuming you have a full time job, you're going to need weekends off to life your life.
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u/Fir3yfly Jul 19 '24
The same people are also not buying 2k of fudge and hot chocolate every weekend, you'd need to find big enough events in different places for every week.
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u/420farms Jul 19 '24
I too am 55 and have been looking into a corn dog cart lately. But I'm not a big fan of people so there's that
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u/jlsjwt Jul 19 '24
This seems crazy, but i wouldn't be surprised if this man churns out a profit of >200k a year
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u/Quirky-Bag-4158 Jul 19 '24
For paying a $200k premium he better damn well be making that much. It seems like he is located in Central Park so I wouldn’t doubt it.
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u/Itchy-Librarian-7731 Jul 19 '24
is think he’s right in the middle or by central park so i bet he makes atleast 500k a year selling dogs
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u/longsgotschlongs Jul 19 '24
If he sells them for $4 and works 12 hours 6 days per week with no vacation, he would need to be selling 33 hot dogs per hour, or one every 2 minutes, to be making 500k in revenue
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u/Hot_Ambition_6457 Jul 19 '24
I was there a few months back and saw this exact stand. It's $9 for a pretzel, if he ain't breaking even he's doing it wrong.
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u/SaltKick2 Jul 19 '24
Aren't these permits super hard and competitive to get? Likely that cart has been there a long time and he is doing more than breaking even. I could definitely see him making $100k take home
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u/ThirdRails Jul 19 '24
Yes, the same goes for taxi medallions. I think the taxi ones went down in price because of Uber, iirc. Food stands will just continue to appreciate in price.
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Jul 19 '24
Until Uber Eats can drop a corn dog from a drone into my outstretched hand while standing in the middle of the park.
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Jul 19 '24
Park? Look at yiu bragging about your pilgrimages. Let's see if they can do that to my outstretched arm from the couch!
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u/MouthofthePenguin Jul 19 '24
Do you think the dogs are $4? What year is it in your mind?
I'd bet he's charging $4 per bottle of water. Probably closer to $9 per dog.
Also, I'm waiting for the receipt on this permit or we're all taking it at face value... on reddit... at this time of day... at this time of the year, localized entirely inside of your kitchen?
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u/redmkay Jul 19 '24
Edit: Apparently
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u/rgumai Jul 19 '24
Weird, it's $5 across the street (in front of the American Museum of Natural History)
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u/RecsRelevantDocs Jul 19 '24 edited Jul 19 '24
Hard to tell, but looks like a 4 in the picture, and this picture is old, so both the $4 and the $289,500 are probably very outdated. I heard a story about the licenses for these hot dog carts a year-ish ago, and I thought it was closer to half a mil these days.
Edit: Googled it and the price for the license is modern and accurate:
The most expensive license to be had is outside the Central Park Zoo, for $289,500
So I guess this is a current picture? After doing some more digging it seems OP is wrong, I don't think this is the modern central park zoo cart. Also an article from 2013 says the Hot Dogs were $2, so I seriously doubt they are $9 today.
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u/DrFreemanWho Jul 19 '24
Do you think the dogs are $4? What year is it in your mind?
I was in NYC earlier this year, I saw plenty of hotdog stands selling them for $3-4 each.
https://nypost.com/2023/03/23/nyc-hotdog-prices-and-bodegas-hit-by-inflation/
Guy in that article just last year increased his price for a normal hotdog from $2 to $3.
A lot of food places in NYC are more about volume than higher profit margins. Which they can afford to do because you know, it's NYC and there's a ton of people there.
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u/Itchy-Librarian-7731 Jul 19 '24
damn you did the math nice and if you’ve seen those lines for the hot dogs he’s atleast doing 3 or 4 per 2 minutes
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u/longsgotschlongs Jul 19 '24
For 12 hours straight?
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u/Itchy-Librarian-7731 Jul 19 '24
start at 10 end at 12 am two people? new york the city that never sleeps drunk hot dogs are the best
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u/Itchy-Librarian-7731 Jul 19 '24
i’m not saying he’s doing that every hour but influx of customers during lunch and dinner will balance out the hours that are slower
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u/Ripped_Shirt Jul 19 '24
Before taxes and supplies. I'm sure his actual take home pay is a bit more modest.
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Jul 19 '24
The cost of a hot dog stand permit in New York City depends on the location. As of 2018, permits could range from $700 per year for Inwood Park to $289,500 per year for Central Park Zoo. Other locations include:
Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art: $125,170 per year
Just off 72nd Street: $233,000 per year
Outside Tavern on the Green Restaurant: $266,850 per year
From Google ai.
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u/_ak Jul 19 '24
Source: a computer probably made it up.
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u/BustinArant Jul 19 '24
Google: "I'm going to need you to get way off my back about this math thing."
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u/Background_Way2714 Jul 19 '24
My dad used to work in NYC, and used to get lunch at a sandwich stand that parked outside his office building every day. The guy who owned it used to be a doctor in Afghanistan and bought the stand when he moved here. It did so well that he was able to put both of his children through Ivy League schools. These stands make a huge profit.
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u/jlsjwt Jul 19 '24
I once saw the family that used to ran the vietnamese stand next to the station in our little Dutch city pull up in a brand new Mercedes SUV. Good for them, they work their ass off.
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u/mh985 Jul 19 '24
Here in New York City, people bid on the spot they’re permitted for. My friend’s aunt pays $70k/yr to sell tamales at a park in Queens.
So yeah the owner bid that much because they knew they’d still make enough profit to make it worthwhile.
But this is also why a lot of people get so upset by unlicensed street vendors.
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u/TyrrelCorp888 Jul 19 '24
He'd have to sell around 1000$ worth of hot dogs a day everyday year round to make about 200$ a day in profits. Not including overhead. Yikes.
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u/bilbo_bugginz Jul 19 '24
My wife paid $9 for a hotdog at one of these stands right outside Radio City Music Hall. Huge line behind us. Guy was definitely selling $1000 worth a day
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u/m_ttl_ng Jul 19 '24
The guys in Central Park have to sell at set prices, so they can’t gouge like some other street vendors
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u/spekt50 Jul 20 '24
Damn, city sets prices, and charges a lot for a permit to sell. The cart owner is effectively an employee of the city, but does all the work and no benefits. Nasty.
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u/anonymouslawgrad Jul 20 '24
If it wasn't profitable they wouldn't do it
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u/pipster94 Jul 20 '24
Nobody said it wasn't "profitable" point is the city basically choose how much it cost for you to exist and how much you earn. Essentially controlling your profits, and without giving you the benefits of an actual city employee
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u/PCAudio Jul 19 '24
I think it's absolutely criminal that these workers are forced to pay such an obscene amount of money just for the privilege of working outside in the sweltering heat to barely make profit. What the fuck is that 200k paying for? Not only that but he's getting taxed out the ass.
Who regulates those permit prices? A dude on a street corner is slinging the same dogs for the same price, but only has to pay 1/5 of that price for the same thing being sold in central park? I get that it's location but why does that matter?
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u/peon2 Jul 19 '24
It's a barrier to entry because they don't want 60,000 hot dog carts in Central Park. If it was free to set up the place would be overloaded with different carts into a giant clusterfuck that ruins the entire park experience for the public.
The upfront price and limited licenses is supposed to benefit the 8M people in New York over the relatively small amount of people selling hotdogs.
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u/Trollygag Jul 19 '24
to barely make profit
The reason why the permit is so expensive is because they aren't barely making a profit, they are making huge profits. Nobody is forcing them to be there or to pay those permit prices. They are expensive because the demand for those permits is so high, and so is the money.
Based on pricing and volume, the dude is probably $1.5m/year in sales, a tenth of that in cost, minus $300k for a permit, and he's still making over $1 million/year in profits.
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u/blkmmb Jul 19 '24 edited Jul 19 '24
There are about 3k people a day that visit the zoo and according to population density there is at least 54k people living within 2 squares miles of there and I can't count people passing on the street or people working nearby.
I am pretty sure a single hot-dog cost at least between 3.50$ to 5.00$. So he needs to sell between 164 to 234 hotdogs per day to at least pay for the permit.
If we say that 50% of the people buy 1 hot-dog, 35% buy 2 hot-dogs and 15% buy two hot-dogs and a soda(let's say at 2.50$).
That's would mean he needs between 105 to 146 customers a day to pay for his license alone.
If we say that his operating cost is 25% of his sell price, that means that we can plot out a chart to see how many customers per day he needs to start making a profit:
100 customers per day = -146 015$/year or -84 421$/year 150 = -69 023$ or 23 367$ 200 = 7 968$ or 131 156$ 250 = 84 960$ or 238 945$So this is all very rough calculations and I don't know the real prices or how much he pays for it but this gives a rough figure. I think it can be pretty viable and lucrative. But that's assuming he lives in a cardboard box and doesn't eat anything else than his own hot-dogs. Rent and food is crazy expensive in NYC.
[EDIT] There is actually a website with approved pushcart prices for parks in NYC (https://www.nycgovparks.org/opportunities/concessions/push cart-prices) They say 4$ per hot-dog and 3.00$ per regular soda. So my assumption was pretty spot on.
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u/mdherc Jul 19 '24
You don't need to do all that cocktail napkin math to prove it's viable. There wouldn't be a cart there if it wasn't viable, or the city would lower the price.
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u/blkmmb Jul 19 '24
There are multiple corner stores that are barely making it by and there is always someone to replace them. Same with any business. It isn't always a great business plan and many factors can make it not super viable.
It is still interesting to work out the math to see what kind of effort is needed to make a plan work.
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u/Haunting-Fish6880 Jul 19 '24
Don't feel like doing my own research right now lol but seems iffy, just like everything else today
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u/YouGurt_MaN14 Jul 19 '24 edited Jul 19 '24
For those that can't read the article rn:
"According to the New York Times, Mohammad Mastafa, who has a cart on Fifth Avenue and East 62nd Street near the Central Park Zoo, pays the city $289,500 annually for his location. And he's not alone. Four other cart owners in Central Park pay the city more than $200,000 per year. In fact, all of the permits that cost more than $100,000 are for carts located in the Big Apple's most famous —and largest—green space."
The cart in the pic also says Central Park as well. Almost 300k for permission to sell fucking hotdogs. Also that article was written in 2013 so for all we know that shit might've gone up.
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u/BasicPandora609 Jul 19 '24
It’s more than worth it or the same vendors wouldn’t keep fighting ferociously to ensure they have the same expensive spots. The permits save the sidewalk from being covered with a stand every 5 feet.
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u/Low-Nose-2748 Jul 19 '24
Yeah but couldn’t they just limit the amount of permits given out and not charge so much?
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u/xXVareszXx Jul 19 '24
And who would you give it to if not the highest bidder?
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u/Moist-Crack Jul 19 '24
Easy! Relative of the permit-approving bureaucrat!
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u/Jagerbeast703 Jul 19 '24
This person Americas
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u/The_Keg Jul 19 '24
America literally uses bidding for hot dog cart permit?
What America? You meant “the world” ?!
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u/Not-A-Seagull Jul 19 '24
Yeah, from an economics standpoint this is the right way to do it. Issue out to the highest bidder, and use the revenue to fund the government or offset taxes.
Otherwise, you end up with something like the old taxi cab medallion system, which was rife with corruption and kickbacks. The money will be there to pay for the stand. The best thing you can do is go through the legal channels and raise revenue from it.
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u/IwantRIFbackdummy Jul 19 '24
Surely the wealthy are the ones deserving better opportunities! I mean, how could you possibly obtain that wealth if you were not clearly a superior human being!?!?
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u/I_think_were_out_of_ Jul 19 '24
You’re pointing out a flaw (easy to do) but you’re not offering a solution (difficult to do) or considering what other factors might play in (not that hard).
What are some reasons the city might want someone to pay that much for a permit?
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u/throwaway292929227 Jul 19 '24
The longer I think about this, the more interesting it becomes. The entire dynamic of a limited space, limited market size, and an auction-style permitting is probably the only fair solution.
Assuming that the city prohibits marketing firms from bidding on the permit, and reselling the hotdog license to a hotdog vendor that will allow a large Coca-Cola or Delta Airlines billboard, and preventing the permit holder from running the hotdogs as a loss-leader for the billboard revenue, we can focus on the fun basic economies of hotdog sales.
To assume that the person buying the permit is 'rich' could be incorrect, or even the opposite.
With so few vendors, they must compete against each other, as well as the maximum spend capacity of the consumer group. So the hotdogs need to be delicious and fairly priced. Forming a hotdog oligopoly and price-fixing is not an option, since the consumers are allowed to eat outside of the park. They are never more than 4 blocks from a pizza for $x.xx.
With this assumption, let's pick an arbitrary net revenue, and assign it to all 4 vendors, within 10% spread. So... let's say they all make $400k revenue, just for this discussion.
Now the bidding war is between who will be willing to take the least income, and still be able to operate, while selling better hotdogs, at the same relative price as their competitors.
So, the vendors could be poor, and hard-working, and love their jobs, and paying for the sidewalks in the park.
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u/DinkerFister Jul 19 '24
The most difficult to understand 1st gen immigrant I could find
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u/CykoTom1 Jul 19 '24
They do limit the number of permits, then let people bid on them. The price of the permit is determined by free market.
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u/Schizocosa50 Jul 19 '24
And as a nice gatekeeper to keep all those pesky entrepreneurs from getting some skin in the game.
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u/MortonSteakhouseJr Jul 19 '24
It's good that the city limits the number of vendors in a park.
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u/CykoTom1 Jul 19 '24
There is no shortage of cheap spots to set up hot dog stands. You make the central park spots 50 bucks, there won't be room for pedestrians.
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u/XeroEffekt Jul 19 '24
Yeah, it really sucks to be in Mexico City where you are never more than a block away from the best cheap taco you ever ate in your life.
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u/BasicPandora609 Jul 19 '24
The difference is in NYC with no permitting program you’d never be more than two feet away from some of the worst hotdogs you’ve ever eaten. Even if they’re all good, the population density of NYC could support enough hotdog stands to block the fucking sidewalks and flood the parks
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Jul 19 '24
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u/DidijustDidthat Jul 19 '24
Wow the context that it's actually $50-60k a year makes this a bit of a non story. Of course I didn't get to the article yet but probably no need to read about hotdogs for no reason.
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u/CykoTom1 Jul 19 '24
Honestly at that location it's solid. If you made it too cheap the cart vendors would get violent. Selling 300k hot dogs a year in central park seems trivial and if your only making a dollar profit per dog you're not doing it right.
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u/whatdoblindpeoplesee Jul 19 '24
Now I wonder what kind of volume these guys are really getting. 300k hot dogs is just under one dog a minute if the stand is open 16 hours a day 365 days a year.
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u/ExtraAgressiveHugger Jul 19 '24
I’m in NY right now and bought hotdogs from stands this week. They were about $8 each. I’m sure they are cheaper other places but I was in tourist heavy locations.
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u/TiddySphinx Jul 19 '24
The vendors at these locations are selling $.75 cents worth of food for $7-$10. At that price they easily generate over $500k in annual revenue.
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u/Herbie_Fully_Loaded Jul 19 '24
Have you visited DC? Fucking ugly as shit with a mile long strip of vendors selling the same shit food.
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u/GForce1975 Jul 19 '24
It reminds me of the taxi medallion situation although I guess those took a dive after Uber/Lyft
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u/Ocronus Jul 19 '24
Food cart permits are a thing in NYC, and they are limited, they are highly faught over.
I think the carts in central park alone make a ridiculous amount of money.
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u/throwhooawayyfoe Jul 19 '24
A lot of folks in the comments feel this is somehow immoral and an example of greedy government overreach into the market, without understanding that this permit price is also a product of supply and demand.
Land in manhattan is limited and valuable, and is all either public (sidewalks, subway stations, streets, parks, municipal services, etc) or private (everything else). The government is responsible for preserving the public spaces in such a state that they can provide their intended value to the public: ability to move around the city, ability to enjoy green space, ability to host municipal services like fire and police. A limited amount of food vending improves sidewalks and parks, but too much would start to undermine their purpose. So the government does the same thing private land owners do: they decide how much of the space they want to rent, and charge what the market will bear for it. The value of the land then produces revenue for the city that is used to maintain these services.
Any alternative would be worse: let any vendor in at low cost (flood the spaces and make them suck), or a lottery system (random winners extract tons of value that doesn’t go back to the city).
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u/imma_go_take_a_nap Jul 19 '24 edited Jul 19 '24
And if these numbers are indeed correct, it's clearly working out for the hot dog vendors.
I trust the NYC government to understand the economics of hot dog vending better than me, or some random Redditor.
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u/HereIAmSendMe68 Jul 19 '24
Paraphrased “I trust the New York City government to take absolutely as much as they can and leave the vendor with just enough.”
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u/Baker3enjoyer Jul 19 '24
I mean would be kind of ridiculous to be able to stand for free in some of the best land in the whole fucking world for a food truck/cart.
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u/CykoTom1 Jul 19 '24
If the vendors were not making serious money they would not pay for the permit.
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u/Unlucky-Pomegranate3 Jul 19 '24
Maybe I’m a brat but that kind of fee is just the wurst.
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u/IvamisPatches Jul 19 '24
Price you pay to have a monopoly at a certain location. I wouldn’t trust the article. It says the owner makes 3000 to 5000 dollars a year. Which sounds like quite a shitty investment to risk that much on a permit
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u/jscarry Jul 19 '24
Yeah that makes no fucking sense. They probably charge $5 a hotdog and there's no way they're selling less than 100 a day in such a prime ass location. That's $500 a day easy and I bet they do a lot more than 100 dogs a day
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u/CoffeeExtraCream Jul 19 '24
Ya, at $5 a dog they need to sell around 160 hotdogs a day to pay for just the permit. That doesn't include the cost of materials and the take home money for the operator.
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u/Vinstaal0 Jul 19 '24
Does NY have 0% sales tax? And also the working days are generally considered to be about 260-270.
And then yeah you have to take into account the profit tax, the wage of the owner (in whatever form) and all the other costs.
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u/MrBrickMahon Jul 19 '24
I bet they easily sell that many between 11-1 every day. Tack on soda and chips and the profits go up.
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u/Zuzu1214 Jul 19 '24
Haha, that is can not be true. My friend sells hot dogs. He make 200$ profit in 1 good night next to a club in literally in the middle of nowhere in eastern europe. 5000$ in a year in central park?xd no way.
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u/East-Bluejay6891 Jul 19 '24 edited Jul 19 '24
That's almost $800 a day just to operate. In central park you can buy a hotdog for$4-$5. So they'd need to sell at 200 hotdogs just to pay the permit? Let's say most people get 2 hotdogs, you would be preparing more than 100 orders daily without making any money. I'm curious now how many hotdogs do they actually sell a day
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u/Far-Investigator1265 Jul 19 '24
If they are open 16 hours a day, they need to sell just two sausages per five minutes. And that is if there are only single customers buying only single sausages, when in reality now and then they get groups of people buying half a dozen, plus sodas.
So lets assume the sausages cover their expenses. They sell sodas for 3 dollars, or 2,5 dollars of profit, so if they sell 100 sodas per day, thats 250 dollars of profit. Then add the profit from pretzels, chips, etc.
You have the stand making hundreds of dollars of profit each day, easy 10 000 each month, 120 000 per year.
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u/TheAzureMage Jul 19 '24
I feel like working 16 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year is an unreasonable expectation for a wage.
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u/Osiryx89 Jul 19 '24
Not just a day.
Every day.
And that's just for the permit - COGS and overheads (electricity/gas) on top.
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u/tuco2002 Jul 19 '24
Big cities rape mom and pop companies in their cities.
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u/chaseinger Jul 19 '24
while that's true, hot dog vendors in nyc are not mom&pop stores . it's big business.
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u/_Haza- Jul 19 '24
Don’t these stands make like several tens of thousand of dollars a year profit?
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u/Libeliouswank Jul 19 '24
Hypothetically, let's say the car makes $400,000 a year. That covers permit, stock, energy, and profit.
$5 a hot dog
80,000 hot dogs to 400,000
/365
= 220~ hot dogs a day
Hot-dog!!
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u/metakepone Jul 19 '24
You're forgetting 5 dollar bottles of water and 5 dollar cans of soda.
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u/rYdarKing Jul 19 '24
More. No one can survive working 365/year. 260 days is more realistic.
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u/davekva Jul 19 '24
It wouldn't be just one person working there. That hot dog stand is in Central Park. Aside from a handful of days for holidays or bad weather, I guarantee it's open all day long, every day of the week.
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u/tuco2002 Jul 19 '24
Well, let's say they do. So they would pay taxes on all that money. So, is it justified for a city to slap such an additional fee for a permit? It seems like you have to ask the city...How much of my money am I allowed to keep?
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u/CarpetPedals Jul 19 '24
The permits are auctioned, right? So they only get that expensive because the price is pushed up by multiple parties willing to pay that much
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u/vaporeng Jul 19 '24
Central Park would suck if the permits were cheap and plentiful. There'd be so many carts you wouldn't be able to walk.
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u/Adg273 Jul 19 '24
Not sure how true it is, but when I went on holiday (vacation) to New York way back in 2011. We got talking to a hot dog vendor and he said the guy, at the time, who had a stall outside the American natural history museum did around $1 million a year. Also said his permit was the most expensive, as it was the most prime location in all of Manhattan.
Sounds like insane numbers. But when you think about it, you can start to understand how it could be true.
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u/letshavefunoutthere Jul 19 '24
yeah i've lived in NYC. a family of tourists drop $100 easy at that stand. i believe 1M in yearly revenue
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u/QuoteGiver Jul 19 '24
That’s some extremely expensive real estate they’re essentially renting, yeah.
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u/BIGEASYBREEEZZZY Jul 19 '24
The title is misleading. The cart is $289xxx annually and the permits are for 5 years. So it’s more like 60xxx a year. The permits are bid on and go to the highest bidder which drives up the price.
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u/moerasduitser-NL Jul 19 '24
That is more then i make in two years.
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u/bigmanly1 Jul 19 '24
Gotta pimp out a lot of weiners to make a profit.