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Inspiring Conversations with Soulaire Allerai of Bad Rooster Food Truck

Today we’d like to introduce you to Soulaire Allerai.

Hi Soulaire, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
My story started in March of 2020, we were a brand new food truck and didn’t even have our graphics on our truck yet. We launched for only one day on a Saturday before the mandatory quarantines began and we didn’t know what we were going to do without work. Our family crew quarantined together (that’s right, 9 people in one house!) and used the time to perfect our recipes and graphics. We officially launched on April 2nd of 2020 and hit the ground running in the parking lot of my office building in Minnetonka, The Soulful Journey Wellness Center. Cooking our family recipes is a labor of love and everyone kept telling us to share it with the world. Although we had never owned a food truck before, my son and I are both chefs and knew what we loved- and that was food. Everything is made from scratch fresh, many of our ingredients are sourced locally, and our chicken is only sourced from humane practice farms. A standard we’ve been able to stick to throughout our journey.

Our popularity in the neighborhood grew quickly, and I was able to use the food truck to support 13+ small businesses that rent from my office building in Minnetonka. While they were forced to be closed and couldn’t pay their rent, our food truck supported those businesses in staying afloat until they could fully re-open fully (almost a year later!)

We began serving at breweries, neighborhoods and festivals as events opened back up in 2021.

Our food truck has won several awards in 2021 including the Star Tribune’s MN Best (Best Foodtruck, Best Sandwiches, Best Catering, Best Wings & Tenders.) We serve an incredible customer base that is willing to wait in long lines (even through the cold winter months!) We’re very grateful for the loyalty of our fans. I believe in feeding my customers like I feed my family.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
The biggest struggle we’ve encountered are costs of food and how much they have gone up. We absorbed the costs for as long as we could, but we’ve now had to raise our prices to accommodate. Another hurdle has been sourcing food throughout the pandemic, especially with chicken shortages across the industry. We only source high quality humane-practice chicken and sourcing that consistently proved challenging at times. What helped us through all the hurdles are our loyal customers that believe in us as a small business and stick by us through it all.

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about Bad Rooster Food Truck?
What also sets us apart is that we use our food truck as a way to support local non-profit organizations. Many people don’t know, but at one time I relied on food shelves to support my family when raising 6 boys. These food shelves became a lifeline for me, and I vowed to pay them back with interest one day. We work closely with shelters and we’re always looking for donations that can be dropped off at the wellness center during open office hours.

My customers coined me, “The Chief Mother Clucker,” because of my frankness and honesty. I tell it like it is, and I think they enjoy my candor. We’re very transparent with our customers, if something happens, we tell them what’s going on.

Our truck also believes in building the food truck community as a whole, not building competition. We love partnering with other complimentary food trucks, many of which have become dear friends of ours. The standard of our food quality also sets us apart. We refuse to open if we can’t source the quality product we use, and we will always stand by that.

Do you have any advice for those looking to network or find a mentor?
In terms of networking, I believe in partnering with every location we attend. If it’s a brewery we work to promote them, not just ourselves. We really look at it as partnerships when we choose to collaborate with other businesses.

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