My short adventure in the world of the Hot Dog Business

I get a lot of "bright " ideas. When the bottom fell out of our contracting business in 2008 we hung in there as long as we could, well longer than we should have. WE hung in there to the point that we were broke, behind on our mortgage , bills, forget credit cards and owed on taxes, you get the idea. I was starting to convince myself that year round tent living wasn't a bad idea. 

Oh I got a part time job. I had applied everywhere for years from 2008 until, well I never stopped. A dear friend asked to help care for her mom who had Alzheimer's. I did this until the sweet lady passed away. My friend paid me well and it was a blessing. I took this experience and got another caregiver job but it was only slightly above minimum wage. and mostly it was only 6 hours per week. You're bright, you do the math. I did this for 2 years. It was the only job I could get and believe me, I tried. I loved the people I cared for. When they passed away I was very upset. The office staff wasn't bad either. It just wasn't enough money. Some day I'll write a blog about caring for Alzheimer's patients.

In the meantime, hubby's working himself to death, competing for the few jobs that were out there in construction. Mainly our competition was people from south of the border, that had very low overhead if you know what I mean. He started to have major back, knee problems and arthritis in the hands. Now Hubs is very talented, he can remodel like nobody else can. I'll blog another time about the construction industry.

Then a tragedy happened, my older sister Kathy died suddenly of lung cancer.  I miss her every day as I do my younger sister Marie. Their passing has left a hole in my heart.

My sister left me some money and I was able to get out of debt. I will be forever grateful. But we still had a problem, namely, we weren't making enough money to live on, and hubby's body was falling apart.

Enter my bright idea, we will buy a hot dog cart !  My version of this wonderful idea was that I would run the cart and hubby would get a job, just in case it failed. I bought a book "Hot Dogs saved my Life" by Ben Wilson.  He's a great guy and this was a funny, inspiring, well written book. I shouldn't have let hubs read it. 

Now hubs wanted to run the cart. He is a great cook and he loves it. Also, his body was going south, so I guess it made sense. BUT we were going on toward winter, I still had the low paying part time job. I nervously agreed to support him in this. We did a lot of research and homework. We shopped around, we did everything right.The investment in start up costs and buying the cart was about $12,000. That was the industry average, unless you buy a used cart. We bought a gorgeous new one from ...Ben Wilson !  

It was still winter coming however, even in South Carolina, it gets cold.