June 5, 2026 - The Texas Department of State Health Services has opened applications for a new statewide license for mobile food vendors, including food trucks, pushcarts and roadside vendors. Last year’s passage of HB 2844 created the new MFV license type that will be valid everywhere in Texas so mobile food vendors will no longer have to obtain a separate license for each local jurisdiction they operate in. Beginning July 1, all MFVs must have a DSHS license to operate.
Good. In my area there are four small cities that would fit in a ten mile square. It is ridiculous to have to get a separate license for each city, most food trucks here set up in all of these cities.
It is next to impossible to get a food truck license in our county. You can be licensed in all the bordering counties quite straightforwardly, but not here. Too much political pressure from all the fixed restaurants around Ocean City I believe. But I don’t blame them really because they have a limited tourist season to make their real money.
Absolutely. Within a five-minute's drive I can hit League City, Dickinson, Texas City, Hitchcock, La Marque, Galveston, Alvin (Home of Nolan Ryan Beef!), Webster, and Houston.
Around here, you just set on a private empty lot with a table and a grill with vats of stuff on the table and people line-up, or you have ice-chests full of something like tamales in your trunk.
I think one of the few possibly legal trucks operates in the Tractor Supply parking lot with their permission. I heard it was pretty good.
Back before it was legal to sell cooked from home food, a lot of those people used to irritate me to no end. One had the audacity to leave a bad review of the company I worked for. They had never hired us nor even been to one of our events. I was on really good terms with the local health inspector…and I made sure that they were clamped down hard.
I’m not sure what the fines were…but was told that they were significant enough that the people had to seriously rethink they’re business model.
SheilaAnn I’ll stand on that same soap box.
And…if it doesn’t have an inspection rating, I won’t eat there…and will advise the same to anyone within earshot. Get inspected, prove you’re generally safe, or take a long walk off a short pier.
They might be ok, but there’s no way that I’m purchasing anything that’s been sitting in the back of a car for who knows how long.
Different but related, I once saw a pickup on a freeway LOADED with frozen seafood. Many of the boxes were clearly thawing.
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When I owned an ice cream truck (early 1980s), I had to get permits for every little boro, township, and burg on my route. Sometimes it was way out of proportion to the income generated there: [for example, it was long ago and I don’t remember exactly] one place would be $2 a year and generate 50% of my business, another would be $100/month for a couple streets. And different municipalities had different rules.
My business was Good Humor, all popsicles and bars, and even in the mid ‘80s I had to charge $1.25 for the top items: candy centered bars and cookie sandwiches. I don’t see how you could make a living with one now, what with the cost of fuel and product,and what you’d have to earn to make the work worthwhile.
I decided to ask Google. It looks like straight up street vending is not really profitable, and most owners do private events and fairs and festivals. That makes sense. Street vending is really hard on the equipment. It’s basically stop sign to stop sign, all idling, 8-12 hours a day, in mid summer heat. I changed the oil once a week, and the filter once a month. You couldn’t go by miles, you just had to count it as cost of business.
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