Mobile retailers gain speed around the country, giving customers a truckload of experience, from erotic toys to bohemian-chic apparel
It’s the beginning of March and Mary Buffington is gearing up for a bachelorette party. Driving her truck to the location in the city of Minneapolis, Buffington, 53, gathers her lingerie, handcuffs and edible body paints. Hosting the party on her mobile retail truck, Pie Essentials, Buffington blasts loud music and shares crazy stories with the women around, as she sells them her erotic adult toys. “My face hurts by the time I’m done with an evening. It’s just so much fun,” Buffington says. Spending 15 years of her adult life working a desk job in the property management world, Buffington was never satisfied. Longing for her own business that gave her independence, she tossed around ideas like opening a brick-and-mortar retail store, but due to the expense, was out of options. Then she came across a television newscast.
The newscast featured a mobile fashion truck—the first to debut in Minneapolis—and attracted Buffington’s interest right away. Buffington, with dark stained lips and chopped hair that constantly changes from red to purple, decided to launch her own mobile retail business, Pie Essentials, now three years old, searching for a vehicle the next day. Since she opened this year, she has been booked every weekend.
Though more niche than other mobile stores, retail trucks like Buffington’s are popping up all over the country, from big cities like New York and Los Angeles to smaller ones like Illinois and Arizona. Beginning in 2010 with fashion designer Cynthia Rowley, who tested a retail truck out along the California coast, her experiment created exposure and followers. These trucks now sell everything from bohemian clothes, to designer buys, to vintage apparel or accessories and beyond. In 2012, the American Mobile Retail Association, a national organization, was formed to support the growing community. Founded by the owners of Le Fashion Truck in LA, the AMRA aims to unite mobile retail owners and educate the public. With over 80 members, the site describes and lists the trucks across America. It offers advice for starting one up, like where to buy a vehicle or obtain permits. The AMRA also offers live webinars, to give tips, with the owners of successful trucks and one-on-one sessions, a helpful tool as more mobile retailers open and individuals flock to them. “They allow people to engage with the fashion like you just simply can’t if you are buying online,” says Professor Carla Lloyd, director of the Fashion and Beauty Communications Milestone Program at Syracuse University. “It’s bringing all of that fashion and accessories that you see online but you can’t experience, especially if you live in a market that has a restricted number of stores. So it’s that sensory experience that it’s allowing.”
Krystal Lorbiecki, owner and designer of Barefoot Gypsy Boutique in Florida, gives customers this experience through festivals. Attending more than 30 last year, Barefoot Gypsy Boutique will attend two to three festivals per month this year, with an online shop on the side. “You can really find your market when you’re mobile. You can find who you are instead of sitting in one spot and hoping that they find you,” says Lorbiecki.
According to Professor Lloyd, a retail truck gives further advantage, as it is a sort of in-person, online experience that doesn't leave chance of disappointment when the product arrives. Versus shopping online, it is more engaging when a truck pulls up and customers can feel the materials and try items on. “It’s experiential marketing. You’re not just engaging. You can, but this is experiencing it,” she says. “It’s new, different, unexpected, and fun. And it’s manageable.”
For Lorbiecki, who makes her products, she creates what she wants to share. Other retailers curate their collections, connecting with designers who supply for the trucks. “It takes the guess-work out of walking into a giant department store with so much inventory. Some people want more prompt and more assistance,” Lloyd says.
The mobile fashion trucks do just that, offering a unique and focused experience that allows shoppers to walk up and enter the back of a truck and shop away.