It has been said that few things bring folks together more than good food. That good food has to come from somewhere, and that’s where Ana Rabicoff Lim comes in. Her business is bringing people together through food trucks.
In fact, the name of her business, SW Food Truck Gigs, is pretty self-explanatory: she books food trucks for events.
“The definition of a gig is a job, especially one that is temporary or freelance and performed on an informal or on-demand basis,” she said. “And that is exactly what my service offers with food trucks – and caterers. I assist clients with booking a food truck for a gig, and I can assist food trucks in finding the gigs.”
Rabicoff Lim works with schools (teacher lunches, schoolwide events, teacher appreciation), private events (graduations, birthday parties, weddings), corporate clients (employee/client appreciation, employee holiday meals, real estate open houses), farmers markets, festivals, even homeowners associations (weekly food truck and holiday events).
“Everyone loves a food truck – and with the assistance of SW Food Truck Gigs, it’s a perfect fit,” she said.
As for the name, Rabicoff Lim explained, “I am providing a service, so I knew my business name needed to answer the Ws (who, what, where ..). I never intended for it to grow outside of my Benbrook community. Nevertheless, I wanted it to offer a big-city vibe.
“I am based in Benbrook, which is technically in southwest Fort Worth, so I took the SW from where I am based. Keeping in mind that if my business grew, the SW could also mean Texas, which is the SW of the U.S. The who is food trucks and the what is gigs.”
The business has grown from the humble beginnings in Benbrook during the COVID-19 pandemic to now serve the entire DFW area, working with food trucks, caterers, dessert trucks and mobile bars. If a client requests a specific type of food or truck, and she doesn’t have them on her roster, then she will happily make that connection.
“I honestly don’t know how many food trucks I partner with because they come and go so quickly. It’s a very tough – and seasonal – life operating a food truck,” she said. “So, if the slow season is too slow, it can be difficult to bounce back from it.
“Others do so well that they decide to sell their truck and open a storefront. Whatever the case, I try to always look at their point of view and support them anyway I can. They are truly some of the hardest working people, who offer some of the best food, in town.”
Her current focus is on the DFW area, but Rabicoff Lim’s career background allows her to organize an event or food truck far beyond her North Texas base. For example, she had a local corporate client who wanted to host an employee lunch event in Uvalde soon after the elementary shooting incident. She was able to locate an available veteran-owned barbecue food truck operator in San Antonio, who drove to Uvalde and offered a surprise lunch.
“I was so honored to bring a little happiness into her employee’s lives that day,” she said.
Like many people, Rabicoff Lim faced hardship during the pandemic – her career of more than 25 years as an independent conference organizer was destroyed by the shutdowns and her 15-year marriage ended abruptly, leaving her a middle-aged single mom with two young boys.
“Fortunately, I am a ‘make lemonade out of lemons’ type person, so I knew I had to think of a way to use my conference planning skills to create a service business for the new pandemic way of life,” she said.
The Fort Worth native grew up in East Texas and lived in Boston before returning to Fort Worth in 2009 so her children could grow up closer to their grandparents.
During the summer months in Boston, Ana and the kids would take road trips up the coast to spend a weekend in Maine and eat fried clams and lobster rolls. One day in August 2020, she was sitting at her laptop in Benbrook craving an authentic lobster roll but had no idea how to get one so far away from the lobster-rich Northeast.
“Like eerie magic, Facebook heard my thoughts and as I was scrolling in my feed, a Cousins Maine Lobster ad appeared,” she recalled. “An aha moment! I booked Cousins Maine Lobster food truck for my neighborhood and posted it on the app, Nextdoor, hoping others would want a lobster roll, too. To my surprise, over 100 people showed up!
“The next day, I received messages from my neighbors thanking me for bringing lobster to our community and asking me to do it again.”
A few weeks later, she booked a taco truck for Taco Tuesday and 70 or so people attended.
“My initial thought was just to create this service for my Benbrook community, since we don’t have a wide variety of food options,” Rabicoff Lim said. “But then a teacher at West Park Elementary in Benbrook asked me to book ‘Food Truck Fridays’ to boost the morale of their teachers.
“It was a huge success but created a bit of jealously from the teachers across the street at Benbrook Middle High School. Soon, their assistant principal sent me a list of dates to start booking food trucks for their teachers, too.”
Between those two schools and local social media pages, the word got out about her food truck service. Soon, other Fort Worth ISD and area schools, along with people around town, started contacting her for assistance with the food trucks needs for their events.
“Without realizing it, I had found a small niche that needed to be filled and fit perfectly in my wheelhouse,” she said. “I was able to utilize my expertise in events to assist others in booking food trucks for their schools, events, employees, etc. while also supporting my family and the small business owners – on wheels – who were really struggling to find more work.
Rabicoff Lim’s two sons, ages 10 and 14, have grown up with her working from home, first as a corporate conference organizer and now with SW Food Truck Gigs. She said her work booking food trucks gives the family the opportunity to explore what the Metroplex has to offer.
“Most food trucks owners I partner with know my boys, too, so they are excited when I book a food truck at their school,” she said. “The food truck owners always say hi to them, and they are the coolest kids in their class that day.”
Rabicoff Lim comes from a cooking family.
“My family is Jewish and our lives seem to be centered around cooking and eating, she said. “My maternal grandparents lived in Houston and always took us to the best restaurants in town. This taught me to appreciate high-end cuisine. My paternal grandmother was always in the kitchen and my dad, the youngest in his family, was always by her side.
“During my childhood, my dad would prepare most of the dishes that my grandmother would make, which became staples in our house. When I was in college, my dad created a small binder of those recipes and gave them to me so I could continue to make them for my family.”
Now, whenever she and her boys visit her parents in East Texas, Ana’s dad is occasionally teaching her boys how to cook and he has started compiling cookbooks of his recipes for them.
“My friends are amazed at how my boys are so young and can create amazing and delicious meals,” she said, adding with a laugh: “I just wish they had the same enthusiasm to clean up afterwards.”
Rabicoff Lim, amazingly, said she has never spent a dollar on advertising her business. From building a Facebook page in 2020, word about her business has organically grown throughout the DFW area, with over 2,500 followers and still growing.
“I come from a customer service background and truly take it to heart. When someone contacts me to assist them, I give them 110 percent,” she said. “I am friendly, efficient, organized and follow through to make it an easy experience. In turn, those customers have offered shout-outs and referrals on other social media groups or shared my posts. The food truck owners that I partner with have also shared my name and business with other food truck owners.
“It’s just incredible how there are so many people that I don’t know, who have been kind enough to tag my name, share a post, tell a friend/colleague, and mention my service/business. Word of mouth is the most effective way to create brand awareness, and I am proud to say I am living proof of that statistic.”
For more information contact Ana Rabicoff Lim at 617-834-2021 or swfoodtruckgigs@gmail.com.