Custom Smoothie Trailers
Cold-side builds for smoothies, acai and pitaya bowls, and fresh-pressed juice -- 916 Concession builds the trailer to your menu, HCD insignia and county-ready blueprints included, and serves all of California.
A smoothie trailer lives or dies on its cold side. You are running two or three commercial blenders all day, holding fresh produce and milk in a reach-in, keeping frozen fruit and acai packs hard in a freezer, and pouring through ice faster than most builds plan for. 916 Concession builds the whole unit around that reality -- power sized for blender startup surges, refrigeration that keeps up in a parking lot in July, and a layout where prep, blending, and the topping rail all fall to hand. We are a Sacramento builder serving every county in California. Whatever size and menu you bring, we build the shell, wire it, plumb it, get it carrying the HCD insignia under Title 25, and hand you blueprints your county health department will recognize.
Most smoothie and bowl builds carry two to three heavy-duty commercial blenders in the 1,500 to 2,000 watt class -- think Vitamix or Blendtec, motors built to run all day rather than the home units that quit by week three. Cold storage is split: a reach-in refrigerator for milk and fresh produce, plus a chest or upright freezer for frozen fruit and acai or pitaya packs. Ice gets its own under-counter ice machine or a stocked ice bin, because a smoothie line burns through it. Juice-forward menus add a centrifugal or cold-press juicer. For acai and pitaya bowls we set a cold rail with topping wells so granola, fruit, and drizzles stay food-safe and within reach. Round it out with an NSF stainless prep table and cutting boards, NSF stainless wall cladding, the three-compartment and handwash sinks, and a water heater.
A smoothie trailer pulls more power than people expect from a beverage build. You are running refrigeration and freezers continuously while multiple blender motors surge to roughly three times their rated draw every time they spin up. We plan a working load around 3,000 to 5,000 watts and build the electrical to about 7,000 watts so you keep roughly 20 percent headroom and your breakers are not tripping mid-rush. Service comes in through a NEMA 14-50 50-amp connection, or an L14-30 30-amp on smaller builds, sized to what your equipment list actually demands. Water is self-contained: a fresh tank feeds the three-compartment sink and the handwash sink, a water heater brings it up to temperature, and a grey tank captures the waste. We size the tanks to your service load so you can run a full market day without chasing a fill or a dump.
The smoothie and bowl market, and who buys these
Smoothie, acai, and juice trailers sell because the menu is clean, fast, and travels to where health-minded customers already are. We build for gym and studio parking lots, beach and park concessions, farmers markets, and festival circuits -- anywhere a line forms for a blended drink or a topped bowl. A lot of our buyers are first-time owners who picked this menu on purpose: lower cook-line complexity than a grill build, no fryer, and product people feel good buying. That does not mean the build is simple. Acai and pitaya bowls demand a cold rail and topping wells, juice-forward menus add a press, and protein and wellness add-ins multiply your dry and cold storage. We talk through your real menu first, because the menu sets the equipment, and the equipment sets the trailer.
Building to your menu and picking a size
There is no single smoothie trailer. A two-blender smoothie-and-bowl concept fits comfortably in a 5x12 or 6x12 -- compact, easy to tow, and quick to set up at a market. Add a cold-press juicer, a third blender, and a deeper topping rail for high-volume weekends and you want the 7x14, which is our most-ordered shell across every menu we build. Bigger is always on the table; 916 Concession builds any size, and we size to your throughput rather than selling you the same box twice. Inside, we set an NSF stainless prep table with cutting boards, your blender station, the cold rail or topping wells for bowls, county-approved cleanable cladding on the walls, a three-compartment sink, a separate handwash sink, and a water heater. The floor plan follows how you actually move from produce to blender to window.
Two approvals, and who owns each one
There are two approvals on a concession trailer, and people mix them up constantly. The first is the unit itself. California requires the trailer to be built to Title 25 and to carry the HCD insignia -- that is the state Department of Housing and Community Development signing off that the unit is built right. That one is on 916 Concession. We build to the standard and the insignia goes on. The second approval is your county health permit, and that one is yours. Every county runs its own plan-check and inspection, and the requirements shift from county to county. We give you a head start by handing over county-ready blueprints that show the sinks, water system, finishes, and equipment layout the way a plan-checker expects to see them, so you walk into your health department with paperwork that matches the trailer instead of a sketch.
Timeline, registration, and getting it to you
A typical build runs about six weeks once the design is locked, though the exact date depends on inspection scheduling, which is never fully ours to control. While the unit is being built we handle California registration -- in California you get temporary tags first and the permanent plates arrive by mail afterward, and 916 Concession manages that process so you are not making DMV trips. When it is done, we bring it to you with in-house transport. That is a dedicated team we run with, not a load-board hauler we found that morning -- the same crew that knows how to move a finished concession unit without rattling your equipment loose. If you need to spread the cost, we work with third-party lenders and can point you to financing; we do not set the rates and we do not promise them, so you deal with the lender on terms.
Build your Smoothie Trailer
Tell us your menu and timeline. 916 Concession builds the unit, sets the California HCD insignia, and provides the county-ready blueprints.
Prefer to talk? Call 7758951064.