Short answer: list your truck on both, but do not let either one be your home base. Roaming Hunger can send you catering leads you would not have found, and Street Food Finder puts your schedule in front of people who are already looking for a truck to eat at tonight. What neither gives you is control: not of the listing, not of the customer relationship, and not of what a competitor's ad looks like sitting next to your name. Use them as spokes pointing back to a hub you own. Here's the honest comparison.
What are Roaming Hunger and Street Food Finder?
They get lumped together, but they solve different problems.
Roaming Hunger is primarily a catering marketplace. Event planners, offices, and wedding coordinators go there to book a truck, and Roaming Hunger brokers the deal. You get a public profile page, and you get quoted into events you did not have to find yourself. Their revenue comes from the booking, typically as a commission or a markup built into the price the client pays.
Street Food Finder is primarily a locator and schedule app. Customers open it to answer "which trucks are near me right now?" You post your schedule and stops, and hungry people browsing the map find you. There are free and paid tiers, and paid plans add things like promotion and online ordering.
So one is about booking events, the other is about daily foot traffic. That distinction matters more than any feature list.
Should you list your truck on them?
For most trucks, yes. A free or low-cost listing on a site that already has traffic is a reasonable spoke, and both are places a certain kind of customer genuinely starts their search. Claim your profile, fill it in properly, and add a link to your own site.
The mistake is not listing. The mistake is treating the listing as your web presence.
What do they actually cost?
Pricing on both platforms changes, so check their current plans before you commit, but the shape of the cost is stable:
- Roaming Hunger costs you a percentage of catering revenue. The listing itself is generally free to claim; you pay when they bring you a booking. If they source a $1,800 event, their cut comes out of that.
- Street Food Finder runs a free tier plus paid subscription tiers, with the paid levels unlocking more promotion and ordering features.
The number to actually watch is not the monthly fee. It's the commission on catering, because catering is the highest-margin work most trucks do. A commission on a lead they genuinely found for you is fair. A commission on a client who would have booked you directly if your own site had a working inquiry form is money you handed away.
What do you give up by relying on them?
Six things, and they're the same six for every directory or marketplace.
- You don't own the customer. The inquiry, the email address, and the repeat booking live in their system. You can't email your past catering clients about next spring if you never got their contact details.
- You share the page with competitors. A planner viewing your profile is one click from three other trucks, often sorted in a way you don't control and can't fully influence without paying.
- You can't control the presentation. Your profile is a template with your logo dropped in. Every truck on the platform looks like every other truck, which is the opposite of what makes people remember you.
- Listings go stale, and stale looks closed. If you forget to update your schedule on a platform you check monthly, customers see wrong information with your name on it.
- You're renting, not building. Nothing you do on their platform accrues to your own search ranking. Reviews, traffic, and SEO value stay with them.
- The rules can change. Fees, ranking, layout, and even whether the platform exists are decisions someone else makes.
None of this makes them a bad deal. It makes them a bad foundation.
Can a directory listing replace your website?
No, for one specific reason: a directory profile cannot be your answer to "where are you right now?"
That question is the whole job of a food truck's web presence, and directories answer it only for the subset of customers who happen to use that particular app. The customer who found you on Instagram, the one who scanned the QR code on your window, the one who Googled your truck name after eating at a festival, and the event planner who got your card all need one link that works. That link should be yours.
Your own site also does things a listing structurally cannot:
- Ranks in Google for your truck's name and your city's searches, feeding how customers find your food truck.
- Shows a real live location map driven by your schedule, not a static address.
- Takes catering inquiries straight to your inbox with no commission attached.
- Carries your photos, your story, and your menu the way you want them.
- Collects reviews and links that build your authority over time.
How should you use them alongside your own site?
Treat this as a hub-and-spoke setup, exactly like website versus Instagram.
- Claim every relevant listing and fill it out completely, including photos.
- Link back to your website from every profile, in every field that allows it.
- Keep your schedule synced. If a platform shows your stops, either keep it current or remove the schedule from it entirely. Wrong is worse than absent. Here's how to build a schedule worth publishing.
- Convert marketplace customers into direct ones. When a Roaming Hunger client's event goes well, get their email and their permission to follow up. Next year's booking should come to you directly.
- Point your printed material at your own domain. The QR code on your truck, the card you hand a planner, and your Instagram bio should all lead to your site, never to a third-party profile.
What about the other food truck apps?
The same logic applies to all of them. Best Food Trucks leans toward lot management and online ordering, Truckster is another locator and booking directory, and most metro areas have at least one local Facebook group or city-run truck map that matters more than any national app. Claim what's free and relevant in your city, keep the ones that actually send you business, and don't spread your schedule across ten places you'll never update.
The verdict
| Roaming Hunger | Street Food Finder | Your own website | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Best at | Catering leads | Daily foot traffic | Being your home base |
| Live location | Limited | Yes, in-app | Yes, on a map you control |
| Cost model | Commission on bookings | Free plus paid tiers | Fixed monthly, no commission |
| Who owns the customer | Them | Them | You |
| Builds your own SEO | No | No | Yes |
| Look and feel | Template | Template | Bespoke |
List on the platforms. Send everyone to your own site.
If you don't have that hub yet, FoodTruckPin hand-builds one for your truck with the live location map included, $249 to build and $34.95 a month, and we keep it current for you. See real examples with working live maps, or compare the paths in FoodTruckPin vs. building it yourself.
Frequently asked questions
Is Roaming Hunger worth it for food trucks?
It can be, if you value catering leads you would not have sourced yourself and you accept a commission on those bookings. It works best as an extra channel rather than your main one, because the client relationship and the repeat business stay on their platform unless you deliberately move them to your own.
Is Street Food Finder free for food trucks?
Street Food Finder offers a free tier along with paid subscription plans that add promotion and ordering features. Check their current pricing before committing, since plans change, and weigh the paid tiers against what a site with your own live map would cost.
Can Roaming Hunger or Street Food Finder replace my website?
No. A directory profile only reaches customers who use that particular app, uses a template every other truck also uses, and does not build your own search ranking. Your website is the single link that works for every customer, no matter where they found you.
Should I list my food truck on multiple directories?
Claim the free listings that are relevant in your city, but only keep schedules current on the ones you will actually maintain. An out-of-date listing tells customers you are somewhere you are not, which costs you more than not being listed at all.
How do I stop paying commission on catering?
Make it easy to book you directly. A website with a clear catering section, an inquiry form that reaches your phone, and fast replies captures the planners who look you up by name. Then follow up with past clients yourself so their repeat events never go back through a marketplace.