Food truck catering sits inside a much larger food-away-from-home economy. In 2024, U.S. food-away-from-home spending reached $1.27 trillion, while caterers and mobile food services employed 217.8 thousand people in May 2026. These figures describe the market context around food trucks and catering; the employment series combines caterers and mobile food services rather than isolating food trucks.
Contents
- U.S. food spending and the catering opportunity
- Where food-away-from-home spending goes
- State and regional demand
- Seasonality and price conditions
- Employment trends in catering and mobile food
- Pay and workforce composition
U.S. food spending and the catering opportunity
The broad U.S. food system expanded in 2024. Consumers spent $2.58 trillion on food, up 4.0% from 2023. Food-away-from-home spending grew slightly faster, reaching $1.27 trillion after a 4.2% increase. By comparison, food-at-home spending reached $901 billion, up 1.4%.
These are national food-dollar measures, not food-truck sales. They are useful for understanding the pool of spending that includes restaurants, catering, mobile food, and other food-service outlets. The USDA’s Food Dollar - Summary Findings reports the 2024 totals and year-over-year changes.
Food services also represented a substantial share of economic value in the food-away-from-home chain. The food-services industry group supplied 38.6 cents of value added per food dollar in 2024. Its value added totaled $836.8 billion, up from $790.0 billion in 2023, a 5.9% increase.
Labor was especially important in food-away-from-home activity. Workers received $1.17 trillion from the U.S. food system in 2024, equal to 54.1 cents per food dollar. Food-away-from-home output used 59.1 cents of labor per dollar, compared with 47.1 cents for food-at-home output. Within the food-away-from-home value chain, food services supplied 65.8 cents of value per dollar, while labor supplied 44.2 cents of value per food-services dollar. These measures help explain why catering costs and staffing capacity matter so much to a mobile-food operation.
Where food-away-from-home spending goes
The outlet mix provides a useful comparison for food truck catering, even though food trucks are not separately identified in the supplied series. In 2024, full-service restaurants accounted for 36.3% of U.S. food-away-from-home spending. Limited-service restaurants accounted for 36.2%, leaving 27.4% for other food-away-from-home outlets.
| Outlet group | Share of food-away-from-home spending | Measurement period |
|---|---|---|
| Full-service restaurants | 36.3% | 2024 |
| Limited-service restaurants | 36.2% | 2024 |
| Other outlets | 27.4% | 2024 |
The latest split was unusually close between the two restaurant categories: the full-service share exceeded the limited-service share by 0.1 percentage point. The USDA describes the 27.4% share for other outlets as the lowest recorded since 1997. The figures come from Full-service surpasses limited-service restaurant sales in 2024.
Historical comparisons show how the mix has shifted. In 1997, full-service restaurants represented 36.0% of spending, limited-service restaurants represented 33.5%, and other outlets represented 30.5%. In 2020, limited-service restaurants reached a 37.8% share. Those historical values should be read as changes in the overall outlet mix, not as a direct time series for food truck catering.
For a food truck caterer, the practical implication is that mobile service competes within a broad market that includes both restaurant formats and other outlets. The 2024 data supports a balanced view: full-service and limited-service restaurants each captured about 36% of spending, while all other outlets together captured just over one-quarter.
State and regional demand
Per-capita food-away-from-home demand increased in every U.S. state in 2024, according to State-level changes in food sales varied in 2024. Per-capita total U.S. food spending increased 3.2% from 2023 to 2024, while food prices increased 2.3% in the USDA comparison.
The strongest overall increase in per-capita food sales was in Washington, DC, at 10.4%. New York recorded 5.9% growth, and California recorded 5.5%. These are overall per-capita food-sales changes, so they should not be treated as food-truck-specific growth rates.
Not every location had an increase in total per-capita food sales. New Hampshire had the largest state decline, down 2.0% in 2024. Its food-at-home sales fell 6.6%, while its food-away-from-home sales rose 2.1%. West Virginia’s per-capita total food sales declined 1.0%, and Kansas’s declined 0.2%. The contrast illustrates why total food spending and away-from-home spending can move differently in the same place.
The share of food spending occurring away from home also varied substantially by location. In 2023, food-away-from-home sales represented 76.2% of per-capita food sales in Washington, DC; 63.9% in Nevada; and 63.5% in Hawaii. The average for other states was 53.0%. These shares come from Hawaii, Nevada, and Washington, DC, had highest shares of food-away-from-home sales.
For caterers, the geographic figures are market context rather than a ranking of the best places to operate. They show that away-from-home demand can make up a very different portion of local food spending, and that a rise in away-from-home sales can coexist with a decline in total food sales.
Seasonality and price conditions
Food-service demand changes sharply around the turn of the year. Average daily inflation-adjusted food-away-from-home sales dropped about 12% month over month in January 2022, about 5% in January 2023, and about 12% in January 2024. The comparable average daily inflation-adjusted food-at-home decline exceeded 13% in January 2022, January 2023, and January 2024.
These January comparisons come from From holiday feasts to new-year savings, U.S. food sales shift with the seasons. They describe average daily, inflation-adjusted sales, so the figures account for both price changes and the number of days in a month. They are not forecasts and do not establish that every food truck experiences the same seasonal pattern.
Longer-term price movement has been more pronounced for food away from home than for food at home. Food-away-from-home prices were 49.5% higher in May 2024 than in January 2014. Food-at-home prices were 29.9% higher over the same period, while the all-items Consumer Price Index rose 34.3%. The comparison is reported in Food-away-from-home price growth outpaced food at home and overall inflation over past decade.
For food truck catering, the price figures provide a clear planning signal: a menu priced for an earlier cost environment may not reflect the broader food-service price level in May 2024. However, the data does not specify individual ingredient costs, truck operating costs, event fees, or customer pricing. Those decisions require business-specific information.
Employment trends in catering and mobile food
The BLS CES series groups caterers and mobile food services under NAICS 72232,3. It is therefore the closest employment context here, but it is not a food-truck-only count. The series is also reported as nonfarm payroll employment and should not be interpreted as the number of independent operators or all people working in the field.
Employment was 232.8 thousand in December 2024 and 228.5 thousand in May 2025. It then reached 239.5 thousand in August 2025, 248.5 thousand in September, 250.4 thousand in October, and 245.9 thousand in November. The 2025 observations are from the BLS Table B-1b, reported as not seasonally adjusted.
| Month | Employment |
|---|---|
| December 2024 | 232.8 thousand |
| May 2025 | 228.5 thousand |
| August 2025 | 239.5 thousand |
| September 2025 | 248.5 thousand |
| October 2025 | 250.4 thousand |
| November 2025 | 245.9 thousand |
| January 2026 | 197.3 thousand |
| March 2026 | 213.6 thousand |
| May 2026 | 217.8 thousand |
The later series recorded 197.3 thousand employees in January 2026, 204.7 thousand in February, 213.6 thousand in March, 217.8 thousand in April, and 217.8 thousand in May. These observations are from the BLS Table B-1b for May 2026. May 2026 values were preliminary where marked by BLS.
The sequence shows that the reported workforce was lower in early 2026 than in the late-summer and autumn 2025 observations. Because the series is not seasonally adjusted and combines caterers with mobile food services, it should be used to describe employment movement in the combined industry rather than to estimate staffing for a particular truck or event.
Pay and workforce composition
Average hourly earnings for caterers and mobile food services were $26.43 in May 2025. They were $28.33 in March 2026 and $28.56 in both April and May 2026. The BLS labels the source series as average earnings for private nonfarm payroll employees; it does not make these figures a guaranteed wage for every food truck worker.
Average weekly earnings were $681.89 in May 2025 and $739.41 in March 2026. The April 2026 figure was $733.99. The May 2026 table lists the May hourly value of $28.56, while the supplied weekly-earnings facts do not include a May 2026 weekly value. The pay figures are reported in BLS Table B-3a.
Women held 97.1 thousand jobs in caterers and mobile food services in January 2025, equal to 51.1% of the industry’s employees. In November 2025, women held 121.3 thousand jobs, or 52.1% of employees. In December 2025, they held 121.8 thousand jobs, or 51.3%. These employment figures are from BLS Table B-5b.
The broader food-services and drinking-places subsector offers additional occupational context, but these are not food-truck-only counts. In 2025, it recorded 620,270 fast-food cooks, 1,235,200 restaurant cooks, 1,009,330 first-line food-preparation supervisors, and 1,943,380 waiters and waitresses. The occupation figures are presented by the BLS in Food Services and Drinking Places: NAICS 722.
Together, the pay and workforce data show a labor-intensive industry with a combined caterer/mobile-food employment base, measurable hourly and weekly earnings, and women making up slightly more than half of employees in the reported 2025 observations. The broader occupation counts can help frame the labor pool, but they should not be substituted for food truck staffing totals.