According to the Bible, God created the world in six days. Six is considered a lucky number in China. Get Your Kicks on Route 66.

Ben and Jerry said the ’90’s were the ’60s standing on their head. Seriously?! Six is a really important number. We should get to know more about six because it is a “decider” digit.

Every day we have to make decisions. Should I wear this or that? Go out? Stay in? Go to this restaurant or that one? Do I want the steak [cooked] rare or medium rare? Pepper? Blue cheese or vinaigrette? Smooth or chunky?  Small, medium or large? With or without? Regular or decaf? Law school, medical school or culinary school?

In order to survive, we have to narrow our choices. Otherwise, we’ll go crazy. If we decide to write a cookbook based on the Chicken Dishes of the World, we will drown. It would be far easier to compile the Chicken Dishes of Chicago.

Sheena S. Iyengar, the S.T. Lee Professor of Business at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Business, is among the world’s experts on the subject of decision making. She delves into the relationship between how we choose and who we are.

The Art of Choosing by Sheena Iyenga

I mention the distinguished professor because her most famous (at least to me) study, concerned the number ‘six’. The version I discovered concerns heuristics.

It was on Google that I tested a strawberry jam theory that goes like this. A customer wants a pot of strawberry jam so she “Googles” it.  Up pops about 5,260,000 strawberry jam references in less than 60 seconds: where to buy it, how to make it, etc.–all based on Google’s unique heuristics.

Delving deeper:

• One site offers 12 different kinds of strawberry jam. The customer is immediately exhausted. Twelve choices is six too many so she clicks to another site.
• Here only three kinds of strawberry jam are offered. Hmm. The customer decides this company is way too small. (If I give them my credit card number, they’ll probably steal my identity — and I’ll never receive the jam.)
• Click. And Eureka! Here are six kinds of strawberry jam. I think I’ll place my order this company. I submit my order. Done, and done.

This seemingly totally irrelevant stuff is actually valuable information.

If a fast food restaurant offers more than six choices, the line slows and everyone quickly gets grumpy. If a bakery offers six kinds of cup cakes, the buyer will buy at least one, maybe all six. Offer six bagels, and we’ll buy ‘em all even if we had planned to buy only one.

Many chefs figured out that it is shrewd to offer six choices on the menu, particularly on holiday menus. For Easter, there must be: lamb, ham, a fish, a vegetarian dish and two other selections. Keeping the number of choices to six means there is briefer interrogation of the server and  the tables keep turning, and the reservations are honored on time.

(Except, on Thanksgiving, the menu should be turkey, turkey, turkey, more turkey, no turkey and only one other choice.)

Prix-fixe menus with six choices work well particularly when guests are less interested in intricate preparations and more concerned about how much time they have before returning to work or getting to the theater on time.

Linda Duke, the CEO of Duke Marketing, says promotional sentences should be only six words long (or actually, short). Any more, and readers lose interest. She urges restaurateurs to try describing their restaurant this way:

“Ask yourself what makes your restaurant different? Define what you do best? Now try expressing your entire philosophy with six words. Great food. Great service. Finger-licking good — (though not too great if you have sanitized hands).”

Will you ‘deep six‘ this commentary, ‘take the road less traveled’ or when it ‘comes to a fork in the road, take it’?

You decide.

Ms. Patty Melt Food Truck

The term “truck stop” has an entirely new meaning these days.

Rice pudding, exotic ice cream, cupcakes, flavored popcorn, French Fries, Korean tacos or hot soup and artisainal bread are just a few among the literally dozens of street foods offered and flourishing.

A proprietor of a small operation in a busy location can literally make a fortune providing healthy, hearty, homemade sandwiches for the lunch crowd.

Not So Hidden Costs

“Food trucks typically earn a profit equivalent to about 40% of sales,”reported The Globe and Mail. And this is after obtaining licenses and permits that are far from cheap. A new mobile catering permit from the San Francisco Police Department is $9,300.

A used hot dog style cart costs about $2,000, while refurbished trucks for driving and vending can run considerably more than $40,000, with some costing as much as an astronomical $100,000.

Occasionally an investor/partner may be willing to foot the bill for a start-up food truck, but the hope of getting a bank loan may spring pretty much eternal.

Food truck insurance is an additional not so hidden expense not only to protect against the fear of food borne illness, but also in recognition that the truck may be carrying one, or several propane tanks. The chef may be cooking over an open flame or using a hotter’n’hell pizza oven.

And, bad weather is a variable that is impossible to factor into a profit projection.

Sales are likely to plummet on national holidays except for the few, who may prefer to get a turkey taco from a truck rather than committing to a family gathering on Thanksgiving Day.

Permits

The permit permits the purchaser to park in a public place for up to five locations. Each parking spot must be at least two blocks or 300 feet away from a similar food vendor, either a brick-and-mortar business, or another mobile catering vehicle.

If a truck is parked too close to a regular brick and mortar restaurant, it can, and often does, raise an objection citing unfair business practice.

Parking on private property is strictly forbidden and laws are vigorously enforced.

Permits are non-transferable, and the waiting time to get one can extend not for months but years if the city council restricts the number of mobile vendors already allowed to operate.

Some municipalities allow the food to be prepared in a different (but licensed) facility, while others demand all the food preparation be done in the truck itself and properly refrigerated. (It can’t be sloshing about in a Styrofoam cooler.)

Safety First

In many cities, food truck vendors face Health Inspectors who vigorously enforce high sanitation standards.

Spreading the Word

Social media and food truck apps continues to play a large role in food truck success. For instance, more than 50% of Gorilla Cheese’s customers track its location through social media. They tag street locations like tagging friends on Facebook.

In the end, despite all the possible road blocks, owning a food truck could set some feet on the road to happiness.

Dana Mattioli of The Wall Street Journal recently reported that workers are trading sit-down lunches for brown-bags to save cash. Even online bag eBags.com retailer has seen a significant increase in sales of lunch bags and coolers since a year ago.

This led me to think: there must be a job opportunity here. Everyone knows that sweets are affordable luxuries. The New York Times just reported premium chocolate sales grew 17.8 percent for the year ended June 14, compared with 1.4 percent for non-premium chocolate.

You could open your own dessert delivery business without investing tons of money. The most important thing you’ll need is to do is lease a commercial kitchen because zoning laws won’t allow you to operate out of your home. (Schools and churches are often willing to make such arrangements.)

Start by compiling a list of six desserts that are easy to make and to eat with one hand. Six is the magic number. Researchers have discovered that when a potential buyer goes on line to order a product, a jar of preserves for example, it is more likely the order will be completed if there are just six selections from which to choose.

If there are 10, it’s more than likely the buyer will say “to hell with it, I don’t have time to think about this now.” If there are fewer options, the buyer will think this is a fly by night ditzy little operation. If I give them my money, I bet I’ll never get the stuff.” So six makes the perfect list. Imposing a limit also enables you to easily track of best-sellers and keep the purchasing of supplies and labor costs under tight control.

Think about the presentation. If the packaging of the desserts is beautiful and the name of your company is easy to remember, you’ll have customers lining up for more. Test market your product with a group of willing volunteers and listen attentively to their suggestions.

When all your ducks are in a row, make an appointment with the office manager and bring plenty of samples to the meeting.

Of course, you already grasped the idea such a service would be welcome at a retirement home, in a kiosk at an airline terminal or as carry on luggage for needy travelers.

What do you think is the hardest thing about starting a small food business? What advice would you give to someone starting out?