- March 28, 2024
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‘People ask me why I keep doing it.’
From inside the food truck parked on the beach, each window reveals a bright, postcard-worthy scene: waves breaking onto shore, children playing, colorful umbrellas. A comfortable sea breeze wafts through, along with the sound of the churning surf.
“This is my happy place,” said Terrie Barr, owner of T’s House of Dogs, the only beach vendor in Ormond Beach.
It has not been easy, keeping her ‘happy place’ for the past 11 years, but it’s where she wants to be: selling hot dogs, drinks, burgers, ice cream and more from her truck parked near the Granada approach. She enjoys talking to the customers she has come to know and the relaxed pace.
“How can you not be happy in this atmosphere?” she asked.
Barr, 56, started her beach food service business after working at Homac Mfg. Co. for 28 years, fulfilling a childhood prophecy.
When she was 10, her family moved to Ormond Beach. One day she pointed to a food truck on the beach and told her mother that was what she was going to do someday.
She made it happen many years later after buying a truck that had been a mobile lock service. To convert it to a food truck, she cut windows and installed the sinks and necessary appliances, using skills she learned from her father.
“Dad was a small engine mechanic,” she said. “I’m a daddy’s girl.”
Her mechanical aptitude carried through life. She was the first female tool and die maker at Homac and was also a press operator before supervising a department.
Her hard work has been recognized by Gov. Rick Scott. Barr proudly shows a letter from the governor, congratulating her for having no health violations. In fact, she has received the letter every year for four years, ever since Scott started sending them out.
The business has not been a money maker, however.
She said there are beach vendors in other locations that turn a profit but she breaks even and works another job to pay the bills. One reason, she believes, is that her location is frequented by families that bring their own food to the beach.
“People have asked me why I keep doing it,” she said. “I say because I love it.”
Last year was the best year she ever had, she said, because the sand was good enough to allow cars every day. So far this year, only four-wheel-drive vehicles are allowed to enter the beach at the Granada approach.
The soft sand can also be a problem for her food truck. Sometimes, she can’t get onto the beach. Once there, she parks her tires on plywood so that if water does surround her, the truck doesn’t sink into the sand.
“We sometimes wonder how we’re going to get off the beach,” she said. There have been times when they have had to keep moving the plywood and drive slowly off the beach.
“We’ve had good times and bad times but we’re still here,” she said.
At one time, there were three beach vendors in Ormond Beach. Five years ago, Volusia County changed the rules so that all vendors had to incorporate into the Volusia County Beach Food and Ice Cream Service. They were required to deposit the necessary fees for the coming year into an account, instead of paying monthly.
Barr said the other two vendors left, but she scratched up enough money, even selling her personal gold. Now she saves enough through the year to pay for the following year.
It’s her happy place.
“This is where I’m going to stay,” she said.