Taiwan Stores on Wheels

Now, this is a great business model for both owner and customer.

A brick and mortar shop, well, more specifically, sheet metal and rubber, general store on wheels. Almost online shopping, rolling through the neighbourhood, right to your front door.

Taiwan is filled with little businesses whose retail space, customer shipping and home delivery service is a mini Japanese truck. The bed behind the cab is converted into different configurations to hold products from pineapples to sheets of plate glass.

One mobile shop sells household goods and cruises through neighbourhoods regularly, motoring slowly. A recording blares from an ancient public address speaker bolted to the cab roof. From a distance, neighbours know what’s coming. Customers step out of their rows of townhouses into the street to shop roadside. 

little general store - what do you want?

Products hang and swing from every spare space. Huge bright orange plumes from feather dusters blow in the breeze. Goods are bungee cord-secured in place and shoppers can place special orders for future deliveries. It’s like Amazon.

This shop has aluminum step ladders, potting soil, brushes, brooms, mops, garbage bags, mats and more. You need concentration to identify everything and see what you might need. If you can’t locate it, ask because stuff gets buried under piles of toilet plungers. 

open for business in a neighbourhood

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Other tiny motorized shops sell different merchandise and services. An A-frame rack on the back of one truck advertises window repair. It is layered with sheets of glass. Some pieces are picture window size, and others are thick - embedded with mesh. Another section of the rack has coloured and textured glass. Its pa speaker blasts the streets too.

Another entrepreneur specializes in window screen repair. The truck bed is filled with plastic sections of screen, bundles of screen, and even rolls of metal fencing. You pick your product, the driver installs the bug barrier, and the speaker continues down the street.

Keep an ear open for your favourite travelling store and remember to check under the plungers.