LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — Restaurants of Arkansas announced, due to the significant success of its Minute Man Mobile food truck enterprise, it is dramatically expanding its scope and reach.
The expansion will include the immediate addition of the world famous "Space Shuttle Café" mobile restaurant to its fleet.
The Space Shuttle Café is a converted DC-3 Airplane that saw service in WWII in 1944. It is the only road worthy DC-3 airplane licensed for street use in the world.
After WWII, the plane saw service as a commercial airliner on the East Coast and is reputed to have been hijacked to Havana Cuba but later liberated from the communist Castro regime and returned to the USA in the late 1960's.
In the 1990's, the DC-3 was converted into its current design configuration with specifications based on the now retired Challenger Space Shuttle. In 2015, the vehicle was upgraded to a full commercial food-service kitchen by the award-wining Shanghai Mobile Kitchens Solution Group in New York City.
In addition to the recent acquisition of the Space Shuttle Cafe, Minute Man Restaurants has entered into a partnership with a Texas-based food truck developer to build a fleet of customized units designed specifically around the unique Minute Man Mobile menu offering.
The first unit is expected to arrive in Arkansas in March.
"We have witnessed incredible demand for the Minute Man brand across the state," stated Perry Smith, President of Minute Man Arkansas. "Given the inherent flexibility of the mobile model, which allows us to both establish a predictable service schedule in townships across the state while also offering full customization for private bookings, such as supporting office luncheons, wedding and birthday parties, tailgating parties, apartment complex celebrations, etc., we have realized we can delight many more customers by offering a robust mobile presence to complement our traditional stand-alone restaurant offering," he added.
In line with this mobile restaurant expansion, the company also recently launched the Minute Man Foundation.
The mission, duty and purpose of the 501-c-3 Not-for-Profit Foundation is to provide qualified U.S. military veterans of all branches of service access to low to no cost hospitality licensing and franchising opportunities to support our objective of creating more VETREPRENEURS—veteran owned and operated small businesses, across the United States.
The company intends to add another physical location in Little Rock this year. Currently, Minute Man restaurants are located in Jacksonville and El Dorado, AR.