Sizz’lin Street Bites sells Philly cheesesteaks, Reubens, a birria grilled cheese, wings and loaded fries out of Longmont, Colorado. That is not one dish. It is a griddle menu, a fryer menu and a hot holding menu all at once, and the trailer we built for them in 2024 had to carry all three in sixteen feet.
The owner designed the wrap herself, and it came out really well. But the part worth studying is inside, because it is a lesson in what laying a trailer out properly on paper buys you before a single piece of steel is cut.
Walkthrough video
A line built around the menu
The trailer is 16ft long, 7ft wide and 7ft tall inside. Down one side is a single hot line, every piece of it Atosa CookRite except the steam table:
- An Atosa ATMG-36, a 36 inch griddle with three burners at 30,000 BTU each and a three quarter inch steel plate. This is the cheesesteak and grilled cheese station. A thick plate is what lets shaved steak, onions and a row of sandwiches go down together without the surface going cold.
- An Atosa ACHP-2 two burner hotplate at 64,000 BTU in total, for anything that wants a pot.
- Two Atosa ATFS-40 floor fryers, 40 pounds of oil each. One fryer is a bottleneck on a menu with wings and loaded fries. Two means wings never wait behind fries, and one can be filtered or changed while the other keeps working.
- An Eagle Group HT2 two pan propane steam table, 7,000 BTU, with an eight inch cutting board along the front, for anything that has to be held hot between orders.
The griddle and the hotplate sit on an Atosa MGF8448GR, a 36 inch refrigerated chef base with two drawers. The raw meat lives directly under the plate it is cooked on, so the cook turns from griddle to drawer without taking a step.
What laying it out in CAD actually buys you
Every trailer we build is drawn in CAD first, and this one shows why better than most. In a 16ft box the difference between a line that works and a line that fights you all shift is measured in inches.
Three examples from this build. The chef base drawers open all the way, because an 18 inch service table was placed so nothing blocks them. The standup refrigerator and the standup freezer, an Atosa MBF8519GR and MBF8520GR, are placed so both doors swing fully open without hitting each other or the counter. And the sandwich prep, a 27 inch Atosa with eight topping pans across the top, sits exactly where the cook building a sandwich reaches for it.
None of that is visible in a sales photo. All of it is the difference between a cook who can work a lunch rush alone and one who spends it shuffling around their own equipment.
The hood, and why it is bigger than the line
The cook line is six and a half feet long and the hood over it is longer than that. The mechanical code requires a Type 1 hood to overhang the cooking equipment by at least six inches on every open side, so the hood has to be sized to the line plus that overhang, not to the line itself. Size a hood to the equipment and it fails inspection.
On the roof is a 1,650 CFM exhaust fan with a grease trap. Without one, grease that gets past the filters condenses in the fan and runs down the side of the trailer, straight down the owner’s wrap. The fire code wants an upblast fan to drain into an accessible grease receptacle for the same reason. There is ANSUL wet chemical fire suppression over the whole line, plus Class K and ABC extinguishers inside.
Water, window and power
There is a hand wash sink with splash guards and a three compartment sink, fed by separate fresh and grey water tanks with an 8 gallon water heater and a pump. Both tanks have drain valves, so the whole system can be emptied before a hard freeze. In Longmont that is not a nice to have. A tank that freezes full splits.
The service window is a 6ft self closing window in three sections, with plate glass panes that drop in when the trailer is being stored or towed. There is a ram door at the back so a loaded cart can be wheeled straight in, air conditioning with a remote, stainless walls throughout over half inch plywood and an inch of insulation, and an aluminium diamond plate floor.
Power runs through a 100 amp panel with a transfer box for shore power and every piece of equipment on its own labelled breaker. The generator lives in a lockable cage on a pull out tray, so it slides out to be refuelled and serviced rather than being wrestled out of a box. It comes with a custom 10 gauge extension cord. That detail matters: at 30 amps, a 50 foot run of 12 gauge cord loses close to five percent of the voltage before it reaches the trailer, which is enough to make compressors labour and breakers trip. Ten gauge keeps it to around three percent.
The propane lives outside in lockable cages, with an individual shut off valve on each tank so one can be changed without shutting the line down.
Getting a food trailer licensed in Longmont
Longmont has three layers: the county for the health licence, the city for where you can trade, and the fire department for the inspection.
Boulder County Public Health
The retail food licence comes from Boulder County Public Health, not the city. A mobile unit needs a plan review, a Colorado retail food licence and a commissary agreement. The plan review is applied for online with a $155 application fee, and the hourly review fees, capped at $900, are due at the opening inspection. Reviews can take up to eight weeks, so start well before the trailer is finished. Boulder County’s full service mobile licence is $481 in 2026, rising to $567 in 2027 and $682 in 2028.
The City of Longmont
Longmont requires a Mobile Retail Food Vending Permit at $100 a year per unit, and a city sales and use tax licence, which is a one time $25 fee. The city’s own sales tax rate is 3.53 percent and the combined rate is 8.865 percent. The permit application asks for the county health licence, the sales tax licence, the property owner’s consent, and $1 million of insurance naming the city if you operate on public property.
The trading rules are tighter than in many Front Range cities:
- Non residential zones only.
- At least 250 feet from a restaurant unless the restaurant agrees in writing.
- Not in a park while the park’s own concessions are open, and on any public property only with a permit or park agreement.
- The vehicle has to leave every night, and no tables, chairs or canopies.
- Special events can be exempt from the zoning and distance rules.
Longmont Fire
Any food truck or trailer with a generator, propane, or a Type 1 hood and suppression system needs an annual Longmont Fire Department inspection, which costs $50 and is done on Tuesdays. The department wants an ABC extinguisher and a Class K for grease cooking, the suppression system serviced every six months, propane and carbon monoxide detectors, and no more than 60 pounds of propane on board in total. That last figure is lower than the 200 pound cap in the model fire code, so size your cylinders to Longmont, not to the code book.
Trading in Denver and elsewhere
Since 1 January 2026 a Colorado retail food licence is valid in Denver and a Denver licence is valid everywhere else, but Denver still wants its own mobile food licence, issued by its Department of Licensing and Consumer Protection, and a copy of your state licence at least 14 days before you trade there. Denver also accepts a standard Fire Marshals Association of Colorado inspection certificate in place of its own fire inspection, though its $200 annual propane permit still applies. Longmont is on the 2021 fire code, so check with any other city before assuming a Longmont fire permit carries over.
Where a sandwich trailer earns around Longmont
Longmont has about 100,000 people and sits between Boulder, Loveland and the north Denver suburbs, which means a trailer based there can work four or five markets in a week without a long tow. The Longmont Farmers Market runs on Saturday mornings at the Boulder County Fairgrounds, the Boulder County Fair takes over the same grounds every August, and the city’s Rhythm at Roosevelt event brings in a dozen food vendors. Sizz’lin Street Bites also does catering, which is where a wide menu earns its keep: one booking can want sandwiches, wings and fries for a hundred people, and this line can do all three at once.
What a build like this costs
Custom food trailers start at $40,000 and custom food trucks at $55,000, with a typical 16ft truck around $72,000 and a 22ft around $110,000. A 16ft trailer with two fryers, a griddle, a hotplate, a steam table and full cold storage sits toward the upper end of the trailer range, because every one of those pieces needs gas, power and hood coverage. Build time is about six weeks from order.
Frequently asked questions
How many fryers does a food trailer need?
It depends on the menu. A menu with both wings and fries benefits from two, so wings never wait behind fries and one fryer can be filtered or changed while the other works. This 16ft trailer runs two 40 pound Atosa floor fryers alongside a 36 inch griddle and a two burner hotplate.
Why does a food trailer hood have to be bigger than the cook line?
The mechanical code requires a Type 1 hood to overhang the cooking equipment by at least six inches on every open side. A hood sized to the length of the equipment alone fails inspection, so it has to be sized to the line plus the overhang.
Who licenses a food trailer in Longmont, Colorado?
Boulder County Public Health issues the retail food licence after a plan review, at $481 a year for a full service mobile unit in 2026. The City of Longmont requires a Mobile Retail Food Vending Permit at $100 a year and a sales tax licence. Longmont Fire Department inspects every unit with propane, a generator or a hood once a year, for $50.
How much propane can a food trailer carry in Longmont?
Longmont Fire Department limits food trucks and trailers to 60 pounds of propane in total, and requires propane and carbon monoxide detectors. That is lower than the 200 pound limit in the model fire code.
Where can food trucks park in Longmont?
Only in non residential zones, at least 250 feet from a restaurant unless it agrees in writing, and not in parks while park concessions are open. The vehicle must leave each night and cannot set out tables, chairs or canopies. Special events can be exempt.
Why use a 10 gauge extension cord for a food trailer generator?
Voltage drop. At 30 amps a 50 foot 12 gauge cord loses close to five percent of the voltage before it reaches the trailer, enough to make compressors labour and breakers trip. A 10 gauge cord keeps it to around three percent, and it is the minimum size for a 30 amp circuit.
More reading
- Food truck inspection requirements in Longmont, CO
- Food truck inspection requirements in Denver, CO
- Colorado HB 25-1295 and what the reciprocity law actually does
- Do I need a CDL to tow a food trailer
Recent Colorado builds
- 12ft taco, burrito and coffee trailer built for El Paso County, Colorado
- 16ft taco truck, a box truck conversion for Aurora, Colorado
- 14ft boba tea truck built for Fort Collins, Colorado
If your menu is wider than one dish and you are trying to fit it into a trailer, call or text and we will lay the line out with you in CAD before anything gets built. We have built around 500 food trucks, trailers, bus conversions and van conversions.
Jacob Varghese
Zion Foodtrucks
719-722-2537