Many local food trucks are left feeling abused here in the Fountain City. 

Uptown Columbus Inc., the local non-profit host of the upcoming Fall Food Truck Festival, has charged local food trucks a hefty vendor’s fee while participating Atlanta trucks weren’t charged the same rate.

The Columbus event hosted by Uptown Columbus is largely put on in partnership with the Atlanta Street Food Coalition; an Atlanta-based organization outsourced by Uptown Columbus to produce and fill local events with Atlanta-based food trucks.

According to local Columbus food truck vendors, the Atlanta-based organization charges their members a one-time annual fee of just $250 for access to the coalition’s events year-round, including the local festivals hosted by Uptown Columbus. However, Columbus-based food trucks have not been able to join the Atlanta-based organization.

Uptown Columbus then charged only local Columbus trucks a whopping $500 fee to participate in the single event in their own home town while the Atlanta-based trucks were not. 

The high fees charged by Uptown Columbus to only local vendors allegedly went directly to the Atlanta-based organization instead of remaining with Uptown Columbus for local use here in town, though the Muckraker was not able to secure financial records to independently verify the allegation.

While the $500 fee may seem small to some businesses, those in the food industry understand how slim margins can sometimes be — especially in recent months. To many Columbus food trucks, the stiff “local-only” fee seems like an unjust donation they are forced to make to the Atlanta-based organization, as they are the only ones forced to pay to support the Uptown brand while it allegedly lines the pockets of the Atlanta-based organization with the dollars of Columbus food truck owners.

Uptown Columbus also charges admission for the public to attend the event, appearing to be “double-dipping” on both Columbus residents and businesses at their own expense, while funding Atlanta’s economy instead of their own. 

This local-only fee has left many Columbus food truck vendors feeling used and abused, with many of them feeling less-inclined to work with Uptown Columbus, Inc. in the future. The favoritism harms local businesses, denying them even equal access to their own town’s events instead of favoring them instead. 

Considering the event is largely put on to display the “economic progress” made by Uptown Columbus and other similar organizations, the local-only vendor fee raises questions about why it chooses to unfairly punish Columbus-based businesses in order to favor others from out-of-town. 

While it is easy to suggest that vendor fees for the event may be structured to attract Atlantan attention, doing so appears largely unfair to the hard-working Columbusites who live here year round. While Uptown Columbus uses the events to highlight how “amazing” Columbus is, they appear to have treated local business owners in a way that could be categorized as abusive as their dollars leave Columbus and wind up in Atlanta.

The unequal fees also cause two undesired effects that undermine Uptown Columbus’ own interest in economic development. 

Firstly, charging Columbus vendors the exuberant fees incentivizes fewer local food trucks to participate. It suppresses local businesses that exist here year-round; a crucial factor of sustaining economic development efforts. This runs hypocritically to the intent of Uptown’s core mission and values. 

Secondly, the incentivization of out-of-town food trucks suggests that Uptown Columbus may feel it has a smaller pool of local food trucks to choose from and are seeking to fill that gap with Atlanta-based vendors. With so many local food trucks here in Columbus and its immediate surrounding area, this begs the question of why so few of them are willing to work with Uptown Columbus, Inc. in the first place. 

The answer may stem from Uptown’s thematically unjust behavior itself, with the local-only fee being the most recent example. 

While organizations like Uptown Columbus often seek to use local food truck vendors to activate their many events, a continued pattern of perceived mistreatment and abuse has made many local vendors unwilling to work with Uptown and other local organizations like them. 

The local-only fee may be an ironic symptom of Uptown Columbus Inc.’s behavior finally catching up with them. By charging local vendors more, it creates a feedback loop that ironically drives local vendors further away, harming the organization’s long-term economic development goals in the process.

The more Uptown Columbus tries to “develop,” the more they appear to suppress local businesses and residents in favor of attracting out-of-town attention at the expense of those who live here year-round. They are missing the moon for the stars.

The long-term results of Uptown Columbus Inc. and other similar organizations are measurably counter-productive. This theme stretches through many other public/private partnerships here in the Fountain City, as the Columbus poverty rate continues to rise. New developments like the Dragonfly Trail Network as well as the Columbus Civic Center continue to be taken over by criminal destruction, graffitti, and filth, as the city’s widely-mocked logo tries its hardest to attract “talented and educated people” to the area through the failing Columbus 2025 initiative.

One would think that Uptown Columbus would want their food truck festival to highlight its own town’s local food trucks, incentivizing their local participation to help grow their businesses within the community. 

Instead, Uptown Columbus appears to be more interested in catering to Atlanta-based businesses at the expense of local owners and the long-term, self-sustaining, developmental health of Columbus. 

The local-only fee appears to have overlooked how the purposeful favoritism of one group inherently must come at the expense of another — a sentiment currently felt by many Columbus businesses.

Columbus residents can voice their opinions of how Uptown Columbus, Inc. charges local food trucks exuberant fees to vend at their own town’s events by contacting Uptown Columbus through their website here.