At the Dank we serve some authentic Durham Bull City food
From making sandwiches for friends, to owning his own boutique, and then eventually transitioning to The Dankery in Durham, NC, Ian Burris has created a late night munch spot loved by Durham locals and coveted by visitors you don’t want to miss. Through engaging with other local restaurants in Durham like the Dirty Bull, Ian is able to create a night of yummy food while keeping the locals invested in the community. Through the use of social media platforms, it is easy for customers to reach out and order - especially through his Instagram feed.
I was born and raised here in Durham and went to Riverside High School. That is where I started out making sandwiches, and then owning a reselling clothing and shoes boutique. Eventually my entrepreneurial spirit led me of course to the dank.
I had this dream of having a food truck since probably 2010 when food trucks started to get big. I always loved cooking for people, it is something that always came natural for me. When I was starting the dank specifically, I wanted to have a menu that a lot of people, no matter what kind of background you come from, could enjoy the food. Even though I have the capabilities of cooking fancier food, I wanted to create a product that a lot of people could enjoy and be an everybody kind of food truck/restaurant.
I guess just cooking at home with my family and being exposed to different recipes and backgrounds has influenced my creation of The Dankery. With my dad being African American and my mom being Puerto Rican, we had a lot of different recipes going on in our household. I feel like those roots have influenced the menu (at the dank), along with my own creativity.
I believe that The Dankery brings cultural understanding to this area, especially when it is not “corona time” anymore and people can come and hang out. Downtown Durham is getting to become a very gentrified area, so the vibes that it used to have when I was growing up aren’t the same anymore. I feel like it's important to have the Dank open at the late hours we’re open (6pm to 2am) and at the location that we’re in just because it keeps the culture of Durham alive. People can really come to the dank and know this is some authentic Durham Bull City stuff as opposed to new restaurants in the area that are kinda trendy and make some locals feel uncomfortable.
My favorite part of being an entrepreneur is being able to scale out my business and just the anticipation of the next move or next menu item and seeing how far I can really grow this. Also, I am excited to create opportunities of income for my employees so they can eat and fulfill their lives. These business goals are what really keep my life interesting.
During peak service hours, if we’re doing straight walk up orders, I’ll have about six to seven people working with four or five working in the truck and two working outside. Now with deliveries we’ll have up to 8-9 people working depending on how busy we are on delivery orders.
Before my role was kind of supervising, checking in on different trays randomly, checking the consistency of our quality and ensuring that orders are coming out at a good time. Now during this COVID-19 pandemic my position has become more online all the time, taking orders and sending them to the truck so they know what to make and drivers know what to deliver.
When I first started the dank, I felt that using Instagram, Snap [Chat] and Twitter was the easiest way for me to reach my demographic and my peers. So it was super natural for me to use those platforms and now I feel like it's still pretty easy. Instagram is kinda like the new Facebook. The common ground. You’ll see many 30 to 50 year olds using instagram as opposed to just using Facebook a few years ago.
In regard to COVID, we are kinda going back to our roots, how I started the business. Taking only online orders not walk ups whatsoever. That's how I started the business because that's what was most comfortable for me and I wanted it to be a really smooth transition from the garage to the food truck so I kept the ordering system the same. So now we’re going back to that. It’s kind of like my people are already used to it and accustomed to it. For a lot of customers, that's how they started out ordering with me so it's nothing new for them and I feel like that has definitely given us an advantage over other businesses who have been based on straight walk up or phone calls. Now those businesses are having to adjust and go through growing pains that I went through a couple years ago.
We have required our employees to wear masks and we have been putting a lot more emphasis on surface cleans and cleaning outside as well inside the food truck. Also we wash our hands a lot more often than we would when we weren’t worrying about the pandemic. We encourage our customers to practice social distancing in line and waiting in cars rather than waiting outside and hanging outside the truck.
In response to COVID we’ve tried to make everyone know that we’re an ally to the community. Meaning, we’re going to stay open and give people a safe place and a safe environment to eat good and take it home or we’re going to deliver the product to their doorstep in the safest manner possible. I try to spread this positive message on my Instagram and Twitter which I think does a lot because I think a lot of people are listening to what I post. I also point out flaws that I think our community needs to overcome for the better as well as celebrating progress that we’ve made throughout all of this crisis. I think that it is important for me to do these things with my platform.
Our relationship [with the Dirty Bull] is very good, they’ve had to start doing things that are foreign to them which I think has been a bit scary. But I have been doing my best to help them out no matter what with promos, etc. Now their sales have switched to online and pick ups and because of my familiarity with that already I have been trying to help and guide them along. They have been doing pretty good with pickups and curbside so I feel like they should be able to stay afloat and once this all passes we’ll be back to our regular ways of packing the place out.
When it comes to financial relief for small business struggling due to the pandemic they’re very strict on criminal history. So if you’ve had any probation or charges or any run ins with the law in the last five years, you automatically disqualify yourself from any loans and financial support. This affects a lot of minority-owned businesses and disqualified me from receiving financial help. However, I am luckily not in the position of some other people that had to lay a lot of people off. Some employees did file for unemployment and I feel like those services would help them if I do have to lay anybody but yeah pretty much everybody is still getting paid so that is great for them.
Durham needs to just control this virus as much as possible and find a way to keep people employed. Hopefully the stimulus package helps a lot with that but we need money to continue to circulate while being safe so we just have to keep adapting and help move cash from business to consumer and then back in the full circle. We need to follow what the mayor says as well as guidelines suggested from the health department; and we need to trust that this will all pass soon.
I believe that the dank is a very resilient business concept that is going to do well in any market. I feel like now I have a lot of proof of this because people are in a frenzy but they are still making it a point in their lives to have a Dank tray in their week. I feel very confident in this business, but at the same time, I know that some of the best businesses have gone through a lot of trouble in past recessions. So, all in all, I am really thankful for the success we still have even with this pandemic going on.
Written by Sofia Lappas, Sustainable Tourism major, NC State University
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