Produce vans (Burbank: apartment, neighborhoods, buy)

[genjy]

I remember back in the early '90s in the Silver Lake / Los Feliz area, mostly-unmarked cargo vans (maybe a bit bigger than food trucks) would come around at NIGHT to sell fresh produce to local families.

They were kind of shady looking, but were pretty popular nonetheless. The vendors would sell stuff straight from the cargo hatch.

The fruits and veggies were mainly of Latino flavor... chili peppers, tomatoes, corn, lettuce, beans, oranges, limes, etc and so on.

My family kind of moved all over the city and the county after the mid-'90s, and I don't recall seeing those vans again anywhere else.

I was only reminded of them when I saw a dilapiated (and obviously retired) one parked on the side of the street in downtown today!

Do you guys know what I am describing? Are these produce vending vans still a thing?

[Exitus Acta Probat]

Never seen them. But in the 90's, like many people, somebody in a white van tried to sell me audio speakers that were allegedly left over from a recently completed job.

[genjy]

Originally Posted by Exitus Acta Probat

Never seen them. But in the 90's, like many people, somebody in a white van tried to sell me audio speakers that were allegedly left over from a recently completed job.

I've only had that happened to me once.

Around 1998 or so, a couple 20-something year olds tried to sell me speakers from the back of a van with a warehouse overstock story. That was in Burbank at WaMu's parking lot.

Even back then I knew about the scam... and it was being attempted on me.

[owl6969]

Originally Posted by genjy

Do you guys know what I am describing? Are these produce vending vans still a thing?

Yeah I seen them some place elsewhere at night a long time ago though they were like box trucks.

[Exitus Acta Probat]

Originally Posted by genjy

I've only had that happened to me once.

Around 1998 or so, a couple 20-something year olds tried to sell me speakers from the back of a van with a warehouse overstock story. That was in Burbank at WaMu's parking lot.

Even back then I knew about the scam... and it was being attempted on me.

I never did get why there were so many vans. There must have been more than 100 vans driving all around the city. Did they rob an entire container ship full of speakers?

[echoParkDate]

I see these trucks in West LA and Palms on streets that have a lot of apartment buildings, the hispanic tenants buy from them.

For whatever reason I never see them in Echo Park, I would guess that's because we have latino supermarkets in the area. I think the produce trucks have a particular niche, hispanic neighborhoods without a hispanic supermarket nearby.

Having said that, most of the stuff on those produce trucks looks like regular old fruit & veg.

[echoParkDate]

Originally Posted by Exitus Acta Probat

I never did get why there were so many vans. There must have been more than 100 vans driving all around the city. Did they rob an entire container ship full of speakers?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_van_speaker_scam