Taco Shack
Taco Shack
Written by Rachel Youens Monday, 07 May 2007
American dream realized through selling Mexican food
In 1995, Yoli Arriaga was a teacher in Round Rock, and that’s what she assumed she always would be. Today Yoli and her husband Orlando own a chain of restaurants with locations in every part of Austin ranging from a tiny stand to a downtown high-rise.
“The American Dream is alive and kicking,” Yoli said. “It’s hard and emotionally and physically tiring, but it can be done.”
The couple met at St. Edwards University, where they were both the first in their family to receive a college degree. After graduating, they began careers in education, Yoli as a teacher and Orlando as a coach.
When a neighborhood restaurant near Medical Parkway shut down, they started eyeing the location. Using Yoli’s teacher-retirement as collateral for a loan, the first Taco Shack launched in 1996.
“Going blindly into starting your own business is almost the best way. Ignorance is a blessing because if you knew how hard it was going to be, you wouldn’t do it,” Orlando said.
While Orlando worked on the building, Yoli worked on the menu. Deciding what to make wasn’t hard; tacos were the foods she ate as a child when her mother would leave potatoes, chorizo and eggs on the stovetop. Through trial and error, Yoli invented the restaurant’s signature salsa and The Shack Taco with eggs, cheese, potatoes and chorizo.
“What makes Taco Shack unique, besides being freshly made, is that our food is real Tex-Mex,” Yoli said. “It’s what a Mexican-American, and specifically a Texan, would grow up eating in their own home.”
For the first three years, both Yoli and Orlando spent every day either in the kitchen or behind the counter, sometimes from 5 a.m. to 8 p.m.
After about six scary months, where the average profit was $400, the tide began to turn.
Rather than putting up billboards or using TV commercials, the company invests its advertising budget into local schools. At the Metric location, Connally High School baseball players eat Shack Tacos before heading out to the field. In Austin, the Anderson football teams play in the “Taco Shack Bowl.”
Taco Shack has now opened seven locations, and in the future Orlando hopes to franchise the restaurant.
“We have had a lot of success, but we don’t take very much time to reflect. We try not to get complacent,” Orlando said. “A true entrepreneur sees a mountain and just has to climb it, and they can’t tell you why. It’s not the money or cars or success, it’s the thrill.”
The story behind the name
After a long day of construction and cleaning at the first location of his restaurant, Orlando Arriaga was driving home. He looked back at the storefront in his rear-view mirror and said “Gosh, it just looks like a little shack.” The name stuck, and the couple commissioned an artist to draw an icon. The original sketch still hangs on the wall of their North Lamar location, alongside original blueprints drawn by Orlando’s father.
Taco Shack, 12439 Metric Blvd • 873-7977, 3901 Spicewood Springs Road • 418-8900, www.tacoshack.com
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