Food truck destroyed after early morning fire, owners consider future

Just more than a year ago, Ashley and Jesse Gainey molded their combined years of service industry experience into a business plan to launch the Southern Asian fusion food truck, Sticky 8’s.

Early morning, on Dec. 9, the husband and wife woke up to calls from people alerting them of a fire that would damage their food truck beyond repair.

“The fire marshal said he thought it had been going throughout the night and it got bigger and bigger,” Ashley Gainey said. “We were sleeping and that’s the part that kind of sucks for us. We were asleep and didn’t get the phone calls until we woke, and we had like 15 missed messages and all sorts of voicemails. My husband went running out the door, like ‘Our trucks, on fire!’”

Ashley Gainey said on Friday night, Dec. 8, she and her husband worked an event and, as normal, stored the food truck at a commissary kitchen, plugging it into the building to charge.

Captain Douglas Smith said the Waynesville Fire Department was dispatched at 6:51 a.m. the next morning to the 1500 block of Asheville Road in Waynesville.

Firefighters arrived on the scene to find the vehicle “fully engulfed by fire” with flames going up 3 to 4 feet in the air, he said.

“There were flames coming out the wheel wells in the rear and coming out the cracks around the windows and the rear door and up by the roof line at the back of the vehicle,” Smith said.

The cause of the fire is still under investigation, he said.

Smith said arson does not appear to be the cause, as all windows and doors of the vehicle were secured, and the truck was connected to the charging outlet on the commercial building.

“We had to force entry into a window initially to start attacking the fire and then we had to force the rear door to get access,” Smith said. “And we opened the front door where the driver’s compartment was so there weren’t any signs of damage or forced entry or anything like that to be suspicious of.”

Two months ago, the food truck operators had an electrical issue fixed that Ashley Gainey said was unrelated to last weekend’s fire.

“It was on the opposite side this time. We’d just recovered from that and got things fixed and put back together. Now this happened,” she said.

The food truck was equipped with a fire suppression system, however, it activated too late, and the fire was too large for it to contain, Ashley Gainey said.

The fire suppression system is over the grease fryers and is meant to suppress cooking-related fires, Smith said.

“If the fire were to start somewhere else outside of the fryer area, the suppression system may activate, but if it doesn’t get to where the fire originated from — maybe a couple of feet away — it will not put out the fire,” Smith said.

Sticky 8’s food truck was about 6 feet away from the commercial kitchen building, Smith said. Other vehicles stored on site were not damaged, nor were any buildings, and no people were injured.

Rebuilding Sticky 8’s

On Nov. 11, 2022, Sticky 8’s made its debut servicing communities across the region, including Waynesville, Hendersonville and Asheville.

In the Asheville area, the food truck has frequented residential complexes and businesses including Highland Brewing, Rivers Arts District Brewing and Zillicoah Beer Co.

Jesse Gainey worked as a chef for about 12 years, and Ashley Gainey worked front of house in restaurants during the same time.

The husband and wife took a break from the restaurant industry to work in corporate America.

“It got to the point where we kind of missed the restaurant industry and the craziness all that entails,” Ashley Gainey said.

The Gaineys decided to start small with a food truck and work up to opening a brick-and-mortar restaurant.

Their backgrounds in Southern cuisine and love for Asian culture led to the Southern Asian fusion food concept.

Sticky 8’s name refers to the stickiness of the Asian-style dishes, like the honey ginger sauce-coated chicken, and the number “8” is said to be a lucky number and the menu regularly featured eight items.

“Obviously, we didn’t get our good luck,” Ashley Gainey said.

The entrepreneurs are waiting to find out if insurance will pay for the damage and losses, and what will be determined regarding business loans. In the meanwhile, they have launched a crowd-sharing fundraiser to raise money for new equipment so they can revive the culinary business.

“We’d had tremendous community response and are incredibly grateful for it and shocked by it,” Ashley Gainey said. “We’re not ones to get out there and ask for help. We usually just try to bite the bullet and cover it up with a smile and keep trotting, but we discussed it and were like, ‘Maybe the community could help us.’”

The holiday season is a particularly difficult time, she said, but those who cannot assist financially can send “positive vibes” and “positive energy.”

The food truck operators dealt with equipment breaks and other issues even before the fire, and have discussed the next move for the business, Ashley Gainey said. Now, they are considering relaunching as a pop-up concept, perhaps at an area taproom.

For more, visit sticky8s.com and follow Sticky 8's at facebook.com/sticky8s and on Instagram @sticky8s.

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Tiana Kennell is the food and dining reporter for the Asheville Citizen Times, part of the USA Today Network. Email her at tkennell@citizentimes.com or follow her on Instagram @PrincessOfPage. Please support this type of journalism with a subscription to the Citizen Times.

This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Sticky 8's food truck destroyed by fire, community offers support