The founder of a popular taco stand died in April. New owners carry on her tradition.

BENSON – Even as she fought through the late stages of breast cancer, Janice Bird had every intention of being healed and returning this spring to the hayfield where she opened the West Coast Tacos stand a decade earlier.

“She was anxious to get down there,” according to her husband, Tim Bird.

Jan Bird died at home in Benson on April 11, at age 61. But her family, and many residents in and around the small Rutland County town, wanted to keep West Coast Tacos going.

Not long after Jan Bird’s passing, West Coast Tacos already had new owners. Jim and Paula Genier of nearby Fair Haven bought the trailer and land, dubbing the revived business West Coast Tacos 2.0 but keeping the same taco and burrito recipes and relaxing vibe Jan Bird introduced in that rural location off Vermont 22A.

The couple saw opportunity. “There’s so much potential for growth there for the community,” Paula Genier said. “It was kind of a no-brainer. Someone had to do it.”

There’s something else, though, according to the Geniers, that made it essential to keep the business going.

“I think it was more to carry on Jan’s tradition than anything,” Jim Genier said.

West Coast of Vermont

West Coast Tacos is an aberration along the 45-mile stretch of Vermont 22A running from Vergennes in the north to Fair Haven in the south. Leaving Vergennes, the road passes by farms, farms and more farms, a smattering of gas stations, a dollar store, more farms, a modest restaurant/diner and more farms.

Then, boom! There it is. A taco truck in a repurposed hayfield at the corner of Mill Pond Road, about eight miles north of downtown Fair Haven.

More than one visitor – probably more than one thousand visitors, come to think of it – has called West Coast Tacos an oasis, a destination promising hot, fresh tastes in a food desert. (Nearby resident Will Tyler opened another pop-up food trailer, Willie’s BBQ, just up the road from West Coast Tacos around the same time.)

The genesis for West Coast Tacos came when Tim Bird, a wood-flooring contractor, discussed with his wife that she ought to find another source of income for her and their daughter, Elyza, should something happen to him. Jan Bird had worked locally in school kitchens and operated an inn in Stockbridge.

“So I said, ‘Well, let’s do a hot-dog cart or something and go to football games,” Tim Bird said. They realized there were many carts fitting that description across the state, so they reconsidered.

“Then I thought, ‘Well, nobody’s doing tacos, and they’re fairly inexpensive to prepare, so let’s look at that,” Tim Bird said. West Coast Tacos was born.

The name reaches back to Tim Bird’s childhood in California, where he remembers sampling the offerings of taco trucks. West Coast Tacos also alludes to property owned by the Birds on nearby Lake Champlain, sometimes called the West Coast of Vermont.

Tacos in snow and sleet

That idea didn’t seem so great at first.

West Coast Tacos opened in April 2012. The Birds were novices at running a food trailer and didn’t know what to expect, Tim Bird said. April in Vermont can bring cold temperatures and snow and sleet, all of which happened that first month.

Elyza Bird, now 21, remembers working with her mother on days that were so slow they’d play cards in the trailer. At the end of the day, Tim Bird said, Jan Bird might have collected a grand total of $40 in sales. They wondered what they were in for. As business owners, they also knew it takes a while to establish something new, and you can’t close early just because customers aren’t showing up.

The second year, according to Tim Bird, West Coast Tacos waited until May to open, and business was much better. “The third year,” he said, “things really took off, and never slowed down after that.”

Locals and travelers were surprised at what they found in tiny Benson.

“Everybody was kind of flabbergasted that there was a taco stand in a hayfield,” according to Tim Bird, who said that for some older residents in town it was their initial encounter with Tex-Mex food. “That was fun for people to experience a taco for the first time, and/or a burrito.”

Elyza Bird attributed much of the success to her mother’s work ethic. She said Jan Bird knew that people encountering West Coast Tacos for the first time might be “suspicious of the taco stand just sitting there in a field,” so Jan was constantly cleaning the trailer so visitors would see it was more than just a fly-by-night operation. Word of mouth spread, and West Coast Tacos took root.

“She ran a tight ship,” Elyza Bird said.

New owners jump in

West Coast Tacos hummed along through the pandemic year of 2020, when eating outdoors became the norm rather than the exception. It was at the end of that year, in December, when Jan Bird was diagnosed with breast cancer.

“She handled it like a trouper,” according to Tim Bird. He said his wife did have emotional breakdowns as she battled her illness for more than two years. Those emotions stabilized in her last few weeks.

“She just accepted that she was nearing end of life and wasn’t fighting it at that point,” he said.

She died this April, and would have opened West Coast Tacos in May. Her family didn’t want to see the business miss the upcoming season.

“It was a good time for Jim and Paula to jump in,” Tim Bird said of the Geniers, who operate a maple-sugaring business in Fair Haven that keeps them busy in the fall and winter months.

Jim Genier said he used to visit West Coast Tacos once or twice a week and enjoyed their soft tacos. (Paula Genier said she favored the taco salad.) They didn’t really know the Birds other than encountering Jan on the other side of the trailer window.

“We just really liked it because it was reasonable and really good food,” Jim Genier said.

An employee of Tim Bird’s flooring business came regularly to the Geniers’ property to trim the hooves of the couple’s goats. Shortly after learning of Jan Bird’s death, Jim Genier mentioned to him that he and his wife would like to talk with Tim when he was ready to discuss the future of West Coast Tacos.

The Birds had posted on the West Coast Tacos website that they wanted to sell the business, and Jim Genier said there was plenty of interest. He and his wife discussed ahead of talking with Bird that they would consider their plans after the meeting.

Instead, 10 minutes into their meeting, Paula Genier asked Bird if he’d take a check for a down payment. He accepted.

“It was very spontaneous,” according to Jim Genier.

“I love the atmosphere, out in the middle of nowhere and being on our own,” according to Paula Genier. She said it was also important to carry on the tradition Jan Bird had started.

“She had everything figured out,” Paula Genier said of Jan Bird. “What’s the KISS thing – keep it simple, stupid?” The Geniers chose to keep things simple and follow Jan Bird’s lead.

Tim Bird liked what he saw in the Geniers. “I sensed that they would be the right people because they’re both outgoing, very personable,” Bird said, adding that Paula Genier has previous food-service experience. “Jim’s like I am – he’ll do whatever needs to be done to help the situation.”

Elyza Bird was impressed that the Geniers wanted to keep intact what her mother started.

“It was important to maintain the quality of the business,” she said. “It was important for me that people who would go down there for the new ownership would get the same experience as when my mom was there.”

Three weeks after Jan Bird’s passing, on May 2, West Coast Tacos announced that the Geniers would be the new owners. They opened for business May 13.

Plans to expand

Morgan Engels of Milwaukee and Russ and Pat Engels of Sussex, New Jersey, sat at a picnic table in the  trailer’s hayfield Saturday and lunched on tacos and quesadillas. They were on their way to visit Russ and Pat’s daughter, who lives in Colchester, a route they have traveled many times before.

“We always drove by and I always wanted to stop,” Pat Engels said.

They enjoyed their first visit to West Coast Tacos. “It’s super-good,” Morgan Engels said between bites of taco.

The quesadillas that Pat and Russ Engels ordered are among new items on the menu. Jim Genier said the new crunch wrap is among the most-popular items at West Coast Tacos 2.0, along with the taco salad Jan Bird devised.

Otherwise, the Geniers are sticking with the items and recipes that have always filled the menu at West Coast Tacos. They’re picking up right where Jan Bird left the business last fall.

“It’s been busy, really busy,” Paula Genier said. “A lot busier than we expected.” Jim Genier said he and his wife were putting in up to 100 hours a week to start, but reduced that to about 80 as summer unfolded. He was planning to start an excavation business, but that’s on hold as the couple spends the summer at the taco trailer.

They expect to expand the business next summer. They plan to add a second trailer for ice cream that would incorporate the maple syrup they produce in Fair Haven. They might offer fried dough and burgers and present community events such as car shows, movie nights and swap markets.

Tim Bird, who retired recently after selling his flooring business, said he’s happy that the new owners see endless opportunities for the property.

“I’m thrilled. I couldn’t be happier for the Geniers,” he said. “I think they’re going to succeed down there.”

If you go

WHAT: West Coast Tacos 2.0

WHEN: 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Wednesday-Sunday through October

WHERE: Vermont 22A and Mill Pond Road, Benson

INFORMATION: http://westcoasttacosvt.weebly.com/

Contact Brent Hallenbeck at bhallenbeck@freepressmedia.com.

This article originally appeared on Burlington Free Press: Vermont taco stand in a hayfield keeps going after owner's death