A startup is turning shipping containers into sustainable food trucks by looking to tiny homes for inspiration

The Walkingboxes food trailer.Walkingboxes

• Berlin-based Walkingboxes is making sustainable food trailers out of shipping containers.
• Walkingboxes founder Daniel Lorch used research from the tiny home industry to shape the project.
• The startup has seen inquiries from around the world since its December 2020 soft launch.

Shipping containers can sometimes find new life as a tiny home, but now, a Berlin-based startup is turning the metal containers into food trucks.

Walkingboxes - which was founded amid the pandemic in 2020 - makes sustainable "mobile kitchens" out of shipping containers to make "good food democratic," according to the company. And there's likely no better time to introduce a new food truck or trailer: outdoor dining during COVID-19 is still the only dining option in some cities.

Read more: California's housing crisis is so dire, a startup just raised $3.5 million in VC funding to drop tiny houses in people's backyards

The project originally began a few months before COVID-19, and the team was in its "funding and prototype phase" when the first lockdown hit. Despite coronavirus pandemic-related troubles, Walkingboxes' founder and designer, Daniel Lorch, kept moving forward.

"Since outdoor dining is less affected by the restrictions and people from the catering industry are less busy at the moment, many are dreaming of their own street food business - including top chefs," Lorch told Insider in an email interview.