The Philanthropic Family

This Valentine’s Day, eat good food and help someone else eat, too.  Use your consumer purchasing power to help make the world we want–one without hunger–by patronizing a restaurant or bakery that participates in food rescue.  If you’re not familiar with food rescue programs, they are exactly what they sound like: homeless shelters, soup kitchens, food pantries and other aid agencies “rescue” perfectly good food from being thrown in the garbage by picking it up from restaurants, bakeries, caterers or grocers who have surplus, and delivering it to hungry people.

It’s been so tough to find resources, I’ve been talking to people about why restaurants don’t tell consumers that they participate in food donation and “food rescue” programs that benefit shelters, food pantries and other social services agencies.  (One exception is the Panera Food-”Doughnation” program which I wrote about last year.) 

Potential Reasons not to Publicize Participation

According to one woman who runs a shelter and receives food donations, the reasons a restaurant would not publicize their donations were these:

1. “Foremost, a liability issue. The homeless shelter is not restricted by any Health codes, but the restaurants are. If there would be a case of food poisoning or any kind of sickness resulting from the food, there could be a liability issue (a reason for not giving), but also if it is well know that a place does give its leftovers, it could trigger Health Dept. investigations/regulations. Baked goods are much easier (thus Panera) with less chance of any liability.
2. “From a PR perspective, diners might question why a restaurant charges so much if it can give away excess food – they should stop making so much, etc.
3. “Also, upper scale restaurants cater to a class of folks who usually buy and patronize places where they can get and eat what most people cannot. If they are having the same fancy food as served to a homeless person, it takes some of the shine off the expensive restaurant.”

Restaurants: Publicize Your Participation

I was speaking with Robert Egger of the social enterprise DC Central Kitchen about this and his reaction to the reasons cited above was simple: “Honestly…and with respect….all those reasons are wrong. There are actually state AND federal laws that facilitate the donation of food. And customers totally dig anything sustainable!!!”  I agree that every savvy restaurant should not just participate, but shout it from the rooftops.

Consumers will love it.  As Robert said, consumers love sustainability.  And we like to support companies who provide great services or products and do it in a way that is sustainable.  As a socially responsible restauranteur, you’d just be giving socially conscious consumers (a growing chunk) an extra reason to choose your restaurant over your competitor: they can feel good while eating good food.

Patronize restaurants that Participate in Food Rescue

Since I first landed on this issue last year, I’m happy to say I’ve found a few resources. If you live in New York City, check out the City Harvest Guide to New York City’s most generous restaurants.  Can you start patronizing these restaurants? Business lunches, client events, and even romantic dinners for two are even better when you’re tied into feeding hungry people and avoiding waste.  Here’s just one listing from the Guide:

“Always highly rated in Zagat Survey, Le Bernardin is also the only French seafood restaurant awarded ★★★★ by The New York Times. City Harvest $40 prix-fixe lunch menu offered daily.”

In my new hometown of Chicago, I can’t find anyone listing restaurants who participate in food rescue but I did find that the Greater Chicago Food Depository operates Chicago Community Kitchens which trains unemployed and underemployed adults to work in the food industry.  These restaurants and retailers provide two-week internship opportunities to participants: 

5 Loaves Eatery
A Piece of Cake Inc.
Bittersweet Pastryshop
BJ’s Market & Bakery
Breakthrough Urban Ministries
Centered Chef Food Studios
Centers for New Horizons
Chicago Christian Industrial League
CJ’s Eatery
Finesse Cuisine
Fox & Obel Market
Gary Comer Youth Center
Greg Christian Catering and Events
Heaven on Seven
Holy Trinity High School
J&L Catering
Jackson Park Supportive Living Facility
Limelight Catering
Little Black Pearl Art & Design Center
Lucky Strike Lanes
MK Restaurant
Museum of Science and Industry
Open Arms Ministries
Perfect Peace Café and Bakery
Perspectives Charter School-Calumet
Salvation Army
South Shore Hospital
Sushi X
Swedish Covenant Hospital
Terry’s Grand Café
The Children’s House I & II
Va Pensiero
Westin Chicago River North

image from the Greater Chicago Food Depository

In San Francisco check out “Food Runners” food donors for a few participating organizations. Everywhere else in California, I’m sad to say I can’t find a thing!  And that goes for the rest of the country, too.  It’s such a shame.

Help Us Help You: Suggestions for those in Food Rescue

Two ideas for those who feed the hungry and want to encourage vendor participation.  Both use the power of consumers to drive the desired behavior.

1. Get a window decal or sticker or marketing logo going for the restaurants to display, announcing their participation and rejection of waste.  Come up with a catchy tagline about “this restaurant doesn’t waste food” and help them use it to market their restaurant. 
2. Create a national database of restaurants and retailers who participate in food rescue and food donation. Make it searchable by type of vendor (restaurant, caterer, retail store, manufacturer, etc.) and location (New York, Chicago, etc.) and have a national hunger organization (Feeding America, anyone?) host and publicize it. Again, consumers like me would love to start there when making plans for special events, business lunches, etc.  

Hell, let the restaurants pay for the database construction and marketing campaign, why not?  Let’s get creative about feeding America, people! (Until we can figure out how to eliminate the causes of poverty, which I’m sure will happen any decade now).

Tags: charity, City Harvest, Feeding America, food rescue, hunger, Le Bernedin, Valentine's Day

This entry was posted on February 6, 2009 at 4:29 pm and is filed under Lifestyle. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.