A rallying cry for local restaurants
Restaurants are in a dire state right now and have been hit hard by COVID-19. Frontline Foods is on a mission to support them — particularly local restaurants — by providing meals to frontline workers and other communities that have been impacted by this crisis.
It’s been about two months since we first launched this grassroots effort. Since then, we have seen an outpouring of support from people across the United States. The support has come in many forms. We’ve received donations from more than 16,000 people. Hundreds of volunteers have jumped in to help build and scale the program, forming dozens of new chapters and formalizing our national infrastructure.
We’ve partnered with businesses large and small who have committed to sizable donations and helped us fundraise — activities that have been and will continue to be instrumental for local chapters. Actors, directors, musicians, writers and other notable people have stepped up to contribute to and help raise public awareness of the cause. The list goes on.
Thanks to this generosity, Frontline Foods has raised $7.9 million for over 1,000 restaurants.
What has inspired us to continue to build are the incredible stories we hear every day from restaurant owners. Stories that are simultaneously heart-wrenching and uplifting. Stories about how partnering with Frontline Foods allowed them to keep their restaurants open, which in turn helped their employees keep food on their own families’ tables.
We are proud of the progress we’ve made thus far. But we are also aware of how much more work there is left to do.
Restaurants need our support. And there continues to be no shortage of communities who could benefit from a nourishing meal.
We don’t know what the future holds with regard to the COVID-19 pandemic. What we do know is frontline workers have been heroes in helping us flatten the curve and fighting to keep many people safe. We know that case counts are down in many regions, giving our frontline heroes time to prepare for a potential second wave of infections. We know the restaurant industry will be vital in maintaining a sense of community and feeding groups that are on the frontlines or impacted by the crisis in other ways. And we know that the restaurant industry is struggling.
In March, the National Restaurant Association wrote in a letter to the White House:
Economically, we are anticipating sales to decline by $225 billion during the next three months, which will prompt the loss of between five and seven million jobs. The restaurant industry is one of low margins, tight cash flow, and a workforce that depends on us for their livelihood.
The coronavirus will almost surely do what neither a catastrophic storm nor terrorist attacks could, wiping out many of the places New Yorkers have turned to for comfort and company.
And according to Eater:
How many restaurants make it to the other side of the pandemic doesn’t depend on any numbers we can marshal, like how many days worth of a cash buffer a restaurant has (on average, 16), or the number of restaurants that achieve that hallowed 10 percent profit (just 29 percent). Rather, it depends on how and where the virus spreads, when we finally get a vaccine and enough of it to vaccinate everyone.
You get the idea. It’s grim.
Chefs and restaurateurs are often some of the first people to step up to help their communities, during crises and on a daily basis. Now it is our turn to help them and, as you can see, they need our support more than ever. The scale of the problem is too big for existing institutions alone to fund it through traditional means.
Our model is built to sustain restaurants. One hundred percent of your donation goes directly to restaurants, serving the dual purpose of helping them stay open and also showing love to frontline heroes and other impacted communities through food.
We need your help. In these uncertain times, it can be hard to part with cash. If you have the means, please consider donating to Frontline Foods.
And if you’d like to get involved, please email us or check out our volunteer page.
