Help end childhood hunger in America by participating in Share Our Strength’s Dine Out For No Kid Hungry™, September 16 – 22, 2012. “In the restaurant business, food is our passion and we’re surrounded by it. We feed people every day, so it’s very difficult to imagine that one in five children in this country doesn’t get the food he or she needs,” says Marc Murphy, Dine Out For No Kid Hungry spokesperson and chef/owner, Landmarc and Ditch Plains, New York, NY. Last year Marc’s restaurants donated $2 for each cotton candy and s’more ordered. “Our employees got very involved sharing information about the cause with customers and we started planning for this year as soon as last year’s Dine Out ended.” Ted’s Montana Grill saw sales increases during its 2011 Dine Out For No Kid Hungry promotion and will run its 2012 promotion for the full month of September. George McKerrow, ceo/co-founder, says, “The program can be a traffic generator, but it’s also just the right thing to do. It’s the right cause for restaurants.”

In 2011, 5,560 participating restaurants across the U.S. raised nearly $2.4 million dollars, an increase of 60% over 2010. These funds were invested in 18 No Kid Hungry state and city partnerships and community organizations in all 50 states. Debbie Shore, Share Our Strength’s co-founder, credits customers’ enthusiastic support of the cause as well as restaurants’ smart fundraising techniques for the program’s success. For example, a number of multi-unit restaurants offered bounce-back coupons good on future purchases to customers who made a specified donation in their stores; one such restaurant even reported a 40% redemption rate.

To learn more, sign up, and take advantage of specially created marketing tools, visit DineOutForNoKidHungry.org.