A major non-profit started in Victoria is launching a national partnership with a Canadian fast-food giant.
Mealshare is teaming up with A&W Canada to tackle youth hunger.
“Today 1,000 new locations start Mealshare,” says Mealshare vice-president Derek Juno.
Founded by two University of Victoria grads, Mealshare has been providing meals to children in need since 2013 through its menu program.
“We put our little Mealshare logo beside a few menu items on a restaurant’s menu and if a customer came in and ordered one of these Mealshare branded menu items they’d be getting their meal just like normal but they’re also providing another meal to a youth in need,” explains Juno.
They’ve worked with hundreds of restaurants across Canada and will now have a larger reach than ever before.
“Now with A&W coming in anyone anywhere in Canada can basically participate in Mealshare,” says Juno.
“Ending youth hunger is a fantastic opportunity and being able to do it right here in Canada is great and we have the means,” says A&W regional operations manager Peter Vik.
“We’ve got 1,000 branches across Canada so I think it’s a great way to make it easy for the community to help us and support that need,” Vik adds.
The A&W partnership also means that Mealshare has dramatically increased the amount of charities that receive funding from the program.
“We’ve worked so hard, our Mealshare team, these last nine months signing on about 350 new charity partners across Canada,’ says Juno.
“That means that in every community across Canada we’ve got a partnership, we’ve got a charity that we’re supporting,” adds Juno.
As for how you can donate, every A&W store will have two methods.
“One is our Mealshare Mondays, so we’ll choose one item from our menu every Monday and if you order that item we will donate a meal to a child in need and then the other way is any day of the week you can add a dollar to your order and we will donate that towards a meal as well,” says Vik.
It’s a small way to help millions of kids in need.
“You can turn your dining out into helping out just by making it a Mealshare,” says Juno.
For more information on Mealshare, visit their website.
Cole Sorenson
