Houston Restaurants Weeks has been extended
Houston Restaurants Weeks has been extended, organizer Cleverley Stone announced on her radio show Saturday morning. Originally slated to end Monday, HRW will now run through September 30.
Stone has always described the event as a “win-win-win” for diners, restaurants, and the Houston Food Bank, which receives a donation of between $3 and $7 for every meal sold. In light of Hurricane Harvey’s closing restaurants for up to a week, keeping HRW going furthers that original mission by bringing in diners who can help restore business at restaurants and contribute critical funds to the Food Bank at a time when the organization ramps up to provide disaster relief.
Food Bank president Brian Greene joined Stone on her show. He explained that after a natural disaster the organization goes into “absolute overdrive.” It will operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week to feed people who have been displaced by Hurricane Harvey’s floodwaters. As the organization is currently receiving up to six trucks of food per hour, it has had to lease additional warehouse space and will incur other costs to keep trucks running to deliver food throughout the Houston area.
“One of the things people don’t realize a lot of times is just because you’ve dried out the homes and people are back in their houses, it could be a year or more before people stabilize their lives,” Greene said.
In conjunction with the extension, HRW will launch a social media campaign that encourages diners to create videos to challenge friends to dine out to support the event.
Stone read a statement on air that included the following:
Because of the devastation of Hurricane Harvey many of the restaurants have been closed and have suffered significant losses. This extends well beyond business owners and to the thousands the industry employs.
As a way to generate business for these wonderful partners, HRW will extend its dates until September 30th. We need you to help us spread the word and encourage Houstonians to DINE OUT AND DO GOOD!
Please join us in showing Harvey what a “Tsunami of Love” can do!
No word yet on how many of the almost 300 HRW restaurants will choose to continue with the event in September or whether the menus will remain the same. CultureMap will update this story as we receive more information.
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