Restaurant Partnerships
Partnering with local restaurants can enhance your meal program by providing participants with more choice and flexibility, appealing to a new generation of seniors with diverse tastes and backgrounds. Review guidance examples and considerations for working with restaurants and examples of successful partnerships.
Quick Guides
- 20 Years and Counting: Connecticut Senior Dine Program’s Flexibility and Choice — Restaurant
partnership uses technology for easy check-ins (Nutrition and Aging Resource Center) - Go and Dine — New York café helps older adults by offering takeout meals with nutrition
program vouchers (ACL) - The Diner: Promising Practices From the Network — Resource with examples on pivoting to social distancing (Nutrition and Aging Resource Center, 2020)
Guides
- Iowa Cafe Guides
- Iowa Cafe Guide for AAAs — Guide to restaurant partnership to help Area Agencies on Aging partner with food service establishments (Iowa Department on Aging, 2023)
- Iowa Cafe Guide for Partners — Guide to restaurant partnerships designed to help food service establishments partner with Area Agencies on Aging (Iowa Department on Aging, 2023)
- Senior Nutrition Programs Seeking to Work with Food Retailers — Guide for partnering with restaurants and grocery stores (Nutrition and Aging Resource Center)
Fact Sheets
- Quick Guide to Working with Restaurants and Grocery Stores — Step-by-step infographic to develop and implement partnerships with local restaurants and grocery stores (Nutrition and Aging Resource Center)
Tools & Toolkits
- Senior Nutrition Programs: Restaurant Program Toolkit — Key features of restaurant programs, how to create them, and promising practices for implementation and sustainability (Nutrition and Aging Resource Center, 2023)
Presentations
- Mapping Your Partnership Assets: Meals of Love partnership — Presentation slides featuring an overview of restaurant partnerships in Florida (Nutrition and Aging Resource Center, 2020)
- Senior Dine: Meeting the Meal Needs of Seniors (YouTube)— Restaurant partnership that provides older adults with nutritious meals using swipe card technology (CatMatt, 2021)
- Senior Lunch Bunch: A New Model for Group Dining — Presentation slides on restaurant partnerships offering community-centered dining programs in South Carolina (Senior Resources)
In the News
- More than a Meal: Restaurant-based Programs Feed Seniors' Social Lives— Video on restaurant‑based dining programs for aging Americans (AP News, 2023)
- More than a Meal— Article on how restaurant‑based dining programs are helping to address social isolation and nutritional needs (AP News, 2023)