This idea is infinitely adaptable to different holidays. Japan has a national “Children’s Day” and Sweden a Young Misses Day that I know of. You could raise awareness of other cultures in kids by celebrating some of these with special lunches or teas, and alos highlight the goodness of seasonal produce featured in full meals.

I too like the idea of a percentage of these events being donated to children’s charities. Don’t forget canned goods and/or clothing collection bin for homeless kids. I’d keep a bin constantly on the premises for this purpose – it’s never too early for kids to learn about social responsibility.

Best of luck!

Why not have a “Vegetable Critter Contest? At a salad bar cut vegetables to be used as body parts for a creature of the child’s making. Small cucumbers, or pickles could be used for bodies, cherry tomatoes for heads, carrot and celery sticks and string beans could be used for limbs (or tail). Use toothpicks to hold the critters together and have a choice of dipping sauce — salsa, pesto, melted cheese, or other healthy dips, etc available.

Take a picture of the finished critter, put it on a board and have the children vote for their favorite. You may want to have something like every $5 spent on by a party gets you one vote.

For the prizes you could have a free lunch or dinner, dessert, or another trip to the Critter’s salad bar.

Be sure to have local media be present as the votes are counted and prizes given. And have the picture of the winning entry ready.

A variation on this is to have a “Winning Smile” contest. This would be to use fruit and vegetables to make a smile. The basic one is two slices of a red skinned apple with one side smeared with peanut butter. Then place golden raisins between the peanutbutter sides of the apple slices. Presto a delicious smile.

You can have variations and do the same as the Critter contest above. We’ve used peach slices with halved grapes held together with cream cheese.

Good luck.

And, as our publicity hound has taught us, if we don’t think of ourselves as selling a product/service, but realize that we ARE the experts in many areas – table manners, how to get your kids to eat the stuff they think they hate, easy, affordable meals to replace a trip to the fast food joint, getting a child interested in cooking/baking, and on and on.

Also, every holiday, have a special offer/event that becomes the list to get on. Don’t overlook “be kind to your boss” day – the media would love to film kids making cookies for their mommy’s bosses.

One more thing, your home page needs to SELL. You need to capture their interest, engage them, and get them signed up for a $47 dollar grand opening event that is donated to a childrens’ charity – a prelaunch for your restaurant can be very enticing.

First of all, remember that originality can be the entrepreneur’s worst enemy. Do your R&D – that’s “rip off and duplicate.” If it worked for someone else, odds are good it will work for you.

The primary reason McDonalds introduced happy meals was not only to serve a new market. Their goal was to capture the kids at a young age so that they would become loyal customers for life.

I’ve had dozens of experiences creating special events for children. If you can entice the kids, their folks always come. When you have worked out the kinks, be sure to hand deliver invitations to your major print and broadcast media outlets. Unfortunately, reporters are often overworked and underpaid and see their young ones far too little. If you create one event (Sunday’s are good), where you focus on bringing in the media and their kids, y

The demos will be a visual that TV stations will like. If any of the kids are in the public school system, you can pitch the local public school TV station on a story featuring their kids cooking. I have received a lot of TV coverage through our local public school station.

Finally, consider having students from a local community college production class shoot footage of your opening events as a class project. This is a good way to get free, high quality video produced and broadcast yourself. Even if you don’t get media coverage you have a great marketing tool for the web and other distribution points.

Best,

John

This would be sponsored by Bean Sprouts

Focus all your promotions on the child.

Buy two children’s meals, get an adult meal free.

Buy 1 children’s desert, get a coffee free.

Children’s size portions at slightly less than adult prices.

And make it a great place for adults so that people like us are not tortured while there with their little darlings.

Children love to create recipes and a children’s recipe-contest seems like a natural. Have monthly winners who compete for the year’s finalist, which will be adapted for menu inclusion.

Should draw community interest, press, etc.

Both of these groups would be excellent partners and do a lot of radio interviews etc.

You promote them and ask them to promote you. Offer to add their products & info into your grand opening and as “stock items.” In return, ask them to mention you in their upcoming interviews and/or by connecting you with one or two of their media contacts. (You would also mention them when you are interviewed.)

Susan Smith Jones: Dynamic, down to earth expert on nutrition. She has written two fabulous books for kids called Vegetable Soup The Fruit Bowl.

Offer her books at special pricing (and as a regular stock item) during your grand opening. http://www.SusanSmithJones.com

Two Angry Moms is another excellent fit for you and would follow the same model as above. Help them get their word out and ask them to help you.
http://www.angrymoms.org/inner/media-news.html

Dec. 7, 2006 — “When two mothers found out what their children were being served in the school cafeteria, they did something about it.”

VegiHead PhotoActivity Idea

People love to have their photos taken and to stick their heads into funny costumes and scenes.

Have an artist make up single vegetables – a child could stick their head in the hole and actually be a “carrot head!” You could make up a “Salad Bowl” where the entire family could be in the photo.

Then give them the photos for free (in exchange for their contact info – newsletter datamining.) Finally, at the bottom of each photo have your business name, address and phone number in LARGE easy-to-read type. (10-12 pt min)

This photo will end up on their fridge and be a constant reminder of you!

Good luck,

Viveca Stone-Berry
Author, The Fatigue Be Gone! Guide