Raving Brands Announces $2 Million Partnership With the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children To Increase Child Safety

With an average of 2,000 children reported missing each day to law enforcement in the United States , Raving Brands sees an opportunity to communicate the importance of child safety to the millions of families it serves.  By communicating NCMEC’s positive and empowering safety messages and the integration of employee training and enhanced safety protocols, Raving Brands is committed to increasing safety within its locations and effecting change throughout the industry.

“The idea of one of our franchisees having to look a parent or guardian in the eye and tell them we did not take every measure to ensure their child’s safety while in one of our locations is unthinkable to us,” said Brian Curin, vice president of marketing for Raving Brands and an official NCMEC Ambassador.  “This is a major opportunity for the entire country and one where we as an industry can make a meaningful difference by adopting a few simple programs that are freely available.”

This April, Raving Brands will create new industry milestones by becoming the first restaurant system to become a Secondary AMBER Alert distributor, thereby enlisting all of its Moe’s Southwest Grill, Mama Fu’s Asian House, Doc Green’s Gourmet Salads, Shane’s Rib Shack, Boneheads Grilled Fish and Piri Piri Chicken, Planet Smoothie Cafe, PJ’s Coffee, and Monkey Joe’s locations and corporate employees as an extra set of eyes to help extend the reach of law enforcement authorities in the search for the most endangered child abductions. 

Another first will be Raving Brands’ system-wide integration of Code Adam, a 6-point system designed for employees to quickly and effectively respond to a missing or lost child on-premise.  Code Adam is a free, turn-key program available to every restaurant in the country and has proven effective in the more than 55,000 establishments in which it has been adapted and is being instituted throughout all brands.

Additionally, all concepts will incorporate NCMEC’s photo partner program to aid in the recovery of missing children.  The geographically-tailored posters will be sent monthly to each concept and, for maximum effectiveness, will contain photos of children either missing from or believed to be in their area.  With one-in-six children featured in NCMEC’s photo program recovered as a direct result of someone recognizing the child and contacting law enforcement, the additional distribution network and traffic of Raving Brands’ nearly 600 locations in over 30 states will have real impact to the program’s continued success.

“The collaboration is really historic because it marks the first time that a national restaurant group has teamed up financially and programmatically to help NCMEC,” said Ernie Allen, president and CEO of NCMEC.  “Raving Brands should be applauded for mobilizing their management, employees, and customers to fully extend their network of resources to aid in our country’s ongoing efforts to successfully bring more missing children home safely.”

Raving Brands’ flagship brand, Moe’s Southwest Grill, is leading the charge for the dynamic portfolio company as the first to adopt all of the programs and by integrating the NCMEC relationship into its core marketing strategies for the year. 

Last month, Moe’s franchisees were personally introduced to the value of the partnership by NCMEC’s Co-Founder John Walsh who was the keynote speaker at their franchisee convention.  Walsh’s speech, along with stirring addresses from a mother of an abducted child and a current college student who was California ’s first AMBER Alert in 2002, overwhelmingly secured franchisee support, participation and excitement for this effort. 

Further leveraging the powerful relationship with NCMEC, Moe’s Southwest Grill has incorporated child identification events during grand openings where parents and guardians receive a free kit that includes a photo of their child taken that day along with valuable emergency information, and NCMEC’s safety tips. NCMEC is also providing child safety brochures that address key safety issues and offer important lessons for parents, guardians, children, and the community at large.  This tactic is proving to be an effective way for Moe’s Southwest Grills to reach into the local communities to which it serves while also delivering a national grassroots communication platform to NCMEC.

With the internal announcement of the partnership just weeks old, the nimble company has already incorporated the charitable alliance into its upcoming Cinco de Moe’s marketing plan for a month-long celebration and fund-raiser.  With May 25 proclaimed as National Missing Children’s Day, all of the brands will be supporting “NCMEC in May” by donating a percentage of sales from a menu item to further NCMEC’s efforts in increasing awareness and recovering missing children.

With all of Raving Brands committed to these initial programs and actively looking to further their involvement, the next step for the company is to encourage the entire industry to support this worthwhile effort.  Allied companies like ADVO, a longtime supporter of NCMEC, have already joined in the effort by offering special programs to Raving Brands for its services as a show of support and appreciation for the campaign.

“This initiative has enormous potential to make a significant, measurable impact on the future of our children’s safety and should become much larger than Raving Brands,” said Curin.  “We are very proud to be the catalyst in what we envision as an industry-wide movement and hope other companies will join us in making their restaurants safer.”

About Raving Brands
Founded in 2000, Atlanta-based Raving Brands, ranked #1 in Fast Casual magazine’s “2005 Top 100 Movers and Shakers” currently consists of eight concepts:  five fast-casual, two beverage-focused dining establishments and one family entertainment facility.  The company’s fast-casual concepts include Moe's Southwest Grill, a 2005 Inc. magazine Top 25 Company, rated 6th in Fast Casual magazine’s “2005 Top 100 Movers and Shakers” and Nation’s Restaurant News’ 2004 Hot Concepts! award winner and  Mama Fu's Asian House, a 2005 Fast Casual magazine “Top 100 Movers and Shakers” company and a 2004 Nation's Restaurant News “Fast 50” brand.  Other concepts include Doc Green's Gourmet Salads named Best New Restaurant by INSite Atlanta , Boneheads Grilled Fish and Piri Piri Chicken and Shane's Rib Shack.  PJ’s Coffee, PJ’s Coffee and Lounge, Planet Smoothie, Planet Smoothie Café and its first co-branded concept, Planet Smoothie and Nestle Toll House Café represent the portfolio’s beverage concepts.    Monkey Joe’s will be the first family entertainment concept under the company’s portfolio.  Collectively, Raving Brands expects to open more than 1,000 locations nationwide by the end of 2008.