The group donated 10 percent of all Wednesday sales for the month

NORTH COUNTY — In August, The North County Restaurant Group (NCRG) and ALF Food Pantry teamed up for a month-long fundraiser that ended up raising $3,500 dollars for the nonprofit and brought in multiple future volunteers for San Luis Obispo County’s largest all-volunteer organization. 

The collaboration started when ALF Food Pantry Board Member Lynne Martin, and the NCRG Controller Tara Tedeschi, randomly met and struck up a conversation, and the rest is history.

“It was actually quite serendipitous. I was at one of our establishments, Colony Sandwich Co., grabbing lunch and sat down next to Lynne and a friend of hers. We got to chatting, and I found out she was involved with ALF, and she had actually been wanting to get in touch with somebody, one of our restaurants, and we got to talking, and we came up with a plan,” said Tedeschi.

“They were fantastic,” said Martin of the NCRG. “Tara is a marvelously organized person, and she worked each week with me and each of them, whatever restaurant was next, and we met with the managers, and they were gracious and lovely and put up our signs and everything for us to alert people about the event.”

Martin added that NCRG also did a ton of social media campaigning and did all they could to promote the fundraiser, which donated 10 percent of each Wednesday’s participating restaurant’s proceeds. The NCRG’s participating dining establishments were Street Side Ale House, Guest House Grill, Jacks Bar and Grill, and Cielo.

“Part of our mission statement, as a whole, with NCRG and the owners Eric Peterson and Trevor LaSalle is to give back to the community in any way we can. Try to be involved in and keep ourselves relevant but also be involved in the community. So it was a great opportunity to meet Lynne,” added Tedeschi. “It was fabulous. They [ALF Food Pantry] were all very kind and respectful of our patrons who were visiting our establishments.”

During the fundraiser, ALF Food Pantry was also on hand, and at each location, they set up a booth with volunteers taking shifts from opening to closing.

“One of the most impactful aspects of this was the opportunity to speak with people as they came into the restaurants. We were able to acquaint people with ALF Food Pantry and the work that we do,” added Martin.

Multiple members of the community expressed interest in volunteering with ALF Food Pantry while meeting their representatives. ALF Food Pantry also received cash donations outside of the funds raised by the NCRG because it was allowed to have presents at the fundraiser locations. Though totals from those additional donations have not beencalculated, Martin estimated that they raised close to an extra $800. This would bring the total raised for ALF in the month of August to over $4,000.

Martin said that the fundraiser was a huge success due to it being a team effort and also wanted to thank the Atascadero News/Paso Robles Press and KSBY for media coverage. She added that due to the coverage, more people showed up for the fundraiser and their website traffic went up expodentially.

ALF Food Pantry has been operating for 40 years, and in 2023, they distributed close to 700,000 pounds of much-needed, nutrition-filled food to community members in need.

For more information, to make a donation, or to volunteer, head to alffoodpantry.com.

Tedeschi also said that NCRG is always on the lookout for community members and organizations to work with on fundraisers and that the group is always open to putting new events on its calendar. To find out more about NCRG or inquire about collaborating, go to northcountyrestaurantgroup.com.

Featured Image: Kathy Bennet of ALF Food Pantry is shown at Street Side Ale House during the nonprofit fundraiser. Contributed Photo.