In this week’s Working Lunch, Joe Kefauver and Franklin Coley of Align Public Strategies speak with Erika Polmar, co-founder and executive director of the Independent Restaurant Coalition (IRC), and Mississippi multi-concept operator Robert St. John, who was also a co-founder. They share how the IRC was born during the pandemic, as restaurant operators across the country joined forces to fight for the industry through the COVID-19 years.
Since then, the grassroots organization has grown into a voice for independent operators, taking on issues from wages and immigration, to child care. Polmar and St. John dispel misconceptions that the IRC is a group of celebrity chefs. It is an organization that includes independent operators at all levels who are, as St. John put it, “living in the solution.”
And the legislative scorecard looks at wage initiatives in Missouri, paid leave in New Mexico, the new U.S. Secretary of Labor and the return of National Labor Relations Board member Gwen Wilcox.
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