Tuesday, September 3rd, 2024

"The Hundred-Foot Journey" is a heartwarming film about an Indian family who opens a restaurant in a quaint French village, directly across the street from a prestigious French restaurant. At first, a rivalry ensues between the two establishments, but it gradually transforms into mutual respect. The movie explores themes of culture, cuisine, blended traditions, personal growth, and belonging. While it's a beautiful story we can all learn from, specifically for us, it's an important message to help people understand the power of your Center.

In this issue of Fun Facts, we'll explore those themes as they relate to helping people make the (figurative) hundred-foot journey from their own homes to your Center.

Let's have a look.

Enjoy!

500 Miles

To make a Center visit, most people must embark on an actual journey to get there. While there are some Centers in the Network that are connected to apartments or in senior living neighborhoods, the majority do not have participants that are an elevator or sidewalk away. For those that do, you have the distance issue solved. For those that don't, your proximity to potential participants is extremely important.

2/3rds of participants live less than 5 miles from the Center. For Centers in densely-packed urban or suburban areas, that might be everyone you need. For others, it means that in order to help people make the journey, a transportation program is an important part of your offering. Keep an eye out for a future edition of Fun Facts dedicated completely to transportation programs.

Blended Family

While the range of ethnic and racial participants who attend a Center is most influenced by the demographics of a community, there are benefits to exploring different cultures and traditions. The movie does a wonderful job (yes, it's an adult fairytale, but it's lovely) of showing how the initial barriers break down and end up enriching everyone's lives. Centers can play a crucial role in that enrichment when given the opportunity. Although 92% of all participants across the Network speak English as their first language, there is an impressive range of languages within that remaining 8%:

As a result, there has been an increase in the number of cultural-specific events over the past year. Here are a few examples:

Where Everybody Knows Your Name

A Central thead that runs through the movie and through many Centers, is food. Whether it's over an extravagant nine-course meal or a simple stew, sharing a meal cultivates connections with families, friends, and strangers that make us feel good inside. Feeling good is what makes people live more fulfilling lives - the secret sauce of any Center. Not all Centers are able to provide a meal, but across the Network, congregate meals are on a significant rise after leveling off in the late 2010s, and of course, a slow down during COVID.

The Network is on track to serve over 13M million congregate meals this year!

Born to Walk Alone

Not all potential clients are able to get to the Center - and that's where home-delivered meals can be a lifesaver. While the number of meals delivered by Centers across the Network in the last 12 months is not far off from the number of congregate meals served, the number of clients for each is very different.

A typical congregate customer receives 21 meals per year at the Center. The average HDM client gets 120 meals delivered.

Eating alone isn't ideal, but if it's neccesary, HDM is great. Some Centers have continued their virtual programs to provide those at-home clients with opportunties for socialization:

This year, roughly 30% of all virtual participants have also been HDM recipients. Paraphrasing everyone's favorite Christmas elf-turned-dentist: let's be alone together.

Summary

Food is nourishment. Eating a meal can be a cultural tour. Dining with others is a special connection every time. As we head into flannel season, foster those connections as much as possible and watch the results. Approach everything as you always do, with an open and loving heart. If you want to share any stories from your congregate programs about how someone has been positively impacted, bring it on.