Out-Of-Work Bartenders, Servers Pick Up Meal Kits

With several bars and restaurants closed due to coronavirus (COVID-19), a program has been put in place to make sure bartenders and servers have enough to eat.

Mickey Mantle’s server and bartender Jaden Disheroon said she has enough to worry about besides food.

“I have never missed my job so much. Not only on the front of bringing in money, but on the front of being able to talk to people every day,” Disheroon said.

Thanks to the new meal kit program, Disheroon has easy dinners for herself and her husband.

“This is enough food to feed us for the next four or five days. Just from the generosity of RNDC in this nation that’s actually helping us,” Disheroon said.

Republic National Distributing Company created the meal kit program in the past month.

Five days per week, Fatiya Laymoun and other local RNDC employees bring dozens of meal kits to the Tower Theatre, where Oklahoma City servers and bartenders can come in five minute increments for pickup.

“It’s front of house and back of house too. So, there’s a lot of kitchen staff, kind of the heartbeat of these restaurants,” Laymoun said.

Local restaurants supply the food within the kits, enough for about four to six meals per kit.

Essentials are included like pasta, rice, eggs, milk, meat and produce.

Republic and their suppliers pay for the kits and the US Bartender’s Guild helps facilitate pickup for hospitality employees currently out of work.

“The length of this service will depend on budgets from our supplier partners and from our communities,” Laymoun said.

Anyone wishing to contribute to the meal kit program or any other efforts to protect hospitality staff can visit the USBG website.