Residents have until the end of business hours Monday to submit charity nominations for this year’s Starkville Restaurant Week.
Nominations can be made online at StarkvilleRestaurantWeek.com/nominate.
This year’s event is scheduled for March 13-22. Greater Starkville Development Partnership organizers expanded its timeframe to 10 days in an attempt to cash in on March’s college baseball series between Mississippi State University and the University of Alabama, a weekend that could draw large crowds to Starkville’s various restaurants.
The Partnership launched SRW in 2013 as a way to bring Mississippi residents who live within a 60-mile radius — about an hour’s drive — to the city in order to promote Starkville’s growing culinary scene the week after MSU’s spring break, a stretch of time that historically produces sluggish dining and retail sales.
A friendly charity competition helps organizers gauge many diners visit participating restaurants: Diners vote for one of three nominated charities to receive a $5,000 cash donation. The second- and third-place charities also receive donations of $1,000 and $500, respectively.
Organizers use the ballots to track how far patrons traveled by asking participants to list their zip codes. Email addresses are also collected, as they are in the nomination process, allowing the Partnership to increase its digital marketing base.
The Oktibbeha County Humane Society won the inaugural competition, while Mississippi State University’s T.K. Martin Center for Technology and Disability collected the grand prize last year.
Trustees of Starkville’s Convention and Visitors Bureau are tasked with picking the three charity finalists and use the number of public nominations as a guidepost. The ability for the organizations to mobilize supporters and their impact on the tri-county area are also taken into consideration, said Partnership CEO Jennifer Gregory.
“We received about 500 nominations last year, and I anticipate we hit near that same mark this year,” she said. “We’re seeing a lot of completely different charities this year than last. Each year, it seems like the wave of nominations are totally different.”
Cadence Bank will again sponsor the $5,000 grand prize, while Scrubville LLC will sponsor the $500 Silver Spoon Award. Jennifer Prather, the Partnership’s special events coordinator, said her organization is still working to secure a sponsor for the $1,000 Golden Plate Award.
If the Partnership is unable to secure sponsors, Gregory said the SCVB will underwrite the award this year.
“We’re committed (to providing prizes as an incentive for charity mobilization efforts),” she said.
Those wishing to nominate charities may do so online if they provide a valid email address. People may nominate more than one charity, Gregory said, but only one nomination for charity is allowed per email address to discourage ballot stuffing.
More than 30 local restaurants participated in last year’s event, which yielded 16,228 certified ballots for the charity aspect.
A similar number of participating restaurants is expected for this year’s SRW.
Starkville reported a then-record $1.64 million from March 2013 2 percent food and beverage tax receipts. Comparatively, the city recorded only $990,618 in receipts a decade prior.
In 2014, Starkville recorded an $8,300 increase in food and beverage taxes, as tourists flocked to town for an important Southeastern Conference baseball series against Vanderbilt University.
University officials announced a combined attendance of 26,500 fans during the three-game series last year, and Partnership organizers attributed SRW’s growth to the influx of sports tourists.
Using the same sports-favorable formula, 2015’s dates will include the three-game Alabama series and a single-game matchup against Eastern Illinois.
Carl Smith covers Starkville and Oktibbeha County for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter @StarkDispatch
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