The barbeque franchise will offer customers compostable straws for a more environmentally-friendly dining experience.
Mighty Quinn’s is about to provide customers with a more eco-friendly barbeque experience. The barbeque franchise has partnered with SeaStraws, a New York City-based company that creates eco-friendly products for the restaurant industry to incorporate their products across all locations. The U.S.-made straws are made from white compostable paper and vegan wax and are tested to last over two hours. The straws are certified by the Sustainable Forestry Initiative and will be used in all Mighty Quinn’s restaurants.
The partnership grew out of an opportune meeting this past October, when SeaStraws founder Antonio DiMeglio spoke on an entrepreneurship panel for NYU’s Stern School of Business. Also at the event was Mighty Quinn’s co-founder Micha Magid, who approached DiMeglio after the panel and began a conversation that would lead to this new partnership.
“Mighty Quinn’s is thrilled to partner with SeaStraws and incorporate more sustainable products into our restaurants,” Magid said. “Not only will these eco-friendly straws help us expand our sustainability efforts, but this roll-out follows our recent switch to new disposable trays that are on pace to reduce our waste by 7,000 pounds annually.”
This collaboration marks SeaStraws’ first time working with a barbeque brand.
“This is definitely a unique partnership,” DiMeglio said. “We have worked with hundreds of different restaurants and sports venues around the country, but barbeque is not something we’ve gone into before. We couldn’t be happier about partnering with a beloved and innovative brand like Mighty Quinn’s and helping them tell their sustainability story.”
DiMeglio noted that the collaboration between Mighty Quinn’s and SeaStraws marks a significant partnership in the region.
“Working with a New York-based company shows the impact we can have here at the local level,” DiMeglio said. “New York City lags behind other cities in terms of sustainability efforts. By putting our products in all of their restaurants, the Mighty Quinn’s leadership team is showing true conviction and a real commitment to sustainability. Mighty Quinn’s really cares about the brand’s social impact and how customers feel when they eat.”
Mighty Quinn’s is the first authentic barbeque experience in a fast-casual setting and winner of the 2013 Zagat award for best new restaurant in New York. Defining Urban BBQ, its barbeque is the merging of two great barbeque traditions: Texas and the Carolinas. It brings together the best of both and creates something uniquely its own. The process begins with the best, all-natural meats and poultry, seasoned with perfect spice blends and then smoked with wood for many hours until the perfect harmony of smoke, flavor and time emerges. As a brand, Mighty Quinn’s was first introduced in 2011, when co-founder and Pitmaster Hugh Mangum smoked brisket and pulled pork out of a mobile smoker hitched to his pickup truck in Williamsburg (Brooklyn). Deciding to expand beyond the mobile offering, which regularly resulted in a 40-person line that continued to grow until Mangum ran out of product, Mangum joined forces with his step-brother, Micha Magid, and Micha’s brother-in-law, Christos Gourmos, to open the first brick and mortar Mighty Quinn’s restaurant in the East Village. Since the brand’s inception, the three partners have opened 9 corporate-owned locations, a restaurant at Yankee Stadium and five international franchised units. Now, with strong operations and a growing fan base, the brand is excited to push growth forward through franchising.
