The aftermath of Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma left many communities, and the surrounding roads and infrastructure devastated, so Denny’s knew that in order to be able to provide meals to those in need, it couldn’t simply direct people to their closest Denny’s location; Denny’s needed to be able to go into the communities and prepare a hot, freshly cooked meal. Thus, the Denny’s “Mobile Relief Diner” was born. Within a span of just about a week, the Mobile Relief Diner would go from a concept, to a fully-functional, mobile kitchen serving the residents of Houston, and eventually the Florida Keys and South Florida.

Over the course of nearly two weeks, Denny’s would send the Mobile Relief Diner to locations in Houston and South Florida, where teams would cook and serve as many hot meals as possible.

To determine what specific communities could benefit most from the Mobile Relief Diner, Denny’s worked closely with local franchisees, government officials and first responders, along with prominent community leaders, who helped to connect Denny’s to residents throughout Houston and South Florida.

The Mobile Relief Diner was incredibly effective in helping Denny’s accomplish what it set out to do, which was to find a way to deliver on its brand purpose and help the communities it serves in a time they needed it the most. Over the course of about two weeks, the Denny’s Mobile Relief Diner traveled to Houston, the Florida Keys and South Florida, serving over 14,000 meals, including over 56,000 strips of bacon, 28,000 pancakes, 9,000 bottles of water and 5,000 cups of coffee.

While media outreach was intentionally limited to local media in Houston and South Florida for the purposes of providing logistics to those communities, and not to promote Denny’s, news about the Mobile Relief Diner did spread, ultimately generating nearly 50 different placements and over 5.9 million earned media impressions.