My Kids Plate and Lake Family Magazine are looking for Lake County’s NUMBER ONE Kid Friendly restaurant!
Read all about how you can nominate your favorite Kid-Friendly place to “chow down”. The restaurant most voted for will win a year’s free advertising on MyKidsPlate.Com and in Lake Family Magazine and YOU could win a $100.00 gift card to the restaurant of your choice!
With all the errands and scurrying around with kids, there’s one activity that is a consistent must—eating! Most parents’ errands include a combination of eating at home, in the car or at one of many different restaurants. The challenge becomes a choice of: What restaurant? Sit-down or drive thru? What restaurant will get my kids and I out the fastest? Which one has food that my kids and I both like? Which one offers the best value?
Regardless of a restaurant’s location or menu, today restaurants must be kid-friendly. What does kid-friendly mean? According to research conducted by MyKidsPlate.com, kid-friendly means a combination of 30 different characteristics including clean, quick and helpful. Here are some of the characteristics that currently rank at the top:
Number one on the list is always a clean restaurant. Clean tables, chairs, plates, silverware and of course, restrooms. Not only do parents not want their tables and chairs freshly waiting, they also do not want to change their child or manage a potty run in a dirty restroom. It is a reflection of the restaurant and often the food and the staff.
Activities for kids are important too. Why are McDonald’s and Chick-fil-A capturing the family diner? It’s because of the playground for younger kids. But the category “Activities for my Kids” applies to older kids too. This category means more than a black-and-white menu with games. When parents take kids out to eat, they want at least 10 minutes to relax and take a couple of hot bites. “Activities for my Kids” helps achieve this seemingly easy task.
Rounding out the top ten most important features of kid-friendly restaurants are “hot buttons” such as servers who don’t put hot plates and full glasses in front of young diners, healthy menu selections, a “my kid can blend in” noise level, short or no wait times, reasonable menu prices, kids drinks with lids and friendly staff.
So, what’s important to you when you take kids out to eat? What’s the “make it” or “break it” that makes you a loyal diner or turns you away for good?
MyKidsPlate.com wants to know. A local company created for parents, by parents, the goal of MKP is to identify what’s important to you when you take your kids out to eat and use that feedback to help restaurants improve their service to families. MyKidsPlate.com is the only online resource that lists restaurants that have been nominated and certified kid-friendly based directly on feedback from consumers. You can indicate what’s important to you when taking kids out to eat by rating restaurants on a “five-spoon” scale, taking the survey, and submitting comments about dining experiences at particular restaurants listed on the site. It’s easy and fun!
So the next question is: Are there any kid-friendly restaurants in Lake County? Only one has been nominated so far…but there has to be more. Where do you take your kids out to eat in Lake County? Why do you choose this restaurant? Are there any “Kids Eat Free” nights in
Lake County? MyKidsPlate.com wants to know!
From January through March 2009, MyKidsPlate.com will be looking for the most kid-friendly restaurant in Lake County exclusively through Lake Family Magazine and it’s up to you to help find it. Visit MyKidsPlate.com, select “Nominate a Restaurant,” and vote for the restaurant that you think is the most kid-friendly restaurant in Lake County. Or, you can email lake@mykidsplate.com with the restaurant’s name, location and why you think it’s kid-friendly. By submitting a nomination, you will be entered into a contest for a $100 gift card to the restaurant of your choice. Plus, the winner of the most kid-friendly restaurant in Lake County will win a free listing as a Certified Kid-Friendly restaurant on MyKidsPlate.com for one year and a year of free advertising in Lake Family Magazine. The search is on!
Some criteria for great family-friendly restaraunts…
Staff/Servers are nice to my kids
Servers use common sense (hot plates, full glasses)
Healthy Kids Menu selections
Kids drinks with lids/no spill cups
Short/No Wait Times
Reasonable Prices for Kids Menu Items
Clean Restaurant
Clean Restroom
Good noise level for my kids
Activities for my kids
Contest disclaimers: If more than one person nominates the winning restaurant, a drawing will be held to reward the prize. Contest begins January 1st, 2009 and closes March 5, 2009. Some nominated restaurants will be printed in the February and March issues of Lake Family Magazine. Winner of the $100 gift card and restaurant winner for most kid-friendly restaurant will be notified by March 10, 2009 and will be published in the April issue of Lake Family Magazine. All information submitted to MyKidsPlate.com becomes the property of Kid-Friendly Restaurants, L.L.C. and MyKidsPlate.com and can be reprinted and duplicated without compensation or additional permission from the person who submitted the information. Free ad placement in LFM for winning nominee is a 3.8 X2 ad. One time design fee is included. All ads must be approved by LFM. Changes to ad may be made with approval of LFM. Nominal fees may apply.
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{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
Stephanie,
We like Oakwood Smokehouse Grille. The place is noisy enough that the kids can be themselves without us worry-ing too much about disturbing other diners. It’s clean. The menu is reasonable, and flexible. One of our kids is a vegetarian, so that’s way important to us. We can get a grilled cheese sandwich eventhough it’s not on the menu. The servers have always been nice to the kids, and make sure that all of our needs are taken care of. Food comes quickly, more ofthen than not. Prices are reasonable. Generally, no matter where we go, we end up paying around $30 for the 4 of us, and Oakwood is right around that price point. Also, the TV’s have never had anything other than sports or news on them, which is better than a couple of the other similar places. We were in one “family ” bbq place that had some half naked women pole dancing on the TV’s! Overall, I would say Oakwood is one of our favorite places to go. Everyone of us walks out of there happy.