Meatless Monday Best
Practices
Assessing the Implementation and Maintenance of Meatless
Monday Initiatives in the U.S.

foodsystems.asu.edu

Swette Center for Sustainable Food Systems, Arizona State University
April 2022
IRB STUDY00014132
This publication is a Capstone Report by the Graduate Certificate in Food Policy and Sustainability Leadership
class of 2020-2021 and MS in Sustainable Food Systems class of 2021.
Suggested Citation:
Swette Center for Sustainable Food Systems. Meatless Monday Best Practices: Assessing the Implementation
and Maintenance of Meatless Monday Initiatives in the U.S. April, 2022. (Swette Center, 2022)

Authors

Francisca Alvarado
Sustainability Specialist
NAU Campus Dining
Jane Coghlan
Student Worker
Swette Center for Sustainable Food Systems
Dory Cooper
Public Health Educator
Cam Petersen
Staff Assistant
Office of Congresswoman Sara Jacobs
Swette Center Staff Contributors:
Carly Wyman, Esteve Giraud, Jesse Dart, and Nick Benard

Client Partner

Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future (CLF)
https://clf.jhsph.edu
Meatless Monday
https://www.mondaycampaigns.org

Acknowledgements

Ariel Kagan
Program Manager
Swette Center for Sustainable Food Systems
Arizona State University
Dr. Kathleen A. Merrigan
Executive Director
Swette Center for Sustainable Food Systems
Arizona State University
Becky Ramsing
Senior Program Officer
Food Communities & Public Health
John Hopkins Center for a Livable Future
Alyssa Wooden
Research Assistant
Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future
Thank you to everyone who gave us their time through interviews, shared their
experiences, and contributed resources to this report, including: Humane Action
Pittsburgh, City of Pittsburgh, Good Food Institute, League of Women Voters of
Needham, San Diego Unified School District, Nancy Weiss, City of Berkeley’s Division
of Aging Service, and Berkeley City Council.

Table of Contents
Introduction ..................................................................................................................... 1
Literature Review ............................................................................................................ 2
Importance of Reducing Meat Consumption for Human & Environmental Health ....... 2
Public Attitudes Towards Meat Consumption .............................................................. 3
Meat Reduction Initiatives............................................................................................ 6
Components of Successful Meatless Monday Implementation.................................. 10
Methodology.................................................................................................................. 14
Analysis of Meatless Monday Initiatives in Six Mid-sized U.S. Cities ............................ 16
Non-Profit & Volunteer-Led Initiatives ........................................................................ 16
Local Governments.................................................................................................... 24
School Systems ......................................................................................................... 28
Recommendations and Best Practices.......................................................................... 34
Overall ....................................................................................................................... 37
Stakeholder Engagement .......................................................................................... 38
Education and Information Sharing............................................................................ 39
Conclusion .................................................................................................................... 41
References .................................................................................................................... 44
Appendix ....................................................................................................................... 55
Interview Guide .......................................................................................................... 55
About the Authors ......................................................................................................... 57

Executive Summary
Meatless Monday is an initiative that encourages actionable steps toward the reduction
of meat consumption by asking participants to eat meat-free on Mondays. Many
organizations, cities, schools, and correctional facilities have implemented Meatless
Monday initiatives as a push to improve environmental sustainability, human health, and
the welfare of animals. Such initiatives provide an opportunity to educate consumers on
the health benefits of a plant-forward diet, the environmental impact of meat production,
animal welfare issues, the innovation of non-meat proteins, and to engage stakeholders
in gaining more control over their food choices.
This report offers a summary of seven Meatless Monday initiatives throughout the U.S.,
highlighting best practices and notable challenges of implementing and maintaining
such an initiative in three different contexts: local government, school systems, and nonprofit or volunteer-led organizations. This report was conducted through an extensive
look at previous research, news articles, and marketing materials, as well as interviews
with stakeholders in six mid-sized U.S. cities.

Page | 1

Introduction
Meatless Monday is a global movement that encourages people to reduce meat in their
diet for their health and the health of the planet. The campaign was started in 2003 by
Sid Lerner, the Founder of The Monday Campaigns, in association with the Johns
Hopkins Center for a Livable Future.
Meatless Monday’s simple message to “skip meat once a week” works because it
provides a regular cue to take action on Monday, which research shows is the day
people are most open to making positive changes. Starting each week practicing
Meatless Monday can lead people to eat more fruits, vegetables, and plant-based
meals throughout the rest of the week.
U.S. meat reduction campaigns can be traced back to World War I, when Herbert
Hoover - then head of the new Food Administration created to control production and
distribution of food - initiated the “Food Will Win the War” campaign, asking the
American people to forego meat consumption on Tuesdays (Avey, 2013). It was a
success at the time and the campaign was even re-invigorated during World War II.
Fast forward to 2022, the Meatless Monday Campaign has been adopted in over 40
countries, some with more success than others (Meatless Monday, 2021). Institutional
settings like schools and universities indicated the most success in sustained behavioral
change in the adoption of meatless or reduced-meat diets. It has become increasingly
apparent, however, that social and cultural attitudes (and players who influence those
attitudes, like the media) have a large role to play among different populations,
especially as vegetarian or reduced-meat diets become more popular in the West. More
importantly, engaging the targeted population in the decision-making process has
proven to be a critical element of successful initiatives.
This study identifies best practices in the implementation and maintenance of Meatless
Monday initiatives in mid-sized cities across the U.S. to understand the common
conditions and drivers behind food systems change. We first review the literature on
meat reduction initiatives, focusing on the motivations and public attitudes behind
reduction of meat consumption, and detailing examples of such initiatives and
components of successful Meatless Monday implementation. Second, we identify
barriers and best practices associated with successful Meatless Monday initiatives by
analyzing seven semi-structured interviews with community members, non-profit
leaders, and school nutrition professionals across six U.S. cities in Colorado, California,
Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts. Finally, our research summarizes best practices and
provides recommendations for the implementation and maintenance of Meatless
Monday initiatives.

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Literature Review
To better understand the context of Meatless Monday initiatives, we reviewed the
academic literature around four central themes: 1) the importance of reducing meat
consumption for human and environmental health, 2) public attitudes towards meat
consumption and reduction, 3) the landscape of meat reduction initiatives more
generally, and 4) components of successful Meatless Monday implementation.

Importance of Reducing Meat Consumption for
Human & Environmental Health
Reducing meat production and consumption is a worthy investment into human and
planetary health. There is overwhelming scientific evidence that overconsumption of
meat - that is consumption exceeding the daily recommended intake (3.3 oz. of red
meat, 7.2 oz. of poultry and 6.9 oz. of fish per week (Willett et al., 2019)) - is
detrimental for human and environmental health (Rust et al., 2020).

Consequences for Human Health
Red meat intake in the U.S. is 300-600% higher than the daily recommended levels,
while the intake of fruits and vegetables is approximately half of the recommended level
(Willett et al., 2019). Overconsumption of meat and especially processed meat has
been linked with cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, cancers and diabetes
(Bouvard et al., 2015; Bradbury et al., 2020; Delimaris, 2013). The industrial production
of meat also affects human health. For example, the heavy use of antibiotics in nonorganic industrial meat production contributes to antibiotic resistance in humans
(Spellberg et al., 2016). Additionally, concentrated livestock operations produce
pathogens that can be dangerous to humans (Jones et al., 2013), and create air
pollution due to nitrogen and fine particulate matter emissions (Tschofen et al., 2019;
Williams & Brent, 2017).

Consequences for Environmental Health
The production of meat also has negative impacts on planetary health. For one,
producing animal feed is resource intensive. Currently, 22% of the global freshwater
supply is used for feed crop irrigation and meat production (Hoekstra & Chapagain,
2006) and 83% of the world’s farmland is used for animal agriculture, including meat,
aquaculture, eggs, and dairy (Poore & Nemecek, 2018). Considering that some animal
feeds are edible for humans, studies estimate that 70% more calories would be created

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and could feed up to four billion people if such calories were allocated directly to human
consumption (West et al., 2014).
Furthermore, raising animals, especially in concentrated animal feeding operations
(CAFOs), is a leading source of freshwater pollution (FoodPrint, 2019; U.S. EPA, 2017).
CAFOs often house thousands of animals and generate millions of gallons of animal
waste every year, which is stored in pits or open ponds (Formuzis, 2016). These sites
not only affect the health of the communities who live nearby - overwhelmingly low
income and black, indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) communities – but they also
regularly leak into the environment. This situation creates devastating impacts, such as
groundwater contamination and run-off into streams, leading to fish toxification and
eutrophication of rivers (NOAA, 2016; 2021). Because land is cleared for feed and meat
production, animal agriculture is also the leading cause of global deforestation (Steinfeld
et al., 2006), a key driver of biodiversity loss (Machovina et al., 2015), and a major
contributor to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions (Poore & Nemecek, 2018) and climate
change. Scientists estimate that 70-80% of Amazon rainforest deforestation is caused
by cattle ranching (Nepstad et al., 2008). Notably, if we globally adopted the national
recommended guidelines on weekly meat consumption, researchers estimate that
global GHG emissions could be reduced by 30% (Chaudhary & Krishna, 2019;
Springmann, Clark, et al., 2018; Springmann, Mason-D’Croz, et al., 2018).

Public Attitudes Towards Meat Consumption
Recognizing the need for reduced meat production and consumption, it is important to
consider the cultural context of meat in the western world and how this may impact
compliance with meat reduction initiatives such as Meatless Monday.

Meat and the Environment
Despite the well-established link between industrial meat production and climate
change, studies continue to find a lack of understanding and awareness of this link in
the general public (Macdiarmid et al., 2016; Mattson, 2020; Rust et al., 2020; Stubbs et
al., 2018). Additionally, among the small minority of the population that are aware of
meat production’s impact on planetary health, an even smaller minority are willing to
stop or reduce meat consumption based on that understanding (Sanchez-Sabate &
Sabate, 2019). Those who have implemented such a change based on ecological
reasons tend to be young females who eat a reduced meat diet rather than fully
vegetarian or vegan, are ecology-oriented, and are more likely to live in Europe and
Asia than in the U.S. (Sanchez-Sabate & Sabate, 2019).

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Meat and Masculinity
In studies on perceptions of meat consumption, one of the strongest associations that
has been found is between meat consumption and masculinity (Fiddes, 1991; Milford et
al., 2019; Sanchez-Sabate & Sabaté, 2019; Stubbs et. al. 2018). Ruby & Heinem (2011)
found that vegetarian men were perceived as less masculine than omnivorous men
(Sanchez-Sabate & Sabaté, 2019). Aligned with this perception, positive attitudes
towards the consumption of meat have been found to be higher among men
(Rothgerber, 2013), whereas women tend to be more open to reducing their levels of
meat consumption and are more likely to be vegetarian than men (Dibb and Fitzpatrrick,
2014; Kwasney et al., 2022; Rosenfeld, 2020). In a 2016 scoping review of public
attitudes toward vegetarian diets, Corrin and Papadopoulos (2017) found that being
male has the strongest connection of any variable to the perception that the barriers to
vegetarianism are too high to actually adopt such a diet.

Perceptions of Vegetarianism
Despite such perceptions towards meat consumption, rates of vegetarianism and
reduced meat consumption have been growing over time in the West, (Pribis et al.,
2010; Neff et al., 2018), with around 2-10% of the populations of western societies
identifying as vegetarian (Corrin & Papadopoulos, 2017). A 2018 Gallup poll found that
about 5% of American adults identify as vegetarian (Hrynowski, n.d.). Vegetarian diets
are “generally perceived in a positive light” (Corrin & Papadopoulos, 2017, p. 40),
viewed as healthy or “admirable” (Corrin & Papadopoulos, 2017; Piazza et al. 2015) and
the majority of people are “interested in learning more about plant-based and vegetarian
diets” (Corrin & Papadopoulos, 2017, p.46). Vegan diets, on the other hand, tend to be
perceived more negatively than vegetarian ones, with some perceiving vegans as
“unhealthy”, “weak”, “fundamentalist”, and “hostile or confrontational” (Corrin &
Papadopoulos, 2017, p.42). However, people tend to be more open to reducing meat
consumption rather than eliminating it completely from their diets (Corrin &
Papadopoulos, 2017). This increased interest in ‘plant-forward’ diets and public
willingness to reduce overall meat consumption shows that there are existing public
attitudes that an initiative such as Meatless Monday can capitalize on to further reduce
meat consumption.

Why People Eat Meat
The primary reasons given for eating meat tend to fall into four categories as
summarized by Piazza et al. (2016), which are known as the “4 Ns”: Natural, Normal,
Necessary and Nice. In one study, 83-91% of the reasons given by meat-eaters fell into
these “4 Ns”:

Page | 5

1. Natural: “eating meat is written into our biology, and that it is what our species
evolved to eat” (Piazza et al., 2016, p. 115).
For example, Corrin and Papadopoulos found that a common reason stated by men for
continuing to eat meat was that humans are “meant to eat meat” (2017).
2. Normal: eating meat “is what most people in civilized society do and what most
people expect from us” (Piazza et al., 2016, p.115).
For example, when asked about barriers to adopting a vegetarian diet, the fact that
research participants had a spouse or other family members unwilling to also consume
a vegetarian diet was a common reason stated for not being vegetarian (Corrin &
Papadopoulos, 2017). This is indicative of the belief that stepping out of such a “norm”
of meat eating would be met with resistance from people’s closest social circles.
3. Necessary: “that we need meat for survival or that we need to consume at least
some meat to be strong, fully healthy individuals” (Piazza et al., 2016, p.115).
The idea that meat is a necessary part of a healthy diet is associated with the common
perception that a meat-free diet might result in a lack of sufficient protein and iron
(Piazza et al., 2016; Corrin & Papadopoulos, 2017).
4. Nice: eating meat is tasty and enjoyable.
Many studies have found that meat eaters identify eating meat as pleasurable, and is
therefore a commonly cited reason why people don’t give it up (Lea & Worsley, 2003;
Sanchez-Sabate & Sabaté, 2019).
Understanding these perceptions toward meat are important when designing and
implementing any meat-reduction incentive program.

Why People Reduce Meat Consumption
It is also important to understand attitudes and perceptions as to why people decide to
reduce or eliminate meat from their diets. Several major categories of motivators for
reduced meat consumption can be found in the literature and are associated with
different social groups (Neff et al., 2018; Sanchez-Sabate & Sabaté, 2019). The primary
motivators are:
1. Health
In the West, health concerns are one of the main motivators for reduced meat
consumption (Hopwood et al., 2021; Sanchez-Sabate & Sabaté, 2019). This has been
found to be particularly true among older populations who reduce their meat intake
(Pribis et al. 2010), as well as among higher-income groups (Neff et al. 2018).

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2. Animal welfare issues
Animal welfare concerns are another primary motivator for reduced meat consumption
in the West (Hopwood et al., 2021; Sanchez-Sabate & Sabaté, 2019).
3. Environmental impact
Along with animal welfare and health, Hopwood et al. (2021) found that environmental
concerns were one of the top three motivators for reduced meat intake in the West. In
the Netherlands, it was found that ecology and environmental health might influence
younger people more so than older people in their decision to choose a reduced meat
diet (Pribis et al., 2010). Of those who do choose to reduce their meat intake, women
appear to be more likely to do so out of concerns for the environment than men
(Sanchez-Sabate & Sabaté, 2019). Additionally, vegetarians with higher incomes are
more likely to do so out of environmental concerns than those with lower incomes (Neff
et al., 2018).
4. Cost
Lastly, cost often plays a role in the reasons people choose to eat less meat. It has
been found that women are more likely to reduce their meat intake because of the cost
of meat than are men (Neff et al. 2018).

Meat Reduction Initiatives
Effectiveness
Taking these public perceptions of meat in mind, many strategies have been
implemented to encourage consumers to reduce their personal meat consumption.
While there is substantial scholarly work on barriers to reducing meat consumption,
effectiveness of consumption reduction interventions represent a relatively novel area of
research. However, several different approaches have been tested with mixed results.
Many interventions have focused on restructuring the “physical micro-environments”
that individuals encounter when making decisions regarding meat consumption,
referring to making small changes to the “settings in which people may gather for
specific purposes and in which they may acquire or consume food” (Bianchi et al., 2018,
p.385). This includes strategies such as reducing meat serving portion sizes at
restaurants, providing appealing meat alternatives, or changing the sensory properties
of meat (Bianchi et al., 2018). For example, one study altered an image of a pork roast
on a menu to also include the animal’s head (Bianchi et al., 2018). This simple nudge,
perhaps leading consumers to consider the welfare of the animal, increased demand for

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plant-based alternatives in two of three randomized control trials (Bianchi et al., 2018).
Such strategies are based on findings that simply educating consumers on the negative
effects of meat production and consumption is not enough to change consumer
purchasing habits when the environments in which consumers operate “exert a powerful
influence on behavior” to continue consuming meat (Bianchi et al., 2018, p.385).
Despite the paucity of work done on the effectiveness of such measures, some themes
have emerged from the literature. One study examined the effects of a multicomponent
intervention to reduce meat consumption in a group of college-aged men in Canada
(Amiot et al., 2018). The four interventions utilized were: social norm (sharing
information with participants on the fact that an increasing number of people are
considering reducing meat intake), appealing to fear (showing videos on the negative
treatment of meat-animals), goal-setting (asking participants to set a goal for reduced
meat intake) and information (providing education such as the health benefits of
reducing meat). Participants meticulously tracked their food intake, including portion
sizes of meat. The informational component (e.g., increasing awareness of the negative
impacts of meat consumption) was identified as the most effective in leading to
reductions in meat consumption, when compared to the other three components (Amiot
et al., 2018). Another study has examined motivation for purchasing sustainable food
products in Italy. It was found that past purchasing experiences that were rewarding to
consumers predicted future purchasing and consumption of sustainable foods, including
those without meat (Vassallo et al., 2015).
The effectiveness of informational and emotional messaging has been evaluated in
experimental settings, with the latter in particular associated with reduced meat
consumption in certain contexts (Carfona et al., 2019). In a review study conducted by
Kwasny et al. of published literature from 2001-2019 addressing meat reduction, the
authors found that meat reduction interventions are most effective if information:
1. Is provided on health, animal welfare or environmental effects
2. Is emotionally or cognitively framed, and
3. Is aligned with consumers' information needs (Kwasny et al., 2022).
Recognizing the emotional intelligence of animals and acknowledging the connection
between meat and animals triggers negative responses and, as a result, reduces meat
consumption. This aligns with insights on why people choose to reduce meat
consumption as outlined above. “Further, increasing the visibility and variety of
vegetarian dishes in food environments decreases meat-eating” (Kwasny et al., 2022,
p.1). Educating people on how to shop and cook vegetarian food can also reduce meat

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consumption (Kwasny et al. 2022). Less evidence exists on the effectiveness of
interventions addressing socio-cultural factors, such as social norms.
Even when meat reduction interventions are effective, they are not without their flaws,
as participants may replace meat with increased consumption of products that still have
significant negative environmental impacts (de Boer et al., 2014). Additionally, though
existing research has investigated the influence of interventions on attitudes and
behavioral intentions, it’s also true that more research is needed to judge the long-term
effects of interventions on meat consumption and their potential to change diet and
lifestyle habits. The following table summarizes the recommendations for designing
effective interventions (Kwasny et al., 2022).
Table 1: Recommendations for Designing Meat Reduction Interventions

Targeting
Policies to
Specific
Consumer
Groups

Type of Intervention

Recommendations

References

Inform about Negative
Side-effects with a Focus
on Health

●

combine health and
environmental appeals

Cordts et al., 2014;
Klöckner & Ofstad,
2017; Vainio et al.,
2018

●

highlight health appeals
rather than environmental
appeals

●

provide personalized
information aligned with
consumers' decision stage
and goal orientation

●

communicate emotionally
framed messages

●

relate to animal suffering or
show pictures of
unprocessed meat

●

show pictures of living
animals or cute animals in
restaurant contexts

Trigger Emotions

e.g. Carfora et al.,
2019; Kunst &
Hohle, 2016;
Palomo-Vélez et
al., 2018

Page | 9
Provide Competence
Training and Support
Habit Change

Increase the Visibility of
Vegetarian Food

●

combine goal setting and
counseling with educational
materials on healthy
lifestyles

●

provide cooking courses to
assist in the preparation of
vegetarian food

●

make vegetarian food more
visible in the food
environment (e.g.
restaurant; supermarket)

●

increase the visibility of
vegetarian food by labeling
a vegetarian meal as “dish
of the day”

e.g. Carmody et al.,
2008; Emmons,
McBride, et al.,
2005; Grimmett et
al., 2015

e.g. Garnett et al.,
2019; Kurz, 2018;
Reinders et al.,
2017

Reference: Kwasny, T., Dobernig, K., & Riefler, P. (2022). Towards reduced meat
consumption: A systematic literature review of intervention effectiveness, 2001–2019.
Appetite, 168. p. 12 (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.appet.2021.105739).

Meatless Monday as a Meat Reduction Initiative
Meatless Monday, is a global initiative with a simple message to not eat meat one day a
week for personal and planetary health. The movement was founded by Sid Lerner in
collaboration with the Center for a Livable Future at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg
School of Public Health, as one of its Healthy Monday initiatives, which encourages
consumers to make healthier choices at the beginning of each week. Starting each
week with Meatless Monday can lead people to eat more plant-based meals throughout
the rest of the week.
The Meatless Monday campaign has the goal of facilitating a 15% reduction in global
meat consumption for both environmental and health reasons (Meatless Monday, n.d.).
The movement focuses on Monday in large part due to the “fresh start effect,” which
refers to the phenomenon that people are more likely to engage in aspirational
behaviors following temporal landmarks, such as the beginning of a new week.
Behavioral researchers at the University of Pennsylvania found evidence for this effect
among such behaviors as dieting, gym attendance, and the creation of commitment
contracts (Dai et al., 2014).

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In a 2021 nationally representative consumer panel, 37.5% were aware of Meatless
Monday. Of those who reported hearing of Meatless Monday, 26.1% tried to incorporate
more meatless meals throughout their week, and 25.1% reported experimenting with
new meatless recipes when they cook at home. Overall, 67.5% were reducing, had
reduced, or intended to reduce their meat consumption (Meatless Monday, 2022).
While numerous surveys have been administered regarding the general effectiveness of
Meatless Monday (Leidig, 2012), it does not appear that any experimental research has
been conducted to ascertain the specific impacts that the Meatless Monday campaign
has on individual meat consumption behavior (e.g., in the form of food diaries). This gap
is due in part to the challenges of accurately tracking meat consumption and of causally
attributing such behavior to Meatless Monday messaging (Chan & Ramsing, 2017).
Instead, the vast majority of existing research related to Meatless Monday has been
limited to qualitative descriptions of the campaign’s origins, examinations of its potential
generalized role in mediating climate change (Doyle, 2011), and practical tips for more
effective implementation in specific dining settings (Chan & Ramsing, 2017).

Components of Successful Meatless Monday
Implementation
Levels of Implementation: Example of Universities
There are many ways and avenues in which Meatless Monday initiatives can be
implemented. For example, there are city-wide resolutions, university campus initiatives,
restaurant campaigns, and even individual choice at home (Chan & Ramsing, 2017;
Lombardini et al., 2013; Pulkkinen et al., 2016; Zenoff, 2014). Below we discuss the
example of Meatless Monday initiatives in the case of universities.
Alternatives to meat on college campuses are increasing. “In a poll of 167 college and
university dining operators nationwide, [it was] found that vegetarian or vegan dishes
comprise about half of the menu items served on campus, and that number appears to
be increasing” (Middleton & Littler, 2019, pg. 319). Examples of initiatives include
campus dining meal choices, contracting vegetarian/vegan restaurants, and educational
campaigns focused on the environmental and health benefits of consuming less meat.
A 2017 review of Meatless Monday campaigns at twelve Bon Appetit Management
Company sites located mostly on college campuses outlined some of the lessons
learned from such campaigns (Chan & Ramsey, 2017). It was found that there was
pushback from students when campaigns were implemented to exclude meat

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completely from dining options, particularly among student athletes (Chan & Ramsing,
2017). However, the most successful college Meatless Monday initiatives were those
that responded to this student feedback and altered the program design. They did so by
partnering with student groups on education and communication around Meatless
Monday (Chan & Ramsey, 2017). It was also found that reducing meatless options to
only one dining station rather than completely eliminating meat from the cafeteria was
more successful (Chan & Ramsey, 2017). Additionally, creating flavorful and interesting
vegetarian dishes assisted in program acceptance among participants (Chan &
Ramsey, 2017).

Stakeholder Engagement & Participatory Decision Making
Involving stakeholders from the community appears to be an important aspect of
successful Meatless Monday campaign implementation. This includes participatory
decision-making models as well as involving multiple levels of stakeholders within a
community. There are a variety of stakeholders that an organization can create
partnerships with to build community buy-in and expand the reach of a Meatless
Monday initiative. In some cases, these partnerships allow for organizations to share
responsibilities, funding, and program management.
One successful example of involving key stakeholders to help with the implementation
of a Meatless Monday initiative is exhibited in the process of passing a city-wide
Meatless Monday resolution in the city of Los Angeles, California. Compassion Over
Killing, a non-profit animal advocacy organization, was the key stakeholder in
advocating for passing this resolution. They did this through “[working] with the media
and various institutions to promote the implementation of Meatless Monday” (Zenoff,
2014, pg. 6). Incorporating positive messages into Meatless Monday initiatives helps
community members better understand what the change is and how to be a part of the
movement. Compassion Over Killing also involved the Los Angeles Boys & Girls Club,
various celebrities, food vendors, and the city government. The Boys & Girls Club
helped with creating Spanish and English meatless recipes (Zenoff, 2014).
Volunteers also play a crucial role in helping shape change in a community. In the
Bedford, New York community, the volunteer program was critical in their Meatless
Monday initiatives. Volunteers were “responsible for soliciting the support of business
partners, community members, and local media outlets…[They] also provided them with
important collaborative opportunities to promote plant-forward eating within their built
environment” (Ramsing et al., 2021, p. 388). They used a virtual approach through local
media and local businesses to help increase the visibility of their campaign. This

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multifaceted approach to promoting their message helped reach as many people as
possible.
One key lesson learned from Bedford’s model is the importance of connection on
multiple levels of partnerships. These different partnerships can be beneficial in
“approaches to dietary behavior change that can leverage latent community assets, like
grassroots volunteerism, public-private partnerships, and residents’ social networks, to
educate audiences on how to make more informed food choices” (Ramsing et al.,
2021, pg. 390). Every level of the community needs to be a part of the initiative to create
a successful and positive educational campaign that will create change within the
community.

Education & Information Sharing
As found in other meat reduction interventions, information and messaging is an
important aspect of implementing change amongst a group of people. That is why
tailored education and communication strategies are essential components of
successful Meatless Monday campaigns. In some cases, campaigns face resistance
from consumers due to a lack of knowledge sharing in regard to the environmental and
health benefits of reducing meat consumption, as well as tasty plant-based recipes and
cooking techniques (Milford et al., 2019; Chan & Ramsing, 2017). Creating an education
and communication plan that addresses stakeholder needs before implementation, such
as including community members in participatory decision-making, can help Meatless
Monday campaigns successfully tailor their education and messaging.
One example of the importance of education comes from the Norwegian Armed forces
where chefs were responsible for implementing a Meatless Monday initiative in military
camps (Milford et al., 2019). Chefs were the main implementers of the initiative yet
played no role in the decision-making process or implementation plan. This decisionmaking process was a top-down approach and faced significant challenges. In this
case, chefs lacked “training or information on how to cook vegetarian meals. Few chefs
and cooks had experience with cooking or eating vegetarian food, and many were
skeptical toward its taste and nutritional value” (Milford et al., 2019, p. 5). The authors
concluded that the biggest challenge faced was a “lack of knowledge sharing ahead of
the implementation. Information about the environmental and health benefits of reduced
meat consumption was not given in organized, well-prepared manners” (Milford et al.,
2019). Because they had little experience with vegetarian options, many of the chefs
were not in support of the initiative. It would have been beneficial to provide hands-on
vegetarian cooking instruction, taste tests, or nutrition education. This may have

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increased staff support and appreciation for the initiative, instead of reluctance to
participate.

Importance of Stakeholder Engagement and Education
Case Study: Helsinki School District
As illustrated by the case of the Helsinki School District, enforcing policy change in
the absence of stakeholder engagement and education can lead to negative
outcomes such as low participation, increased food waste, and eating less
(Lombardini et al., 2013). In 2010, the school district in Finland implemented a
mandatory vegetarian day as a “natural experiment” in 33 schools. This policy
change was adopted that year by the Helsinki City Council despite concerns from
the public such as the importance of meat in school diets (Lombardini et al., 2013).
Researchers examined this case to determine “whether forced choice restriction is
an appropriate policy instrument for achieving the intended effects on students’
food consumption” (Lombardini et al., 2013, p. 163).
They observed three behavioral choices students made in regards to eating during
the school day: the students’ choice to go to the cafeteria at all, the choice of how
much food they wanted to put on their plates, and how much food they consumed
or threw away (Lombardini et al., 2013). After implementation of the new policy, all
three behavioral choices of students were negatively affected by this forced-choice
initiative. There was a 7% decrease in participation in school lunches, 9% less
food taken, and the “plate waste” went up by 60% (Lombardini et al., 2013).
An additional impact to note is that students who chose not to eat the school lunch
at all after the policy change “end[ed] up not getting their nutritional requirements
fulfilled from the school lunch” (Lombardini et al., 2013, pg. 165), this is particularly
important for students from lower socioeconomic communities who depend on
school lunch as a primary source of their daily calorie intake.
Though not every food policy is enacted in the same way, this case provides
evidence of dangerous, unintended consequences that can come from forced
change without stakeholder engagement / buy-in, education, and information
sharing.

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Methodology
An initial literature review was conducted to obtain a better understanding of Meatless
Monday campaigns in the U.S. This review allowed the research team to gain insight
into the Meatless Monday implementation process, learn more about public attitudes
toward meat consumption and reduction, and situate Meatless Monday among other
meat reduction initiatives. Additionally, we were able to identify education / information
sharing and stakeholder participation as common elements of successful campaigns.
With these elements in mind, we were able to organize best practices of the campaigns
that we interviewed.
The second component of our research consisted of semi-structured interviews via the
video conferencing software Zoom with seven key stakeholders of various campaigns
across six U.S. cities. Cities were chosen based on the scale of their Meatless Monday
campaigns and the variety of organizations and partnerships involved. This study was
focused on mid-sized cities to obtain a realistic understanding of how such campaigns
may be replicated in other similarly-sized communities, based on the understanding that
techniques and partnerships utilized in larger cities such as New York and Los Angeles
may not be as available in smaller cities across the U.S.
We were provided a list of cities that have or previously had Meatless Monday
campaigns from Becky Ramsing, senior program officer with the Food Communities and
Public Health Program at John Hopkins Center for a Livable Future, who has previously
conducted research on Meatless Monday. This list included the date and method of
implementation, as well as a contact for the key stakeholders for each campaign. From
this list, the team reached out to the key stakeholders for each campaign. In total, we
emailed and/or called stakeholders from 15 different Meatless Monday campaigns to
inquire about participating in this study via an interview. Many campaigns did not
respond. Of this list of 15, we were able to interview stakeholders from seven different
campaigns, two of them in the city of Berkeley.
Locations of interviewees included: Aspen, Colorado; San Diego, California; Berkeley,
California; Santa Barbara, California; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; and Needham,
Massachusetts. The team interviewed stakeholders from three categories: non-profit or
volunteer-led initiatives, local government, and school districts. This allowed the team to
analyze the strengths and weaknesses of Meatless Monday campaigns from different
perspectives and levels of implementation.

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Table 2: List of participating organizations and their locations.
Organization

Location

Independent Volunteer

Aspen, Colorado

San Diego Unified School District

San Diego, California

Berkeley City Council

Berkeley, California

City of Berkeley’s Division of Aging Services

Berkeley, California

Santa Barbara Unified School District

Santa Barbara, California

Humane Action Pittsburgh

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

League of Women Voters of Needham

Needham, Massachusetts

The team used semi-structured interviews to gather qualitative data. A semi-structured
interview is meant to resemble a natural conversation, allowing for “more open-ended
questions, [and] a discussion with the interviewee rather than a straightforward question
and answer format” (Doyle, 2020). The interviews consisted of a list of seven questions
that were designed to initiate an open discussion about the city’s Meatless Monday
campaign (See Appendix A). By allowing the respondent to tell their story openly, it
provided an unbiased collection of information to examine. This allowed the team to
gain an understanding of the implementation process, successful partnership models,
creative solutions, and challenges.
All interviews were recorded on Zoom and transcribed to analyze data and find
similarities. Each interview was placed into a category of local government, volunteerled or non-profits, or school systems. Those categories were then compared with one
another to identify general challenges and find similarities and differences.

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Analysis of Meatless Monday Initiatives
in Six Mid-sized U.S. Cities
Information from key stakeholders in six mid-sized U.S. cities was used to better
understand best practices, successes, and challenges of Meatless Monday initiatives.
Interviewees were grouped into three categories: 1) non-profit and volunteer-led
initiatives, 2) local government, and 3) school districts. This was based on the feedback
we received through our interviews. Grouping them into three categories helped give a
holistic view of Meatless Monday initiatives across the country and across levels of
implementation. Based on our interviews and literature review, we were able to come to
some recommendations that could support various levels of Meatless Monday
implementation.

Non-Profit & Volunteer-Led Initiatives
There are many non-profit organizations across the U.S. that have decided to take on a
Meatless Monday initiative for various reasons, such as improving the health and/or
sustainability of their community and increasing animal welfare and protection. This
form of implementation is often born out of a passion for wanting to make a positive
difference in local communities. It typically involves dedicated volunteers or “champions”
who are enthusiastic about taking on a Meatless Monday initiative. These types of
initiatives can easily build trust and interest in the movement since they are run by
individuals who are usually already quite active in their community. In order to gain
more insight into the strategies of Meatless Monday initiatives run by non-profit
organizations and volunteers, we interviewed stakeholders from Needham,
Massachusetts; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; and Aspen, Colorado.

Needham, Massachusetts: The League of Women Voters of Needham
The Meatless Monday initiative in Needham, Massachusetts began in June 2020 with
the help of the League of Women Voters of Needham. Our research team spoke with
board member Karen Price, who gave us insight into their Meatless Monday strategies.
One of the major areas of action for the League of Women Voters of Needham is
environmental protection and combating climate change. The idea for a Meatless
Monday campaign was introduced in their environmental committee as a pathway to
involve the community with their organization’s work while raising awareness of the
impact of meat production on the planet.

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The League created a website dedicated to their initiative which includes a sign-up for a
12-week pledge to participate in Meatless Monday. Participants simply sign their name
and pledge to eat only vegetarian meals every Monday for 12 weeks. After they sign up,
their email is added to a list of recipients for a monthly newsletter created by the League
that contains plant-based recipes, upcoming events, summarized academic journal
articles, and additional local resources related to Meatless Monday, such as upcoming
farmers markets. They also invite participants to sign up for the official national
Meatless Monday organization newsletter which comes out weekly and the monthly
virtual vegetarian cooking class hosted by the Sierra Club.
By having their participants sign a pledge, the organization collects specific data on the
number of participants and the ebb and flow of sign-ups as it relates to their promotion
efforts. Just over a year since the program’s onset, as of July 2021, Needham Meatless
Monday efforts reached around 450 individuals, across 185 households, who signed
their 12-week pledge to go meatless every Monday.
Though initiated by the League of Women Voters, it is a joint effort between three local
organizations: The League of Women Voters of Needham, Green Needham, and
Needham Community Farm. Most stakeholders involved in these organizations
participate across groups. All of the people involved in managing the initiative are
volunteers, they do not have any staff dedicated solely to Meatless Monday. Around five
to six people are managing the program, with two conducting the bulk of the work. The
League of Women Voters and Green Needham fund the website, which is the only
aspect of the initiative that requires financing. The initiative also has ten participating
organizations, and it is endorsed by the Needham Board of Health.
Education and Information Sharing
At the launch of the program, the three founding organizations released an article in
their local newspaper, created a Needham Meatless Monday Facebook page, and
networked to partner with other community organizations. Being a fairly small town with
around 30,000 residents, these were easy and effective ways to reach the community.
When promoting the Meatless Monday initiative and events, Needham Meatless
Monday emphasized the benefits for both personal and environmental health.
Additionally, the website focuses on how reduced meat consumption connects to the
health of people and the sustainability of the planet. This focus on personal and
environmental health has proven to be effective messaging in the Needham community.
This case shows the importance of tailoring information to the target community, and
doing so through multiple avenues, such as print, social media, and organizational
networking. Ten organizations have agreed to become participating organizations, all of
which are listed on the program website. The three founding organizations prepare

Page | 18

information about the program and/or upcoming events and send it out to the
participating organizations who then share it with their respective members. This
method has helped to reach more people than any of their other outreach and
promotion methods. This highlights the importance of engaging multiple stakeholders in
education and information sharing, to capitalize on the networks of a diversity of
involved organizations.
The COVID-19 pandemic has prevented many in-person events, but Karen Price noted
that “the most popular and exciting event [they] have had so far was with a local chef
named Dave Becker.” He cooked plant-based take-out meals that people picked up and
took home to eat. Participants had to purchase tickets in advance to be able to pick up a
meal, and they also received the immersive experience of a live Zoom-hosted cooking
class with the chef. The 200-ticket event was sold out. Though tickets were inexpensive,
participants could go beyond the ticket price to donate to the Needham Community
Council Food Pantry. The event produced a profit of $4,000, which all went to the food
pantry. This creative event demonstrates the importance of hands-on educational
engagement to enliven Meatless Monday campaigns, and how such community
engagement can continue safely and remotely.
In a 2021 survey sent to program participants via the monthly newsletter, respondents
were asked about the resources provided through the program that were the most
useful. The top three resources reported were the monthly newsletter, the event with
local chef Dave Becker, and the Needham Meatless Monday website. This indicates the
importance of providing a variety of education and information, from hands-on to remote
resources.
Respondents also provided suggestions for other resources that would be useful in the
comments of the survey. These suggestions included requests for recipes, cooking
classes, restaurant suggestions, hosting meatless potlucks, a Meatless Monday club at
Needham High School, and more information on the health and environmental aspects
of plant-based food choices. This demonstrates the eagerness of willing participants to
be engaged in Meatless Monday campaigns via multiple channels.
Stakeholder Engagement
Although the founding organizations chose not to involve the local municipality in
program management, they saw value in seeking endorsement from a government
entity to further the reach of the program. They successfully obtained such an
endorsement from the Needham Board of Health. The Board of Health’s endorsement,
as an elected body, had the capacity to build trust in the community and served as a
beneficial precursor to beginning pledge efforts.

Page | 19

Additionally, through involving ten different organizations in program implementation,
the League ensured that they were not operating in a silo, but rather were expanding
their reach to many more participants than they may have been able to alone.
This initiative also excelled in seeking feedback from program participants themselves.
The 2021 survey yielded 49 responses, which is 27% of all their participants. Out of
those respondents, 31% reported a lasting reduction in meat consumption when
comparing their consumption before and after the pledge,
“Having a permanent
with none reporting an increase. These findings indicate
some success of the primary goal of the Needham Meatless impact is the gold
standard.”
Monday initiative: to have a permanent impact on their
community by continuing to reduce meat consumption even
after the 12-week pledge period. Price explained that “having a permanent impact is the
gold standard” for their initiative and it’s how they measure their success. These
responses provide data that suggest this Meatless Monday initiative is making a
difference in reducing meat consumption in Needham, which has encouraged them to
continue the program and expand their outreach. Should the program incorporate
suggestions from participants, it should be expected that the program will only increase
in effectiveness, as has been found in other successful Meatless Monday campaigns
(Chan & Ramsing, 2017).
According to our interviewee, the Needham Meatless Monday initiative has gained the
community’s support with no disputes. The approaches of tailoring education and
information sharing to the demographic make-up of the town, as well as engaging
multiple stakeholders appear to be vital to this success. Also important is that the town’s
ideological and demographic makeup are likely reasons for program acceptance as
well. The average income in Needham, at $165,000 (U.S. Census Bureau, 2021a), is
more than double the national average of $67,000 (U.S. Census Bureau, 2021b).
Norfolk County, where Needham is located, is majority Democrat, as demonstrated in
2020 presidential election results when 67% of votes went to Democrat Joseph Biden
(WBUR, 2020). This aligns with research showing that higher income and liberal
populations are more likely to reduce meat consumption, especially due to
environmental reasons (Corrin & Papadopoulos, 2017; Neff et al., 2018). Therefore,
barriers to reducing meat consumption were already lower in this community, leading to
high program acceptance rates.

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Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: Humane Action Pittsburgh and the City of
Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh is a mid-sized city in western Pennsylvania that has a population of about
300,000 (U.S. Census, 2020). It is known for its industrial-age history, popular art
museums, and for hosting Major League Baseball’s first-ever Vegan Night.
Humane Action Pittsburgh (HAP) is a volunteer-run organization working to advance
animal protection through education, policy, and community action. They have built
great relationships in their policy and legislative work with different members of the
Pittsburgh City Council, employees in the mayor’s office, and other members of the City
administration to protect animals statewide.
In 2017, HAP initiated a Meatless Monday campaign, one of their first policy initiatives
focused on the protection of farm animals through reducing animal product
consumption. The City of Pittsburgh’s Climate Action Plan included a goal to “reduce
meat consumption by 50% by 2030” (Pittsburgh Legistar, 2017). HAP used this clause
to enhance the priority of the Meatless Monday campaign at the City Sustainability
Department and build relationships with employees there. According to Natalie Ahwesh,
Executive Director of HAP, at each city council meeting, she observed that about ten
proclamations were passed. Because of this high volume, there is not often media
attention or pushback on such proclamations. Combined with the city’s existing climate
action goal to reduce meat consumption, HAP viewed this as a good strategy to
seamlessly get Meatless Monday onto the agenda of the city.
HAP’s team of volunteers “sent out cold-call letters to members of the City Council
explaining that they wanted to pass a Meatless Monday resolution and asked them to
let them know if any of them were interested in leading it” (N. Ahwesh, personal
communication, July 7, 2021). They received a response from the City’s Head of
Human Resources Department, Richard Butler, who was eager to spearhead the
movement. Butler turned out to be their “champion” in the City Council that not only
cared about reducing meat consumption for health, environment, and animal welfare,
but also had the power to make decisions at a policy level. Because the HR department
deals with city employees' wellness plans, HAP decided to focus on emphasizing the
benefits of eating a plant-based diet for human health, rather than animal welfare issues
or other benefits. In other words, HAP recognized the goals of their partner organization
in tailoring their messaging.
In July of 2017, the Pittsburgh City Council passed Proclamation 1790 stating,
"Therefore be it resolved that I, William Peduto, Mayor of the City of Pittsburgh, do
hereby declare August 14, 2017 ‘Meatless Monday’ in the City of Pittsburgh" (Pittsburgh
Legistar, 2017).

Page | 21

This resolution led to seven out of ten of the council members taking on the Meatless
Monday pledge, as well as the creation of Pittsburgh VegFest, an annual event that
promotes transitioning to a vegetarian lifestyle and celebrates vegetarian dishes. The
City of Pittsburgh also offers a City Fit Lean and Green Program, which includes
Meatless Monday and encourages a plant-based diet.
Education and Information Sharing
Because of their relationship with the City of Pittsburgh’s HR department, HAP was able
to host a Lunch & Learn Program with city employees as part of their Meatless Monday
initiative called Lean and Green. The program consisted of a series of monthly sessions
meant to educate city employees on the
benefits of plant-based eating. Every session
“Every lunch-and-learn session grew
grew (the first one was about 10-15 people)
until people were standing out in the
until people were “standing out in the hall to
hall to hear what Humane Action
hear what Humane Action Pittsburgh had to
Pittsburgh had to say…”
say during their last session,” according to
Ahwesh. “They attracted a very diverse group of people interested in hearing about
going plant-based.” This engagement with city employees in the course of their work
day was a popular and effective way to get employees committed to such a campaign
(N. Ahwesh, personal communication, July 7, 2021).
Eventually, this grew into a campaign called GetHealthy Pittsburgh, which is a challenge
open to the whole city, not just city employees, to eat a plant-based diet for two weeks.
The goal of this program is to improve overall health by reducing consumption of animal
products.
All of these initiatives happened organically by networking with employees of the city in
the Sustainability Department and Wellness Department. All of the work of the program
is run by volunteers, but typically funded by the City of Pittsburgh or outside funders. In
terms of scale of participants, Get Healthy Pittsburgh is the biggest campaign HAP has
ever implemented and it has the potential to help the most animals. However, Ahwesh
acknowledges that what allowed success with their city level programs has been
emphasizing the personal health component of Meatless Monday, though HAP’s main
organizational focus is improving animal welfare. As in the case of Needham,
Massachusetts, the importance of tailoring the messaging of Meatless Monday
campaigns to the target audience is clear in this case.
HAP has also successfully adapted the program based on feedback. The organization
made a point of dropping the term “meatless” from the names of their programs
because they were told by multiple people, within the city government and elsewhere,

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that it had a negative connotation. The Lunch & Learns, the first extension of their
Meatless Monday initiative, were named Lean and Green to reduce hesitation. This
shows the importance of designing programs capable of adapting to feedback, and
aligns with findings of increased resistance to messaging that emphasizes meat
elimination on the one hand, and more openness towards meat reduction on the other
(Corrin & Papadopoulos, 2017; Ramsing, 2021).
Stakeholder Engagement
HAP highly values relationships and partnerships with the city and non-governmental
organizations. For HAP, success is reaching as many people as possible through
partnerships. As a result of those relationships and programs, Ahwesh hopes that
people will adjust their diets, reduce their meat consumption, and protect more animals.
Apart from their work with the City of Pittsburgh, HAP also worked with Major League
Baseball’s Pittsburgh Pirates and hosted the first ever MLB Vegan Night, as mentioned
previously. According to Ahwesh, “it was the best-selling first-time special event in
Pittsburgh Pirates history, and it was even featured in the Game Changer show on
Netflix.” For participating in the Vegan Night, The Pirates won an award from the Green
Sports Alliance for their commitment to sustainability.
HAP also partnered with University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, the largest hospital
employer in the Pittsburgh region. They worked to incorporate vegan and plant-based
food into the Medical Center’s cafeteria. They also worked with schools in the area to
add more meatless items to the school lunch menu.
The success of HAP proves the importance of building relationships, whether it's with
city officials, local sports teams, or schools. An important lesson learned when
approaching potential partners was to avoid leading with the attitude of, “We’re trying to
change how you eat.” Ahwesh acknowledged that if they had tried to start as an
organization talking about farm animal welfare or giving up meat, they may not have
been able to come as far as they have. This shows the importance of approaching
potential partners with a spirit of collaboration, understanding partners' goals, and
recognizing potential avenues for organizational alignment.
In their programs, HAP calculated an estimate of how many gallons of water, acres of
rainforest, and animals were saved, based on the number of participants and how many
plant based meals they were eating before and after the challenge. According to the
Executive Director of HAP, they estimate their impact with 500 participants in Get
Healthy Pittsburgh will save 8,000 animals in just two weeks.

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Aspen, Colorado: Volunteer-led Initiative
In Aspen, Colorado, Meatless Monday initiatives were implemented and coordinated by
volunteer Dawn Shepard for seven years, who introduced the idea of Meatless Monday
to her book club. This created connections within the community and encouraged
engagement, which helped Shepard with the success of the Meatless Monday
campaign in the small mountain town.
In 2011, the Huffington Post reported Aspen, Colorado as “the Nation’s First Meatless
Monday Community,” due to its all-inclusive initiatives compared to other cities at the
time (Elam, 2011).
Stakeholder Engagement
Shepard made her first connection with a local chef, Martin Oswald of Pyramid Bistro.
Together they brainstormed dishes they could feature for Meatless Monday. Shepard
brought attention to the campaign through advertisements in the weekly newspaper,
which gave readers weekly recipes to cook for Meatless Monday and announced free
events the local community could attend.
There was no local government involvement in this Meatless Monday initiative. Shepard
made connections with the hospitals, schools, restaurants, health facilities, and the
University of Colorado to pursue the mission of Meatless Monday. One key factor that
helped this campaign was the fact that there was, “a team of people from different
segments of [the] community like the hospitals. […] The restaurant community [was]
very important as well” (D. Shepard, personal communication, August 3, 2021). Having
different stakeholders in the conversation helped with creating the dialogue necessary
for the Meatless Monday campaign. The campaign was supported by volunteers,
community members, and key stakeholders in schools, hospitals, and restaurants.
Education and Information Sharing
The group held monthly potlucks to help bring people together to celebrate Meatless
Monday initiatives, recipes, and information. They hosted speakers, sometimes
provided by the Humane Society of the U.S. (HSUS), a non-profit organization that aims
to further animal welfare and provide animal protection. Utilizing credible and respected
speakers and partnerships allowed Aspen’s Meatless Monday initiatives to gain more
respect and credibility within the community.
Joe Maxwell, a past lieutenant governor from Missouri and fourth generation hog farmer
passionate about small farmers, once came to a potluck to speak. He spoke about local

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ranches, which Shepard identified as particularly powerful because “it's one thing having
somebody, a little small farm local rancher talked about Meatless Mondays that carried
a lot more credibility, you know, in terms of why it's so important” (D. Shepard, personal
communication, August 3, 2021). Bringing in different perspectives to share information
and shape the conversation helped with getting people to engage in the Aspen
Meatless Monday campaign.
This example is particularly important because it shows how powerful one person or
“champion” can be in a community. The campaign ran for seven years and had great
engagement.
Best Practices
The above cases demonstrate several best practices that can be applied in the design
of Meatless Monday non-profit and volunteer-led campaigns. In all three cases, the
importance of involving multiple stakeholders and including organizations, local
government, sports teams, and community “champions” to spearhead the initiatives is
clear. By tailoring their message to highlight certain benefits of Meatless Mondays over
others, these initiatives found both a receptive audience and successful buy-in. These
initiatives also excelled in creating community around their programming by engaging
participants through multiple avenues including print, social media, newsletters, and
hands-on learning experiences. Additionally, two of the three campaigns ended up
emphasizing meat reduction rather than elimination, at times softening the branding
around “meatless” to include “lean and green” or “plant-based” messaging. Finally,
these campaigns sought participant feedback and adjusted their programming
accordingly, highlighting the importance of two-way communication in creating effective
campaigns.

Local Governments
Berkeley, California
Sitting just across the bay from San Francisco, the city of Berkeley has a population
slightly over 124,000 (U.S. Census Bureau, 2022). A college town at heart, the city is
greatly influenced by UC Berkeley, the largest employer in the area (Cooper, 2014) and
a liberal epicenter for the 65% of the population registered with the Democratic Party
(City Manager, 2013). Berkeley has been a spearhead for sustainability initiatives at the
city level, and there are numerous programs around transit, energy, and food that
demonstrate the municipality’s commitment to the environment. Energy consumption
(electricity and natural gas) has declined since the early 2000s, and solar photovoltaic

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systems and solar hot water systems are increasingly being adopted (City of Berkeley,
2011). A large portion of the population walks or bikes to work, likely a result of the 36
miles of designated bike routes in the city (City of Berkeley, 2011). Car share locations
have increased tenfold since 2002 (City of Berkeley, 2011). The city also claims the
“highest food-recycling participation in the county, reducing landfill waste by 19% since
the collection program began” (City of Berkeley, 2011).
Since 2015, there have been three distinct moments in Berkeley’s history with Meatless
Monday. The first incarnation came on February 24, 2015, with a city council resolution
that declared Mondays to be “Meatless Mondays'' in the City of Berkeley. The initial
effort was catalyzed by the work of Mara Guccione, a Berkeley resident and member of
the Animal Care Commission and the Humane Society of the U.S., who pushed
community residents, city staff, commission, and council members to commit to a pilot
run of Meatless Mondays (City of Berkeley, 2015). The next phase came in October of
2018 when the city adopted the Green Monday campaign. Much like the previous
Meatless Monday initiative, Green Monday encouraged people to eat more plant-based
food and less meat. It also declared that facilities and programs managed, owned, or
run by the city would have to serve up one meat-free day a week. The third phase
started in July of 2021. The city committed to decrease the animal-based food products
it serves by 50%, and replace them with plant-based options by 2024 (Webber, 2021).
For this research, we spoke with two stakeholders from Berkeley about the Green
Monday initiative in 2018: Natalie Krelle-Zepponi, Registered Dietician and Nutritionist
for the City of Berkeley’s Aging Services Division; and Soli Alpert, Legislative Aide for
District 7 and former staffer of Councilmember Kate Harrison.

Aging Services Division
A part of the Berkeley Health, Housing & Community Services Department (HHCS), the
Aging Services Division provides invaluable insight into the successes and challenges
of implementing the city’s Meatless Monday initiatives. Natalie Krelle-Zepponi, who has
been involved with the department since the late 1990s, played a key role in the genesis
of meatless items for the city’s senior centers and Meals on Wheels program. Working
in conjunction with the HHCS, the Aging Services Division began serving meatless
items every Monday in 2015. Krelle-Zepponi’s motivation was mostly driven by health
considerations and the potential for food to act as preventative medicine, although the
reduced cost of meatless items and environmental benefits were also appreciated. This
focus on nutrition was reflected at the city level as well, with a Sugar-Sweetened
Beverage Product Tax that went into effect in January 2015.

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Green Monday
The Green Monday Resolution in Berkeley, California was initiated in 2018 by Amy
Halpern-Laff, a lawyer and animal rights activist. Halpern-Laff created a draft resolution
in conjunction with legislative assistant Soli Alpert stating that any Berkeley institution or
any Berkeley sponsored event happening on Monday would be meatless, including city
council meetings. Originally, the work of Halpern-Laff on the resolution was motivated
by animal rights issues and ethics, but sustainability increasingly played a bigger role.
To get the council members on board, she used a holistic approach, looking at how U.S.
meat consumption affects the health of the farmworkers, the land that is altered by
animal production, and the climate in general.
Best Practices and Lessons Learned
Seniors have specific dietary needs - “You’re not going to fill them up with beans…
that’s just not going to work for that [person’s] digestive system” (Krelle-Zepponi 2021) but this did not get in the way of Meatless Monday. The implementation of meatless
menus in senior centers was facilitated by two main factors. First, handling meat
products in food services entails additional precautions (e.g. using separate utensils
while preparing meat and vegetables to limit cross-contamination) and Meatless
Mondays were an appealing way to reduce that extra labor. Second, the meatless items
were paired with enticing dishes to encourage the residents to try the new entrées. For
example, cheesy mashed potatoes are served with the vegan ratatouille, or fruit cups
and desserts are offered on meatless meal days. Early on, they also featured ice cream
cups, although Krelle-Zepponi says they’ve now moved away from many sugary
desserts. As a result, a large majority of the participants welcomed the meatless meals,
with Monday sometimes having the highest number of meals served.
Even though the initiative started as Meatless Mondays, senior centers' meatless meals
are served Monday through Friday due to the production cycle, and the Meals on
Wheels participants receive their frozen meatless meal on Tuesdays. This logistical
nuance has led to the city’s dropping of the “Monday” from their promotional language
over time.
When the Green Monday Resolution was passed in 2018, the city used two approaches
for its implementation. One of them was to create a certification program for businesses
and restaurants to get a badge for being Green
“It is really about limited
Monday friendly. The second approach used the
people with limited time and
catering for city council meetings, making sure to
they have to choose which
systematically provide meatless options. Originally,
thing they’re gonna work on.”
the city manager was in charge of both

Page | 27

implementation strategies, but eventually the catering of city council meetings became
the prerogative of the city clerk.
With the COVID-19 pandemic, the meatless efforts of the city came under pressure as
more urgent issues such as homelessness and food insecurity came to the fore. In the
senior centers, the combined increase in participants and decrease in volunteers
created a new set of challenges and the meatless meals became less of a priority,
however they are still ongoing. In the case of council meetings, the shift to remote
meetings removed the need for catering all together.
Stakeholder Engagement
Stakeholder engagement was a critical part of the success of the meatless strategies in
Berkeley senior centers and city council.
As discussed in the previous section, the success of meatless options in senior centers
benefited from bringing forth solutions meeting the unique needs of the food consumers,
handlers and administrators. Seniors still had tasty options to choose from, and
administrators were able to reduce the labor involved in meal preparation. Also, it’s
important to note that participants were able to opt out of the meatless menu, so they
did not feel forced to go with that program which reinforced their engagement. As a
result, only 8 out of 200 participants chose to opt out.
In the case of the city council, animal rights organizations played a strong role. In
general, civil society engagement can have a strong impact on what council members
support when passing legislation. When Green Monday was introduced to the council
members, there was little to no opposition because animal rights organizations
frequently advocate in Berkeley. The implementation of the resolution also benefited
from the support of the national Meatless Monday campaign for education.
Education and Information Sharing
The national Meatless Monday campaign provided support and marketing materials to
help convince the community of the health, environmental, and humane benefits of a
meatless diet. Similarly, Krelle-Zepponi attributes part of the senior center’s success to
the marketing materials provided early on. Additionally, she notes that the cooking
demonstrations and the availability of quality plant-based caterers helped lift doubts on
the feasibility of the initiative.

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School Systems
The Meatless Monday campaign has seen great success in schools, including K-12
institutions and universities. Schools are a perfect environment to impose or suggest
significant changes to diets and to get the attention of a large number of people.
Initially, it was thought that Meatless Monday initiatives would find more traction at
colleges and universities due to a perceived awareness among older students about the
implications of meat on human health and sustainability. However, the actual success of
reduced-meat menus varies widely and is influenced by a number of factors not limited
to age (King, 2013). In fact, more K-12 school districts have “no meat” days than do
universities. In California, San Diego Unified School District, Santa Barbara Unified
School District, and Los Angeles Unified School District have all implemented meatless
days. Following in California’s footsteps, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced
in 2019 that the Meatless Monday initiative would expand to all NYC public schools and
their 1.1 million students for breakfast and lunch items (Buzalka, 2019).
The success of K-12 initiatives in California and New York has been mixed, and
adoption of meatless meals or reduced meat meals have been attributed to several
factors. Whitsons Culinary Group, based in New York, expanded their Meatless Monday
initiative to 95 school districts starting in 2017, and have noted a number of best
practices such as using creative recipes, collaborating with chefs, and utilizing signage
sent to schools describing the environmental implications of meat consumption
(Fitzpatrick, 2018). These practices all play an important role in their Meatless Monday
promotion. Whitsons also attributes the success of the initiative with younger students to
communications efforts like a newsletter for parents and educational engagement
activities like taste tests. For older students, customization is important and a
connection to popular retail items, such as acai bowls, plays an important role in
adoption.
In her 2013 dissertation at Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, researcher Amber C.
Summers suggests that some of the major obstacles preventing the successful
implementation of vegetarian meals in a school setting include increased food waste,
drop in participation rates, negative public and parent/personnel attitudes, and
preexisting food preferences. Indicators of successful adoption of vegetarian meals or
reduced meat options include community support, involvement in school nutrition
initiatives, providing choice and variety, presentation of vegetarian items, and flexibility
of meal plans.
To gain a better understanding of best practices, successes, and challenges with
Meatless Monday initiatives in real world school settings, our research team spoke with

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representatives from two California school districts: San Diego Unified School District
and Santa Barbara Unified School District.

San Diego Unified School District
The second largest school district in California, San Diego Unified School District
(SDUSD), includes more than 226 educational facilities with 13,559 employees that
serve 121,000 students in preschool through grade 12. The Food and Nutrition Services
(FNS) department, with a staff of approximately 1,400 team members, provides around
135,000 meals and snacks to students and staff every day (San Diego Unified School
District, n.d.).
The school district’s FNS department boasts a number of nationally recognized meal
programs including Farm to School, California Thursdays, Breakfast in the Classroom,
and many others. Meatless items have been a part of the menu since 2013 and now
every elementary school serves an entirely meatless menu on Mondays in addition to
providing at least one meatless item every other day of the week. We spoke with
Melanie Moyer, Menu Systems Development Dietitian, and Tara McNamara, Marketing
Coordinator, to gain a better understanding of the implementation and genesis of San
Diego Unified’s meatless initiatives.
Stakeholder Engagement
Partnership with an outside organization has been a part of
“We really like to be
SDUSD’s meatless campaign since its inception in 2013,
innovative and forward
being the result of a collaboration between the Humane
thinking.”
Society of the U.S. (HSUS) and the district’s Marketing
Coordinator who preceded McNamara. HSUS’s involvement
with SDUSD was part of a larger nationwide effort to encourage school districts to adopt
meatless items onto their menus. The program first began at elementary schools with a
veggie burger and then expanded to every grade and increased in its regularity. HSUS
helped usher in meatless menu items at SDUSD through presentations and hands-on
cooking demonstrations with FNS staff, and they continued to engage the district with
meatless recipes and promotional events.
Motivation for implementing meatless items came from SDUSD’s emphasis on
innovation. The district and its FNS department are known for being on the cutting edge,
and incorporating Meatless Monday practices into their programs was yet another
instance of their willingness to try new things. Leadership often provided the incentive,
as they were behind the effort to adopt meatless items. HSUS also provided a number
of talking points. These ranged from appeals to animal welfare to the environmental

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effects of meat production. One aspect that SDUSD’s representatives found surprising,
but also quite effective in convincing FNS staff to adopt Meatless Monday practices,
was the reduction in costs by eliminating meat from their menus.
Best Practices
Maintenance of the Meatless Monday initiative has shifted over the years to include
more of an emphasis on plant-forward or plant-based options. Part of the impetus for
this change lies in the different eating habits for different age groups. As well, the HSUS
has handed off the initiative to the school district, allowing for the district to make the
program its own.
SDUSD’s former Marketing Coordinator, who was originally involved with implementing
the initiative, is no longer with the district. Now Tara McNamara holds that role, and she
has continued with meatless options, albeit with a somewhat shifted focus. The official
Meatless Monday branding has been used less in recent years, with the emphasis now
being placed on plant-forward and plant-based options. Of course, the extent to which
the official Meatless Monday logo is used is largely determined by the composition of
the menu and the age group that is being served. At SDUSD, Meatless Monday
branding is used more often at the elementary school level, where an entirely meatless
menu is served every Monday. At middle and high schools, where they may only have
one or two meatless options, they like to use the terms plant-based or plant-forward
because many of the students are actually vegan.
Another caveat of the older grade levels is the addition of customizable menu items.
SDUSD has built some customizability into the menu by rolling out “build your own”
concepts. This often takes the form of a salad bar, where students are provided with the
main components of a meal and then given the freedom to add various other toppings.
Depending on the final composition of these meals, students could easily end up with a
meal that may or may not include meat.
Education and Information Sharing
While not directly tied to the Meatless Monday initiative, another strategy that has
proven to aid the adoption of plant-based menu items in the district is the nutrition
education and promotion conducted by SDUSD’s Farm-to-School Specialist, Janelle
Manzano. Although the focus is often on local food, her lesson plans and school
assemblies incorporate a lot of education around increasing student consumption of
fruits and vegetables. Her work is also crucial to getting the message home to parents,
as she works closely with school principals to highlight the great things happening at the
district’s FNS department. McNamara also takes steps to make sure that information

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about the school menus get back to parents by notifying them of menu changes and
highlighting certain items throughout the year.
Lessons Learned
As with all school meal programs throughout the country, the COVID-19 pandemic
significantly disrupted SDUSD’s FNS department. The change from a school setting to
home distributed meals often meant that meatless initiatives took the backseat to the
urgent food insecurity created by the pandemic. Nevertheless, meatless items were a
well ingrained part of the process at SDUSD before the pandemic, and the FNS
department has continued to serve entirely meatless meals at all elementary schools
through the district on the first day of the week.
Other challenges identified by Melanie and Tara include different degrees of adoption
among FNS staff and the constraints around school food, especially with regards to time
and money. Some staff were more likely to incorporate meatless items in their menu
due to their own personal beliefs around meat consumption. The size of a school
feeding program and the budgetary restrictions of that program also came into play.
Large schools with razor thin margins and little time to try something new were
understandably hesitant to adopt Meatless Monday initiatives.
Even in schools where meatless menu items are regularly featured, participation rates
are often low. Elementary, middle, and high schools all face challenges with collecting
data on the success of meatless initiatives. For elementary schools, the entire menu is
meatless on Mondays, in effect putting participation at 100%. For the upper grades,
customization proves to be one of the reasons meatless items are hard to track. Food
service staff largely lose their ability to know what is on each plate by giving the option
of choice to students. Both Moyer and McNamara expressed a desire to conduct a
detailed assessment of meatless items in the future.

Santa Barbara Unified School District
200 miles up U.S. Route 101 from San Diego is the Santa Barbara Unified School
District (SBUSD). A much smaller district than San Diego Unified, SBUSD serves
around 14,000 students with 23 educational facilities. Their Food Services (FS)
department is currently offering free breakfast and lunch for the 2021/22 school year.
Other programs include from-scratch cooking with an emphasis on procurement of
ingredients from local farmers and businesses, and a vegetarian/vegan entree offered
daily (Santa Barbara Unified School District, n.d.). We spoke with Chef Nancy Weiss,
former Director of Food Services at SBUSD, about the district’s meatless initiatives
under her tenure.

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Chef Nancy played a big role in the implementation and maintenance of the Meatless
Monday initiatives at SBUSD. A professional chef by trade who used to run her own
restaurant, she was able to bring culinary skills and business experience along with her
as Director of Food Services. Coming out of the restaurant industry, she viewed her
time with school food as an opportunity to educate school kids about the connection
between health and food.
Stakeholder Engagement
Chef Nancy highlighted how the introduction of meatless items at SBUSD was the result
of a coalition of forces. One of them came in the form of philanthropy with Paul Orfalea
and the Orfalea Fund School Food Initiative. The School Food Initiative hired chef
educators and hosted boot camps where SBUSD staff were trained on from-scratch
cooking techniques. With support from the Orfalea Fund and her own background in the
restaurant industry, Chef Nancy was in a prime position to initiate new programs into
SBUSD’s Food Services department. The atmosphere of Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move
campaign and increased availability of USDA grants were also mentioned as key
motivators.
Best Practices and Lessons Learned
Chef Nancy identified three major components to SBUSD’s successful maintenance of
meatless menu items in the district:
• financial sustainability
• administrative support
• creative menu items that are driven by student participation
Citing her experience as a restaurateur, she was able to turn from-scratch cooking and
increased fruit and vegetable consumption into a money maker. She realized that her
staff were integral to the support of a robust Food Services (FS) department, so she
worked to get more employees hired full-time. This benefited the employees by giving
them access to benefits and increased wages, but also improved the quality of the food
being served, as full-time staff were able to invest their time and skills into more
involved cooking methods. She was also able to negotiate sound contracts with local
farmers and thereby keep costs manageable. Additionally, she creatively harnessed
USDA programs like the National School Lunch Program and Child and Adult Care
Food Program to develop partnerships with the local Boys & Girls Clubs that put more
money into the FS department.

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None of this would have been possible, Chef Nancy
notes, without administrative support at the
superintendent and school principal level. Supplemental
programs like school gardens and Breakfast in the
Classroom helped reinforce many of the things Chef Nancy was pursuing during lunch
and afterschool. Many of the creative ideas she was coming up with would have
unrealized potential without the support and trust of the superintendent and other school
leaders at the time.
“It’s not hard, but it takes
the superintendent.”

That trust was reinforced by high participation rates -- the gold standard of every school
food service department. Painfully aware of the direct relationship between participation
rates and funding, Chef Nancy made sure that the meatless items she was serving
would be palatable for students who may not be used to eating plant-based diets.
Multiculturalism was incorporated into her menus and plant-based meat substitutes like
Impossible Burgers and soy chili were featured.
Many of the reasons for the success of meatless initiatives at SBUSD proved to be a
double-edged sword, and eventually became challenges. When the COVID-19
pandemic hit the district, Chef Nancy was no longer with the school district. Without her
steadfast support and creativity with the program, Meatless Monday has fallen by the
wayside. A change in key administrative roles and a different vision by the new FS
Director have meant that priorities have shifted away from the meatless initiative.
As discussed above, the dietary preferences of schoolchildren are one of the main
challenges SBUSD faced when implementing meatless items into their menus.
Participation in school meals is what drives the FS program, and few food service
directors are willing to tolerate low numbers for long. Introducing menu items that are
too unfamiliar for students is a common pitfall that Chef Nancy identified. One parent’s
negative criticism can derail the whole thing if participation numbers aren’t there to
justify a meatless item. A great program can fall apart much faster than it was put
together. Chef Nancy believes that the model she fashioned for her FS department
really worked because kids were enjoying the food, their numbers were good, and they
were making money.

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Recommendations and Best Practices
The purpose of this report was to analyze best practices for Meatless Monday
implementation in three different settings in mid-sized U.S. cities: 1) non-profit and
volunteer-led initiatives, 2) local governments, and 3) schools. The ultimate goal was to
generate recommendations for best practices of Meatless Monday implementation
strategies.
Advocates for reducing meat consumption can utilize these recommendations to
harness the national Meatless Monday campaign in the overall goal of reducing
society’s meat consumption and ultimately meat production. We hope these
recommendations inform methods to create a holistic approach to reducing overall meat
consumption while laying the groundwork for best practices moving forward.
After examining Meatless Monday initiatives in three different institutional settings
across seven different case studies, we derived key recommendations for a successful
initiative.
Table 3 summarizes the best practices observed across the Meatless Monday case
studies. Many of these best practices apply to all three settings explored and are
highlighted in blue. However, additional best practices for each setting are also listed in
the table and are coded by color.

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Table 3: Meatless Monday Best Practices in U.S. Mid-Sized Cities: Three Different Settings

All Categories of
Implementation

(Non-profit and
volunteer-led, local
government, and
schools)

Stakeholder Engagement

Education & Info Sharing

General

Engage multiple organizations for
increased reach & impact, connection
to the national Meatless Monday
campaign, education & info sharing:
● Non-profit/civic organizations
● Animal welfare groups
● City government
● Sports teams
● Hospitals
● Schools
● Universities
● Restaurants

Consider the ideological
makeup of target community;
tailor messaging accordingly,
emphasizing various benefits
(health, environment, animal
welfare, cost savings, etc.)

Seek participant feedback,
respond and adjust
programming accordingly

Understand partners’ organizational
goals, tailor relationship building and
messaging accordingly

Use multiple communication
avenues:
● Print
● Social Media
● Newsletters
● Hands-on cooking
events & classes
● Recipe ideas

Have enticing, creative,
appealing, tasty meatless
menu items and pair nontraditional items with more
popular ones

Engage local chefs
● Recipe development
● Campaign promotion
● Cooking demos & events

Educational & social events
encourage participation:
● “Lunch and learns”
● Various voices highlighted
as presenters: farmers,
chefs, experts, etc.
● Potlucks
● Cooking demonstrations

Successful campaigns engage
Meatless Monday “champions” at
multiple levels

Emphasize reducing meat
consumption rather than
eliminating completely

Ensure participants’ specific needs
are respected (food handlers,
administrators, consumers)
Collaborate with the national
Meatless Monday campaign

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Non-profit &
Volunteer-led

Obtain endorsement from an elected
body (city council, board of health,
etc.)

Local
Government

Animal rights organizations
campaigning at city-council
encourages councils to adopt citywide resolutions

Time-bound challenges
encourage high
participation rates (e.g.,
eating a plant-based diet
for two weeks,
12-week Meatless Monday
challenge, etc.)
Provide marketing materials to
highlight the benefits of
reduced meat consumption
(environmental, health, animal
welfare, etc.)

Dedicated staff in charge
of food purchasing

Dedicated Meatless
Monday budget from the
city council

Schools

Engage farm-to-school professionals
in promotion
● Lesson plans
● Communicating with parents
on benefits of plant-based
menu items

Communicate environmental
benefits of reduced meat
consumption via signage in
cafeteria

Consider the dietary
preferences of school-aged
children when developing
menu items:
● Plant-based meat
substitutes are a good
transition
● Develop menu items inline with cultural makeup of student population

Engagement with food service
directors and staff:
● Provide presentations,
trainings, recipes, and
demonstrations in vegetarian
cooking
● Emphasize the reductions in
cost from meatless meals

Younger Students:
● Newsletter for parents
emphasizing the benefits of
meatless
● Notify parents of menu
changes and highlight such
changes at “back to
school” nights and other
school events
● Educational engagement
activities such as taste
tests (Fitzpatrick, 2018)

Full-time food service staff
can invest more time into
from-scratch recipes

Engage students in developing
creative menu items

Older students:
● Link meatless options to
popular retail items such as
acai bowls (Fitzpatrick,
2018)

Allow for meal
customization, particularly
with older students

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Successful campaigns have school
administrations’ full support

Promote Meatless Monday in
school assemblies
Tie Meatless Monday
messaging to existing school
nutrition initiatives (Summers,
2013)

Overall
Defining and Measuring Success
Whether it is raising awareness about the impact of eating meat, or actually decreasing
meat consumption in the community, each organization must define success of their
Meatless Monday campaign early on so that they can measure the progress of their
programming. This definition may evolve over time, but always having an agreed upon
way to measure success enables organizations to check in periodically to ensure they
are on the right track. This definition of success can inspire implementation strategies
by considering the goal and working backward from there.
When defining a “successful” Meatless Monday initiative, our research team developed
themes to ground the findings. A successful initiative is still active, receives funding,
raises awareness about benefits of plant-based diets, and is making a measurable
impact. These criteria measure success and can be applied to all initiatives, no matter
the form of implementation.

More Than Passing a Resolution
In the case of Berkeley, California, the City Council passed a Meatless Monday
resolution and agreed to partner with the national Meatless Monday campaign to
utilize marketing materials and set up a certification program for businesses and
restaurants. This case therefore shows the importance of not just passing a resolution,
but also including language about who, or what entity, will be responsible for program
management to ensure that there are actions attached to such a resolution. This
highlights the need to have a system in place, staff members responsible, and/or a
budget involved for successful campaign implementation.

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Stakeholder Engagement
Organizational Collaboration and Network Building
It is critical for an institution or organization leading a Meatless Monday initiative to
collaborate with other organizations that have aligned goals or are operating similar
meat consumption reduction initiatives. Connections allow groups to pool resources,
share their successes and failures with one another, and expand the network of
participants. This can come in the form of connecting across cities or connecting with
groups locally.
For example, HAP made it a priority at the beginning of their initiative to form
relationships with members of the City Council. All it took was one connection in the
city’s Human Resources Department to introduce them to more people working in the
city and widely expand their outreach. By recognizing the value in building networks and
partnerships, campaigns can reach as many people as possible and make a significant
impact on community meat consumption habits.

Community Involvement
Not only are connections an important part of a successful Meatless Monday initiative,
but community collaboration is essential. For example, collaboration with Meatless
Monday “champions” or other well-known and respected members of the community is
an effective strategy for attracting participants and growing interest in Meatless Monday.
Creating community within the initiative is critical in building the foundation of the
movement. This element contributes to longevity and increased participation rates.
This outcome was demonstrated in the case of Aspen, Colorado, where one local
community champion was able to grow the campaign to the point of recognition as “The
Nation’s First Meatless Monday Community” (Elam, 2011). Collaborating with the
community will help the initiative build a name for itself, develop an understanding of the
values of the community, and learn the most effective ways to grow participation rates in
the initiative. Another example of this is seen within the Meatless Monday initiative in
Needham, Massachusetts where the leading organization collaborated with a wellknown chef in the community for one of their events. This turned out to be their most
popular event, attracting new participants who then became involved in the Meatless
Monday initiative and learned more about the impact of reducing meat in their diet.

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Education and Information Sharing
Values Assessment
Understanding the values and perceptions that a community holds helps shape the
approach of Meatless Monday initiatives to yield success. In the Norwegian Armed
Forces initiatives explored in the literature review, the soldiers’ values of power and
masculinity were challenged by removing their choice to eat meat, resulting in very little
support. In the case studies explored in this report, the values of the target communities
were often already in line with reducing meat consumption and therefore it was easier to
implement the Meatless Monday initiatives. For example, Berkeley, California and
Needham, Massachusetts are both cities known for their liberal political leanings, high
average incomes, and commitment to sustainability.
It is recommended that Meatless Monday campaigns run a values assessment on the
target community to see where the dominant values line-up with such campaigns, and
where a conflict of values might be. Consider the reasons why people choose not to eat
meat (health, environmental impact, animal welfare, cost, etc.), as outlined in the
literature review. Focusing on shared values will help with Meatless Monday
implementation, communication, education, and program longevity. This can be seen in
the case of HAP. Though HAP as an organization is primarily interested in animal
welfare, they chose to emphasize the health benefits of going meatless, recognizing the
goals of the city’s Human Resources Department that ended up being their biggest
champion at the city level.

Tailoring Messaging
Based on the values assessment, it may be strategic to use different branding than
“Meatless Monday” that is more suitable to the organization, audience, or location.
Depending on the community, however, the recognition that comes along with Meatless
Monday branding may be beneficial. As was demonstrated in the case of Pittsburgh,
there was some backlash to the “meatless” branding, which was interpreted as having a
negative connotation. In response, HAP altered their branding to “Lean and Green,”
though the programming remained intact. A review of the literature around Meatless
Monday campaigns also found that some groups resist such campaigns (Chan &
Ramsey, 2021; Milford & Kildal, 2019; Lombardini et al., 2013). Campaigns can preempt
potential resistance through being clear with communicating the intentions behind the
campaign and why Meatless Monday is being pursued, whether for environmental,
health, animal welfare, or other reasons. Additionally, a focus on reducing meat

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consumption rather than eliminating it was also found to be strategic in several of our
case studies.

Engaging Educational Activities
Hands-on education can improve engagement by teaching participants the importance
of reducing meat consumption, how to prepare vegetarian meals, and build a
community that supports the Meatless Monday initiative. For example, HAP hosted
several Lunch & Learns for city employees to better understand the benefits of Meatless
Monday. We also saw the importance of engaging activities with Aspen, Colorado’s
community potlucks.

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Conclusion
The purpose of this report is to analyze best practices of Meatless Monday initiatives in
six mid-sized U.S. cities across three different levels of implementation: 1) non-profit
and volunteer-led initiatives, 2) local government-initiated campaigns, and 3) schools, to
produce recommendations that further enhance current Meatless Monday efforts.
Through a literature review, interviews with past and current stakeholders, and case
studies, our research team developed a set of best practices for Meatless Monday
campaigns in six mid-sized U.S. cities. Overall, this research helped give a holistic view
of current stakeholders' points of view, which helped to shape these recommendations.
Organizational collaboration, community involvement, and intentional and tailored
Meatless Monday messaging were all important aspects of successful campaigns and
are strongly encouraged for a successful initiative. Connection with other Meatless
Monday initiatives and collaboration between local stakeholders is also an essential part
of the foundation for a Meatless Monday campaign. Additionally, coming up with
innovative ideas, events, and messaging can strengthen such efforts. Having intentional
messaging that matches the values of the target population helps to build buy-in with
the local community and create trusting relationships.
Though we were able to glean relevant best practices from our research, it also became
clear that the landscape of attitudes towards meat reduction in the U.S. has shifted
since the creation of the Meatless Monday campaign in 2003. These shifts have
implications for how Meatless Monday initiatives might evolve to remain relevant in the
current social and political landscape around meat reduction. These are explored below.

Rise of Meat Alternatives
With the proliferation of plant-based “meat” such as those produced by the Beyond
Meat and Impossible Foods in grocery stores and fast food chains, such alternatives are
becoming mainstream (Darmiento, 2020). Sales of the Beyond Burgers at Ralph’s
grocery store chain increased by 40% from 2019 to 2020, becoming the grocer’s
number one packaged burger patty in sales (Darmiento, 2020). Today, the plant-based
burgers are served in fast food chains around the U.S. and some McDonald’s locations
in Canada (Darmiento, 2020). Impossible Foods has similarly made headlines for
making a deal with Burger King to serve the Impossible Whopper (Burger King, 2021).
This shows that dominant attitudes towards meat reduction may be shifting, and quickly.
Cultivated meat products, which are created in a lab utilizing animal meat cells, is also a
growing industry (Good Food Institute, 2022). Such meat-alternative products are not in
fact meatless, as they are grown from animal cells (Good Food Institute, 2022),

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however they may offer a more sustainable option to traditional industrial meat
products. Therefore, term “meatless” may be becoming less relevant as meat
alternative products are innovated. Meatless Monday campaigns, consequently, may be
at a disadvantage in these trends with such branding. However, Meatless Monday may
also be able to capitalize on these alternative meat products for increased program
impact, for example, through partnering with meat alternative companies. Such a
strategy may help to bring meat enthusiasts who want to reduce meat intake but have a
hard time doing so, to a reduced meat diet. For example, a switch to plant-based meat
alternatives was found to be an important strategy in the case of the Santa Barbara
Unified School District as a means to serve familiar and culturally-appropriate recipes
with a meatless twist. This was key for building program acceptance among students.

Reducetarianism
Whole Foods has named “reducetarianism” – “reducing consumption of meat, dairy and
eggs without cutting them out completely” – as one of its top ten food trends for 2022
(Whole Foods, 2021). Blogs and newspaper articles abound with advice for would-be
vegetarians to make the transition to reducing their meat consumption, including from
the Reducetarian Foundation (Clark, 2019; Rose-Edwards, n.d.). This fits into the
literature that has found that people tend to be more open to reducing their personal
meat consumption than they are to eliminating it entirely from their diets (Corrin &
Papadopoulos, 2017). Meatless Monday campaigns can align with and be an active
voice for this trend through messaging to increase program impact.

Policy
Encouraging progress has been made in the public policy realm to nudge consumers
towards reduced-meat intake. Wilde et al. (2019) outline the four main policy options
available to governments, including local, state, and federal, that may support reduced
processed meat consumption at the population level:
1. Taxation of meat products.
Excise taxes levied on meat products have been modeled after the sugar sweetened
beverages or tobacco taxes that many states have already employed. This has been
done, for example, through including processed meat products in snack food taxes, as
Maine did in 2017.
2. Nutrition standards in child nutrition programs including the National School
Lunch Program (NSLP).

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Federal nutrition standards for such programs have a measured impact on food
consumption among the nation’s children, though standards specifically limiting meat
levels have not yet been implemented.
3. Public Service announcements (PSAs).
Such announcements have been utilized in encouraging tobacco cessation, as has
been implemented in California by the Department of Health Services.
4. Warning labels.
Because of the well-established link between processed meat products and cancer,
warning labels on meat products may be a path forward for incentivizing reduced
consumption of such products.
Additionally, several of our case studies included a city-wide resolution declaring
Meatless Mondays as a priority for cities. Though non-binding, such resolutions lend
legitimacy and incentive for participating in campaigns. Understanding such existing
policy tools will be important for encouraging reduced meat consumption going forward.
Meatless Monday campaigns should seek to align with policy makers who may be
making progress on this front already when implementing programming.
Given this broader landscape of “reducetarianism”, the increasing availability and
popularity of meat-alternatives, as well as policy-level strategies, the Meatless Monday
campaign has the opportunity to evolve its programming and messaging alongside such
progress. America’s attitudes toward meat reduction have evolved and the Meatless
Monday campaign is well-poised to be a leading voice in this arena.
Further research should be conducted examining the outcomes of Meatless Monday
initiatives on the long-term meat consumption habits of participants, as data is still
lacking in this area. Additionally, a common theme found throughout our research was
the strategy of changing the messaging of “Meatless Monday” to be more palatable for
participants, including focusing more on “plant-based” or “green” diets. Taking this
evidence into account, further research could be conducted regarding effective
messaging for encouraging long-term reduction in meat consumption.

Page | 44

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Appendix
Interview Guide
1. Who can be credited with initiating or introducing Meatless Monday to the City
Council/city management?
2. What was the motivation for participating in Meatless Monday (e.g., health,
environment, climate, animal welfare)?
3. Were there any issues or arguments raised in opposition to participation? Can you
tell me more about them? How did you address them?
4. What actions has the city taken (now or in the past) to reduce meat consumption and
encourage people to practice Meatless Monday (e.g., events, programs, or
partnerships such as Vegan Fest, community dinners, pledges, city leadership
involvement, institutional outreach such as schools, hospitals and corporations, etc.)?
a. How were/are they promoted/communicated?
b. In your experience, what was the most effective communication tool used for
getting the word out to your community?
c. Are these actions still taking place?
d. Is there any data that assesses the effectiveness of these actions?
5. Are there any dedicated staff or a dedicated budget to Meatless Monday in your city?
6. Who are the key stakeholders involved in Meatless Monday in your city (e.g., city
council, schools, hospitals, restaurants, NGOs, communities)? How were they
involved? Are they still involved? Have any joined since the Meatless Monday
initiative began?
7. Aside from Meatless Monday, has the city adopted any other policies aimed at
improving nutrition or encouraging shifts toward more sustainable diets?

About the Authors
Fran Alvarado
Fran Alvarado is a Sustainability Coordinator with Sodexo for Campus Dining at
Northern Arizona University. As a recent graduate from NAU with a Master’s in
Sustainable Communities, her thesis focused on addressing plastic waste in Flagstaff,
AZ. She researched national policies, limitations in public education and outreach, case
studies, and state and local political relationships to create a recommendation of
policies. She spent the past year as a FoodCorps Service Member in a local elementary
school. There she created a garden program, piloted a composting collection system,
and started a fresh produce weekly pick-up program.
Jane Coghlan
Jane Coghlan is an undergraduate student majoring in Sustainable Food Systems and
minoring in Nutrition and Healthy Living at Arizona State University. She is particularly
passionate about regenerative agriculture and sustainable biological systems. She is
the Vice President for the Gardens at ASU Club and a student worker for the ASU
Swette Center for Sustainable Food Systems. Jane hopes to pursue a career in food
and agriculture research and policy, or sustainable food production.
Dory Cooper
For the past decade, Dory Cooper has been involved with a variety of food focused nonprofit organizations working towards improving access to healthy foods for children and
families. Her passion for food policy grew during her role as a FoodCorps Service
Member where she partnered with the School Nutrition Department in Carrollton, GA to
promote the use of local foods, scratch cooking, and consumption of fruits and
vegetables. She received her undergraduate degree in Public Communication from the
University of Vermont.
Cam Petersen
Cam Petersen is a Capitol Hill staffer currently working for Congresswoman Sara
Jacobs, who represents his home district of CA-53. He discovered a deep-seated
passion for food systems, community development, and civic engagement while serving
as a U.S. Peace Corps Volunteer in Ghana. Since then, he's worked at non-profit
organizations, helped carry out a regional farm to school campaign, taught nutrition and
gardening curriculum at a rural primary school as a FoodCorps service member, and
briefly lived on a coffee farm in the mountains of Nicaragua. All of these experiences
have taught him how central food is to society and driven him to help advance
communities and build resiliency around issues concerning food security and the
environment.

Contact for more information:
Swette Center for Sustainable Food Systems
Email foodsystems@asu.edu | Website: foodsystems.asu.edu

Swette Center for Sustainable Food Systems is a unit of ASU School of Sustainability