Food & Beverage

Noodles & Co honoring Pride Month with crispy LTO

Provided by Noodles.

June 6, 2023

Noodles & Co is celebrating Pride Month by bringing back Pride Crispy for a limited time and pledging to donate up to $30,000 to Out & Equal, an organization advocating exclusively for LGBTQIA+ workplace equality, with help from Pride Crispy sales, throughout the month of June.

The Pride Crispy, a rainbow rice crispy treat made in-house with melted butter, marshmallows, rice cereal with added rainbow cereal is available for purchase through June 30.

"For us, Pride Month means continuing to establish an environment where all feel welcomed and cared for, a value that is at the center of everything we do at Noodles," Sue Petersen, Panera's executive vice president of inclusion, diversity and people, said in a company press release. "We are taking direct action through our Out & Equal give back to advance our inclusion and diversity efforts and to further the mission of LGBTQIA+ workplace equality by educating our team members and guests."

Since starting its partnership with Out & Equal, Panera has donated $45,000.

Message in a Crispy
Noodles is also promoting education and LGBTQIA+ awareness by placing an interactive QR code on the nutritional sticker of each crispy, called Message in a Crispy. The QR code drives guests to noodles.com/pride where they can learn about LGBTQIA+ facts, history, and commemorate the message that Pride is a celebration of love. In addition, Noodles is introducing the Pride Crispy Cam, encouraging LGBTQIA+ couples to celebrate their love and affection with the world, by submitting a photo for the brand to share on its Instagram stories.

"Our approach to inclusion and diversity is to listen, learn, then act, and we care deeply about our responsibility to elevate our team members' voices," Ashton Crowther, senior manager of inclusion and diversity, said in the release. "At Noodles, we have a dedicated Inclusion & Diversity Advisory Council and established a DEI newsletter and inbox to receive real-time feedback from our team members. The concept for the Pride Crispy came from a team member and we will continue to foster an environment where our actions are directly influenced by our team members."

To cultivate an environment where all feel welcomed and safe, several of Noodles' employee benefits directly impact its LGBTQIA+ team members, including six weeks of paid parental leave, surrogacy, and adoption assistance of up to $10,000 as well as gender-neutral bathrooms, Crowther said in the release. Through the Noodles Self-ID program, team members are also encouraged to list their pronouns on name badges so all team members, guests, and the community can properly address them. Added uniform options are also available with inclusive messaging, like "All Noodles Welcome." Noodles also partnered with the National Restaurant Association to provide training on Understanding Unconscious Bias in Restaurants.

Noodles & Co has over 450 restaurants.