An Altona North cafe is offering 10 meals for $15 under an Australian-first pilot.
UrCommunity co-founder and executive director Peter Malliaros said his cafe, attached to Altona North library and a joint initiative with Hobsons Bay council, was “about food security for the community”.
“We believe that food is not a luxury, it’s a human right, and so we’ve set up like a gym membership,” he said. “You pay $15 a week and that entitles you to all our specials, including 10 meals, which is five continental breakfasts and five buffet dinners.
“With every subscription or membership that we get someone to sign up on, it actually helps us feed more people who are at or below the poverty line – so it’s a win, win, win.
“We’re looking to sign up a minimum of 100 and that actually underpins the cafe operations; 200 would allow us the flexibility of opening up at another site.”
Mr Malliaros said most customers were taking away their dinners and could even collect five dinners at once.
He said the food was donated from a variety of sources. Depending on what’s on hand, dinner meals might include creamy carbonara with roast potatoes and salad, or chicken curry with rice and roasted carrots.
“There’s a 100 per cent money-back guarantee,” he said. “You only have to sign up for a week … if, for argument’s sake, you tried it out for a week and you weren’t happy, we just give you your 15 bucks back – it’s that simple.”
From February, the UrCommunity cafe plans to host free weekly dinners.
Hobsons Bay mayor Sandra Wilson said the council was supporting UrCommunity in providing low-cost meals because it was a challenge for many people to find affordable meals.
“It’s a great service and we recommend people take advantage of it,” she said.
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