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How you can empower women next time you dine out

Posted at 4:52 PM, Mar 01, 2018
and last updated 2018-03-01 18:52:43-05

How about using your phone or computer to empower women? That's what one app and website are hoping you'll do when you dine out, for women's history month.

From the hostess stand to the kitchen, there isn't a part of Racine's, an American-style food  restaurant in Denver, Lee Goodfriend doesn't know. That's because she owns it.

"It feels fantastic," Goodfriend says. "I love my restaurant I love being a woman entrepreneur."

Goodfriend has seen things change drastically during her decades in the business.

"When I started out in the restaurant business in 1971 there were virtually no women in the restaurant business that owned the restaurants," Goodfriend says. "Except maybe with their husbands."

Not anymore. And now all restaurants in the country that are owned or co-owned by a woman, or have kitchens run by a women are being highlighted in a new way. 

Grubhub partnered with Women Chefs & Restaurateurs to launch RestaurantHER. You put in your zip code and it shows you all the women led businesses in your area.

"I highly recommend it," Goodfriend says.

Goodfriend says it's not only good for people who want patronize women led restaurants, but be employed by them.

"If I were a young girl starting out I'd want to maybe work for a woman and see learn from her and then start my own restaurant," Goodfriend says.

Still, only 20 percent of chefs in the US are women. Grubhub hopes the RestaurantHER initiative will raise awareness about gender equality in the industry.

Goodfriend hopes it'll show other women what's possible.

"At my old age I like the idea of being a role model for other women so they can see that you can do it," Goodfriend says. "And that you can be in charge."