celebrating our 2025 progress
Meat Me In The Middle is serving up a new approach to eating in South Orange and Maplewood (SOMA), New Jersey.
In our first year, we’re proud to have established ourselves as a positive fixture in the SOMA community. We’ve built name recognition, accumulated champions and partners, performed rigorous research, secured fiscal sponsorship, and established our brand with pro bono support. Consider those 2025 achievements as appetizers for the feast to come.
The main course? In 2026 and beyond, our goal is to lead SOMA residents to recognize animal agriculture’s contribution to climate change, and inspire them to choose meatless alternatives more frequently—without taking away anyone’s choices.
MMITM table at South Orange Community Day
2025 accomplishments
We implemented a SOMA-wide survey in May 2025 to give us the evidence base for a planned 2026 social and behavior change communications (SBCC) campaign that will feature targeted, catchy, repeated messages about meat reduction. We sought at least 500 respondents for the survey, advertising it on social media and distributing flyers in public places, to individual residences, and at public events.
We are pleased to have far exceeded our participation goal: 620 people took the seven- to ten-minute survey, giving us thousands of data points. Our survey research was essential for identifying target audiences and crafting resonant targeted meat reduction messages. And just as importantly, it gave us a baseline from which to eventually measure the project’s impact on habits and attitudes related to meat consumption and the environment.
At a follow-up focus group in November 2025, members of our identified target audiences provided their thoughts on message themes that Meat Me In The Middle produced based on our survey data. The focus group offered valuable new insights into our audience members’ motivations and preferences. Those insights are guiding our campaign development.
Another big accomplishment in 2025 was obtaining support from a variety of local leaders, which has paved the way for funding, recognition, and community-wide receptivity to our meat reduction messages. These leaders include elected officials and civil servants; the government-appointed environmental commissions in Maplewood and South Orange; faculty and students at Seton Hall University; local business associations; and sustainability-focused nonprofits and businesses.
MMITM volunteers designed our website
a taste of what’s coming
Meat Me In The Middle will be offering a menu of fun activities during what we’re calling “Veggie Vebruary” in 2026. We’ll screen a documentary to spark a discussion about why and how to rethink meat-focused diets, and promote a SOMA-wide challenge for community members to try new approaches together. Simple, high-protein, meatless “recipes of the week” will offer further inspiration.
Our team will continue to chew on our SBCC campaign design through the first half of 2026, and we’ll launch it toward the end of the year, setting the stage for a festive “Restaurant Week” that we are planning for 2027.
The 2027 Restaurant Week will conclude the first phase of Meat Me In The Middle. SOMA restaurants will showcase their meatless menu offerings, and ideally also add vegetarian and vegan dishes to their menus. If we are successful in driving a strong, sustained demand among SOMA restaurant customers with our SBCC campaign, then we anticipate that restaurants will respond with a sustained supply of appetizing meatless menu options that continues after Restaurant Week is over.
A restaurant in South Orange, NJ
meat us in the middle
Launching a new nonprofit project has been exhilarating for the Meat Me In The Middle team. We are so grateful for the volunteers who generously donate their time and their huge talent; donors who give our work greater reach; community leaders who give us a spot at the table to make our case; and the people of SOMA who respond with interest and open minds to our work.
Most people don’t have the political power or vast resources needed to address climate change at scale, but when individuals take small actions together as a community, we can have a significant impact. New norms around sustainable eating can start in Maplewood and South Orange, where people care deeply for our people and our planet.
The less meat we all eat, the better for fighting the climate crisis—and that’s true even if meat is still a part of your diet. Wield your fork wisely, and meat us in the middle!