Visitors at the national parks we operate and provide food services are interested in knowing where there food comes from and what’s in it. And when it comes to the meals they order, they want to know even more.

“They might ask if the produce is organic or eggs are cage-free. They want to know the difference between a king salmon and a silver salmon,” said Michael Deighton, General Manager of Lake Crescent Lodge, one of the four properties we operate along the Olympic Peninsula that includes a three-star certified restaurant from the Green Restaurant Association.

Transparency in food is something people care more and more about today. People want to know the story behind the food – what farm it comes from, how long the farmer has been in business, where the fish are running, how the fish are caught. And for visitors to a landmark like Olympic National Park, it’s not just information. Knowing that story becomes part of their travel and experience.

“Sourcing locally provides our guests the best of what the area has to offer,” says Paula Beck, our Director of Sales and Marketing for the Olympic Peninsula. “Fresh flavors while also reducing our carbon footprint.”

On the peninsula, we have partnered with Key City Fish Company in an effort that supports the mission and expectations of those properties, where about 65 percent of the products purchased are required to be locally sourced. Our team at Lake Crescent also works with the other properties – Sol Duc Hot Springs Resort, Lake Quinault Lodge and Log Cabin Resort -- to procure and source local foods with Key City.

“Aramark’s been given a tremendous opportunity by the National Parks Service in trusting us to deliver upon their sustainable initiatives and preserve this land,” says Beck. “We’ve had the opportunity to be innovative and creative in coming up with new ideas of how to deliver on our mutual objectives.”

“On Aramark’s part, I believe it’s an investment in our community,” says John-Paul Davies, General Manager of Key City. “They’re coming to the Olympic Peninsula to invest in locally sourced and sustainable food products...we can get salmon and halibut from the dock to the restaurant and on the plate in just two days.”

Key City supports our commitments by offering products sourced directly from fishermen and farms in the area. Located in Port Townsend, Washington on the Northeast corner of the Olympic Peninsula, Key City offers seafood from the shellfish beds of the Hood Canal to the remote fishing port of Neah Bay. It also offers items from a community of small local family farms, including Mount Townsend Creamery, Spring Rain Farm, which offers organic free-range chicken, and even Chanterelle mushrooms that are harvested in the wild.

By working with food vendors like Key City, our team can describe to customers the farm where a pig was raised, talk about short route the food traveled to the Lodge, or discuss a particular farmer’s belief in raising organic food.

“Key City offers a very special thing,” Deighton said.