Peabody Makes Culinary Connection With Budding High School Talent

PEABODY, MA — Peabody is looking to connect its restaurants and future culinary and hospitality workers through a Chamber of Commerce program with Peabody Veterans Memorial High School and Essex North Shore Tech.

The goal of the program is improve the influx of industry workers as restaurants look to hire, develop and retain staff as the COVID-19 pandemic wanes.

"This initial forum is designed simply to establish relationships between our member businesses and culinary staff at Peabody High and Essex Tech," said Beth Amico, Executive Director of the Peabody Area Chamber of Commerce. "Ultimately, we hope to create an employment pipeline between the schools and the restaurants which will benefit students and business owners alike."

There will be a networking kickoff event to celebration the partnerships on Tuesday at 9:30 a.m. at the Wiggin Auditorium at Peabody City Hall.

"Many of our restaurants in Peabody are small, family-run businesses which have really struggled in recent years," Peabody Mayor Ted Bettencourt. "Now they face staffing challenges heading into the summer.

"I think it's important that we continue to support them during these difficult times while also helping to provide our students with real-world industry experience."

Bettencourt's office said the connection is part of the city's ongoing commitment to its restaurants during the pandemic, which in 2020 included a plan to provide 18 restaurants with expanded outdoor seating capacity so they could increase revenue and hire back laid-off workers.

(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)