NYC News
Russ & Daughters teams up with actor Jake Gyllenhaal
August 18, 2020, 10:56.38 am ET
Photo: Jake Gyllenhaal
Russ & Daughters co-owners Josh Russ Tupper and Niki Russ Federman are launching a fundraiser for Independent Restaurant Coalition, with the support of actor Jake Gyllenhaal. The 106 Year-old culinary mainstay is selling custom-made T-shirts made famous by Gyllenhaal’s “Handstand Challenge” video. Profits from the sales will go to the Independent Restaurant Coalition’s advocacy efforts as the group fights for 500,000 independent bars and restaurants across the country devastated by the COVID-19 economic shutdown. Free shipping in the U.S. is being donated by Goldbelly.
“New York City will not be the same if our favorite restaurants go away,” said Jake Gyllenhaal, prominent actor who starred in films like Brokeback Mountain (2005), Nightcrawler (2014), and Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019). “I can’t imagine our city without Russ & Daughters, just the same way countless small restaurants, bars, coffee shops, and distilleries across the country form the backbone of their own communities.
“After 106 years in operation, there has never been a more critical moment for independent eateries like ours than right now,” said Niki Russ Federman, fourth-generation co-owner of Russ & Daughters. “Our small business has seen so much – war and peace, booms and depressions – but we’ve never seen anything like this. The fallout from this virus is an unprecedented attack on every family-owned business like ours across the country, and the Independent Restaurant Coalition has been on the front lines fighting to save our industry. We’re excited to be doing our part to make sure America’s 500,000 small bars and restaurants, and the 11 million workers they employ, are being heard by our lawmakers.”
Russ & Daughters is a New York culinary and cultural icon, known for the highest quality appetizing foods: smoked fish, caviar, bagels, bialys, babka, and other traditional baked goods. The home of bagels and lox since 1914, Russ & Daughters has been continuously owned and operated by four generations of the Russ family.
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