Break the Chain, a student group at Georgia Southern University, has recently created a program to encourage students to eat in downtown Statesboro.

“Our program began around the second week of this semester. The program is called Break the Chain, and we are basically trying to get Georgia Southern students to eat at local restaurants and get away from chain restaurants,” Director of Human Resources Joel Wituka said.

The Downtown Development Authority is sponsoring this program.

“The Downtown Statesboro Development Authority set up this program to encourage and inform Georgia Southern students on an experience of dining in the city of Statesboro with something that they can’t eat anywhere else in town or in any other community,” Executive Director of Downtown Statesboro Development Authority Alan Muldrew said.

Muldrew supports the program because it will inform students of local restaurants that they may not know of.

“We have fourteen restaurants that are unique to our area. We felt like the Downtown Development Authority would be ashamed to have a student come here for four or five years and not eat in one of these fourteen restaurants,” Muldrew said.

As an incentive to take part in the program, Break the Chain will be hosting raffles for an iPad and VISA gift cards, Wituka said.

“There are cards that we give out for free to students with the fourteen restaurants on the back. Some restaurants will give you ten percent off your meal. Every time you walk into a restaurant, they will stamp the card for a raffle that takes place every two weeks beginning March first,” Wituka said.

“If you have gone to three of the restaurants every two weeks, you can win an I-pad or a visa gift card with about twenty dollars in it. The meeting on March 1 will be a freebie to cardholders. They will get a any restaurant stamped,” Wituka said.

The program aims to inspire students to venture off from chain restaurants by offering coupons and discounts to students to most of these fourteen restaurants.

“A lot of students think that places that are local are expensive. In four of these restaurants you can definitely eat there and get a stamp for fewer than five dollars. A lot of the places have reasonable prices to begin with,” Wituka said.

This experience to eat out in downtown Statesboro can be a topic of conversation, Wituka said.

“It gives students a new experience and once they graduate, they can talk to other alumni and ask if they have ever tried one of these amazing restaurants,” Wituka said.

“You’ll never get an opportunity to eat at one of these restaurants upon graduation if you leave Statesboro,” Wituka said.

As the program, Break the Chain, would say: “Are you breaking the chain?”