How the meal fund actually works.

The mechanics are simple and stated in one line: $8 of every $20 subscription is earmarked monthly for hunger relief and pooled toward the $50,000/year commitment our future hunger-relief partner requires for a formal corporate partnership. Until we cross that threshold, the reserved fund is held and disclosed; once we cross it, meals ship through the partner we select at $0.80 each and real partner receipts publish.

The specific flow: when Stripe processes your $20 charge, we immediately record $8 in a separate ledger earmarked for the meal fund. This is not a promise or a probabilistic reservation — it's a specific number tied to your specific charge. Refunds unwind it; failed charges never enter it.

On the last calendar day of the month, we total the earmarked amount across every active subscription and publish a monthly fund report: the balance held, the amount added that month, cumulative meals reserved, and progress toward the $50,000/year partnership threshold. This report is LADLE-issued (not a partner receipt) — until the threshold clears, the partner is still being selected, not an active integration. A partner reference number will populate the ledger the month the partnership activates.

The math for meals reserved: total earmarked amount divided by $0.80 (our working per-meal peg). If the selected partner's per-meal cost differs from the working peg, we recalculate against the new number in the same month. There's no "$0.80" enshrined in our contract with anyone — we peg to their live published price so the reserved fund translates cleanly the day the partnership activates.

Your personal ledger — the My Table screen inside the product — shows the specific number of meals your subscription has reserved that month, tied to the same fund report as the public ledger. Same source of truth, different granularity.