Privacy Notice

Effective Date: January 19, 2021

This Privacy Notice (the “Notice”) describes the information we collect from and about you and the business you represent during your visit to Darden’s international franchising website, located at www.franchisedarden.com (the “Site”). It also describes how we use information about you, and with whom we share it. This Notice applies only to those Darden interfaces that link directly to this Notice.

The terms “we,” “our,” and “us” in this Notice refer to Darden and its family of companies. It’s important to know that our websites may contain links to third party sites not controlled by Darden or covered by this Notice. We recommend that you check the privacy statements of other websites you visit before providing any personal information.

Personal Information We Collect

We collect Personal Information (“PI”), or personal data as those terms are defined by applicable laws, about you from the information you provide to us when you visit our Site. This information includes:

• PI you may provide to us in information requests, and
• Information about your activities on our site.

We use PI collected online for various functions, which may include:

• Offer and provide products and services to the business you represent;
• Send information to others if you ask us to do so;
• Respond to and communicate with you about your requests, concerns, questions and comments;
• Operate, evaluate and improve our business;
• Perform data analyses;
• Protect against, identify and prevent fraud and other criminal activity, claims and other liabilities; and
• Comply with and enforce applicable legal requirements, relevant industry standards and our policies.

For example, we may use the information you provide to contact you with news and other information.

To the extent permitted by applicable law and with your consent where required, we also use information collected through automated means for purposes such as (i) customizing our users’ visits to our Site, and (ii) managing our Site and other aspects of our business.

How Personal Information Is Shared

Unless you ask or authorize us to do so, or as otherwise stated in this Notice, we do not trade, rent, sell, or share your PI collected from the Site with non-affiliated third parties. We may share the PI we collect about you with third parties, such as companies performing services on our behalf to provide the products or services you have previously requested on behalf of the company you represent and given prior consent where required by law, or facilitate requests to send you communications.

We may share your PI within the Darden family of restaurants. The Darden Family currently includes Darden, Olive Garden, LongHorn Steakhouse, Cheddar’s Scratch Kitchen, Yard House, The Capital Grille, The Capital Burger, Seasons 52, Bahama Breeze and Eddie V’s, as well as our affiliates, and subsidiaries. Members of the Darden family who receive this information from us are not authorized to use or share the information, except as set out in this Notice.

Retaining Your Personal Information

We will only retain your PI for as long as we need it to fulfil our legitimate purposes, including any purposes relating to legal matters. In no scenario we will keep your data longer than the period requested by law.

Third Parties

In order to serve you, we share your PI with service providers or third parties that perform functions on our behalf.

We may share your PI with vendors or third parties who provide services to us, such as providing data processing and other information technology services, and carrying out research and analysis. We do not allow these vendors to use this information or to share it for any purpose other than as allowed by law or to provide services on our behalf or on an aggregated basis for statistical, benchmarking, or other analytical services.

As permitted by law and with your consent where required, we also share information collected about you with companies with whom we have formal agreements to conduct analysis, engage in customer research, benchmarking, and to improve our products or services.

We may, for strategic or other business reasons, decide to sell or transfer all or part of our business. As part of that sale or transfer, we may pass information we have collected and stored, including PI, to anyone involved in the sale or transfer.

Compliance with Laws

We may disclose your PI and other information to third parties, including governmental authorities, to comply with any applicable law, regulation, legal process, or enforceable governmental request, or if we believe in good faith that such disclosure is necessary to protect against harm to the rights, property or safety of Darden, our customers, or the public as required or permitted by law (especially in emergency situations).

Information Collected Via Cookies

We use a variety of technologies, including cookies, to collect information including PI about your online/mobile activity when you visit our Site. Cookies are small text files that a website server stores on your computer or device. They are typically used to monitor website traffic and help us better customize our Site.

You can disable necessary cookies by making the appropriate selection from your browser options to inform you when cookies are set or to prevent cookies from being set. However, if you choose to disable or delete cookies, you may limit the functionality we can provide when you visit our Site(s).

“Do Not Track” Signals

We do not respond to web browser “Do Not Track” signals at this time. To prevent us or third parties from tracking, you can access your browser settings and disable or delete your cookies.

Requests About Your Personal Information

If you have questions about PI you provided on the Site, or would like to exercise rights you may have under applicable laws, please contact franchiseprivacy@darden.com.

Personal Information about Children

Our Site is intended for users over the age of 18. We do not knowingly collect or maintain PI about children under the age of 13.

Public Forums Available On Social Media

We provide experiences through social media websites such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and other similar social sharing websites. Any and all information you share on these social media websites may only be subject to re-sharing if you provide us with prior consent. Refer to each social media website for their terms of use and privacy statements.

International Data Transfers

Darden is based in the U.S., and processes PI subject to U.S. law. If you choose to provide us with PI, please understand that your PI may be transferred to the U.S. and that we may transfer that information to our affiliates and subsidiaries or to other third parties, across borders, and from your country or jurisdiction to other countries or jurisdictions around the world. If you are visiting from the European Union (“EU”) or other regions with laws governing data collection and use that may differ from U.S. law, please note that you are transferring your PI to the United States and other jurisdictions which may not have the same data protection laws as the EU. We put in place appropriate operational, procedural and technical measures in order to ensure the protection of your PI. You acknowledge you understand that by providing your PI: (i) your PI will be used for the uses identified above in accordance with this Privacy Policy; and (ii) your PI may be transferred to the U.S. and other jurisdictions as indicated above, in accordance with applicable law.

Changes to this Privacy Notice

We reserve the right to modify this Notice at any time for any reason at our discretion. Any change to this Notice will be posted on our Site and your continued use of such Site shall be deemed your acceptance of any modified terms. If we make material changes to this Notice, we will notify you more directly, for example by posting a notification or message on our Site prior to such changes taking effect. We encourage you to check this Notice frequently to stay informed of the latest modifications.

How to Contact Us

If you have any questions, comments or concerns regarding this Notice, please reach out to us at franchiseprivacy@darden.com.