Affiliate & Sponsorship Disclosure

1. No pay-for-review model, full stop

Four Loons has never accepted payment — in cash, in kind, in trade, or in any other form — in exchange for a review, a star rating, a score, a positive mention, or for declining to publish a critical assessment. This is an unconditional rule. No restaurant, bar, hotel, food producer, or distributor can purchase coverage on Four Loons, and none is invited to.

Editorial decisions about which venues to review, when to revisit, and how to rate them are made entirely by our editorial staff based on the criteria published on our Ethics & Methodology page. No business relationship — affiliate, advertising, comps, or otherwise — affects those decisions.

2. How reviews are funded

Primary funding for reviews comes from reader subscriptions and direct reader support. When you subscribe to Four Loons, you are paying for editorial independence: the ability to visit restaurants without any obligation to the house, pay for meals out of our own pocket, and publish what we actually think.

The standard practice at Four Loons is to visit anonymously, pay the full check, and not disclose our identity until after a review is published or if we need to conduct a follow-up interview. This is not always possible — smaller establishments may recognize staff over time, or a venue may reach out to us directly — but anonymous, paid visits remain our default and our preference.

3. Complimentary meals and press access

Occasionally, Four Loons is offered — or accepts — a complimentary meal, a press preview dinner, a tasting menu at no charge, or a media tour of a new venue. We handle these situations as follows:

• We disclose every complimentary meal and press visit. If a review or piece is based in whole or in part on a hosted visit, we say so at the bottom of the piece. We do not describe the disclosure in vague terms like "the restaurant provided assistance" — we say specifically what was provided.
• Hosted visits do not change our rating or editorial conclusion. A complimentary dinner earns the same scoring treatment as a paid dinner. If the food was mediocre, we say so. If the service was warm, we say that too. The ratings rubric does not have a hospitality adjustment.
• We do not accept hosted visits from venues we have already decided not to cover for editorial reasons. Accepting a meal creates a social obligation that we take seriously; we minimize that by not accepting invitations we could not in good conscience convert into honest coverage.
• We may return for a paid visit after a press dinner, particularly for restaurants we consider important enough to merit a full rated review. In those cases we may use both visits to inform the piece and will disclose both.

If a venue offers us something we did not request — comped courses, a free dessert, a surprise bottle — we will note it in our notes and, where relevant, in the piece itself. We aim to be transparent about the conditions under which we observed a kitchen or dining room, because those conditions matter to readers trying to calibrate our observations against their own expected experience.

4. Advertising

Four Loons does not currently carry display advertising, banner ads, sponsored content, or native advertising. We do not have advertising clients and do not have an advertising sales operation. If this changes, we will update this page and note clearly on the site which content, if any, is advertising-supported. Advertising, if we ever add it, will be clearly labeled and editorially separated from reviews and essays.

5. Affiliate links and booking platforms

Four Loons occasionally includes links to booking or reservation platforms, such as Resy, OpenTable, Tock, or similar services. Some of these links are standard links with no commercial relationship; others may be affiliate links through which Four Loons earns a small commission if you make a reservation or purchase through the link.

When an affiliate relationship exists with a booking platform or product link, we label it. Affiliate links appear in logistical sidebars and resource sections — not in the body of a review itself. The presence or absence of an affiliate relationship with a booking platform does not influence whether a venue is covered, how it is rated, or what is written about it. We link to the platform that is most useful for the reader, regardless of whether an affiliate relationship exists.

We do not participate in affiliate programs offered by restaurants, food producers, distributors, or hospitality groups. Affiliate relationships at Four Loons are limited to neutral booking infrastructure.

6. Products, cookbooks, and merchandise

Four Loons may write about cookbooks, kitchen tools, food products, and related items. When a publisher, manufacturer, or distributor sends us a product for consideration, we disclose that in the piece. Receipt of a product does not guarantee coverage and does not affect the assessment. We return or donate items we do not intend to write about.

We do not maintain an ongoing commercial relationship with any food brand, equipment manufacturer, or publisher that requires us to produce a minimum amount of coverage or maintain a minimum tone. Relationships of that kind are incompatible with our editorial standards.

7. Reader support and subscriptions

Reader subscriptions and one-time contributions go toward editorial costs: visiting restaurants, travel within Minnesota, editorial staff time, photography, and the operating costs of the publication. Subscribers do not receive preferential editorial treatment, advance access to reviews as unpublished drafts, or any influence over what we cover. Subscription status is not visible to our editorial staff when assignments are made.

8. Questions about this disclosure

If you have a question about a specific piece — whether it was hosted, whether an affiliate link applies, or how a conflict was handled — write to us at editors@fourloons.com. We will answer directly. Transparency is not a compliance exercise for us; it is how we maintain trust with the readers who make this publication possible.