Owners of Culver’s restaurant in Crystal Lake receive company’s highest award

Chuck Martin and Jim DiVerde, owner-operators of ten Culver’s restaurants in the greater Chicago area, including the one in Crystal Lake, received of the 2020 GM Culver Award, the company’s highest honor named for George M. Culver, the father of Co-Founder Craig Culver.

The award is designed to recognize individuals who have demonstrated long-term visionary leadership and success, and this year marks the first time the company has ever given it to two people in one year, according to a release.

Martin joined Culver’s in 2004 as an owner-operator with his first restaurant in Mount Prospect, and DiVerde joined the Culver franchising system in 2005 and became an owner-operator in 2007, beginning the two’s partnership with a Bolingbrook location.

“Chuck and Jim are very deserving of this honor as exceptional owner-operators and restaurant partners,” Culver’s Co-Founder Craig Culver said while presenting the award at Martin and DiVerde’s restaurant in Crystal Lake.

“Jim and his wife, Judy, and Chuck and his wife, Lynnaea, are all great ambassadors for Culver’s,” he continued. “They have been heavily involved in supporting the communities they operate in for the past 17 years.”

Throughout the years, Martin and DiVerde’s restaurants have supported organizations like Feed My Starving Children, the National FFA Organization, Misericordia, Honor Flight Chicago, Vets Roll and local schools, park districts and churches.

Together Martin and DiVerde own MD Restaurant Group and currently oversee operations at Culver’s locations in Crystal Lake as well as Aurora, Schaumburg, Darien, Bolingbrook, Mount Prospect, Yorkville, Rosemont, Arlington Heights and St. Charles.