Nanette Bittler balances a family, manages five fast-food restaurants, and uses her franchises to donate money and Happy Meals back to the community.

Bittler’s McDonald’s of Bend runs more than 20 philanthropic programs geared toward children. The School Reading program, for example, delivers a free Happy Meal to each student in a class if the entire class signs up for a Bend Public Library card. This reading incentive program has given more than 2,500 meals in its first 10 years.

Bittler, 41, started her mini-empire after buying a McDonald’s in Bend in 1989. In 1990, her parents sold her the one they had bought in 1973, the first Bend McDonald’s.