Learn About Veganism and Animal Rights in St. Louis

New to veganism? Curious about animal rights? Looking for vegan food, community, or a practical way to help animals in St. Louis? Start here.

VeganSTL is St. Louis’ locally built hub for vegan food, education, events, groups, and animal advocacy. This page is your starting point: three plain-language guides, quick answers to the big questions, and a simple path from “I’m curious” to “I know what to do next.” No perfection required. No purity tests. Just honest information, grounded in the community that lives it.

By Kyle Luzynski, Executive Director of Project Animal Freedom, and the VeganSTL team · Last updated September 2026

Start With These Three Guides

Three guides, one purpose: to help you understand veganism and animal rights, and to see how both come alive in St. Louis. You don’t have to read everything at once. Start with the question that brought you here.

What Is Veganism? A Complete Guide for St. Louis

What veganism means, how it differs from “plant-based,” why people choose it, what vegans actually eat, and honest answers about protein, cost, health, and difficulty. The guide closes with a practical plan for going vegan in St. Louis. Its health and environmental claims are tied to peer-reviewed research, government guidance, and primary data, so you can check the evidence yourself.

Read the complete guide to veganism in St. Louis →

Animal Rights in St. Louis: What It Means and Why It Matters

What animal rights means, how it differs from animal welfare, why the sheer scale of animal farming makes it urgent, and why a Midwestern city like St. Louis matters so much to the movement. It also shows what animal rights looks like here right now: STL Vegan Market, fish-free Friday dinners during Lent, street outreach, marches, and activism trainings, plus the theory of change behind all of it.

Learn about animal rights in St. Louis →

Vegan Resources for St. Louis

Documentaries worth an evening (Dominion, The Game Changers, Milked, Eating Our Way to Extinction, and more), landmark animal rights speeches from Philip Wollen and Tom Regan, and support for the transition: Facebook groups for new vegans, a Zoom mentor group, book clubs, and organizations that help activists stay in it for the long haul.

Browse vegan resources →

Your First Five Steps in St. Louis

Reading is a beginning. If you want veganism to feel real rather than theoretical, take one small step this week.

1. Eat one great vegan meal. Start with the STL Vegan Guide for vegan, vegetarian, and vegan-friendly food across the metro. Or follow a craving to the best vegan pizza in St. Louis, the best vegan desserts, or the city’s Black-owned vegan restaurants.

2. Come to one event. The VeganSTL events calendar lists socials, potlucks, dinners, festivals, classes, marches, and trainings throughout the year. STL Vegan Market, St. Louis’ 100% vegan monthly market, runs April through October. You don’t have to be vegan to show up.

3. Find your people. Browse local vegan groups, hop into the VeganSTL Discord, and subscribe to VeganSTL for upcoming events, local vegan news, and new ways to get involved. Veganism is much easier when it comes with names, faces, and somewhere to go on a Tuesday night.

4. Try the Gateway to Compassion Challenge. It’s VeganSTL’s free, year-round invitation to try vegan living with local support, built around three seasons: STL Veganuary in January, STL VegWeek during Earth Week in April, and STL VegMonth in November. In January 2026, 768 St. Louisans took our local Veganuary challenge.

5. Do more for animals. Volunteer with Project Animal Freedom if you want to organize, table, photograph, write, welcome newcomers, or help behind the scenes. If time is tight, you can also support the work with a donation.

Quick Answers About Veganism in St. Louis

What does “vegan” mean?

Veganism is a way of living that seeks to avoid animal exploitation as far as is possible and practicable. For most people, it starts with food: no meat, dairy, eggs, fish, or other animal-derived ingredients. But veganism is broader than a diet; it’s an effort to align everyday choices with the idea that animals are not products. Read the full definition and the case for going vegan.

What are animal rights?

Animal rights is the view that sentient animals have interests that matter for their own sake and should not be treated merely as property or resources. Animal welfare asks how animals should be treated while humans continue using them; animal rights asks whether that use is justified in the first place. Project Animal Freedom holds an animal rights position. Explore the distinction and why it matters in St. Louis.

Is St. Louis a good city for vegans?

Yes. The metro has fully vegan restaurants, many vegan-friendly menus, a 100% vegan monthly market, recurring community events, and active groups across the region. You can eat well, meet people, and find something happening in almost every season. Start with the STL Vegan Guide and the events calendar.

Do I have to be vegan to use VeganSTL or come to an event?

No. VeganSTL is for the vegan-curious, the newly plant-based, the longtime vegan, the friend who got invited to dinner, and anyone who cares about animals and wants to learn. Come as you are.

What is the easiest way to start going vegan in St. Louis?

Start with something repeatable: one breakfast, one restaurant order, one dairy swap, or one dependable dinner. Then add another. If you want structure and a community doing it with you, join the Gateway to Compassion Challenge and use the local guides, classes, events, and groups around it.

Why You Can Trust VeganSTL

VeganSTL.com is a division of Project Animal Freedom, a Missouri-based, IRS-recognized 501(c)(3) nonprofit founded in 2018 with one long-term mission: a fully vegan Midwest by 2056. We don’t cover vegan St. Louis from a distance. The people writing these guides also help run STL Vegan Market, maintain the STL Vegan Guide, organize local campaigns, and build the community programs this site describes. Project Animal Freedom organized 56 events in the St. Louis region in 2025.

Experience is only part of trust, so we publish our methods too. Restaurant classifications draw on current menus, official sources, direct communication, community reports we verify, and first-hand visits where noted. Event details are checked against organizers. Advocacy is labeled as advocacy. Material errors are corrected as soon as they’re confirmed. Sponsors cannot buy favorable coverage, and inclusion in our guides and directories is never for sale.

Read more about VeganSTL and our Editorial Standards & Review Methodology. Spot an error, a closure, or a changed menu? Contact us and we’ll review it.

Learn something. Eat something wonderful. Meet someone new. Then, when you’re ready, help make St. Louis a kinder place for animals. Compassion, community, and change—it all starts with learning. Welcome.