I've been using @Reserve for a few months now. Amazingly efficient way to book high-end restaurants. What used to be a race to dial the hostess at exactly the right time of day weeks in advance is now just a few clicks. Also, don't underestimate the beauty of paying through the app. In fact, by letting them auth with my credentials I was able to use it to send my parents to a fancy dinner! Anyway, I think this is early days for Reserve. You know that when you have @JoeMarchese, @gmc, and @vl in the mix, shit is going to happen.
@loris Cover is agnostic about how you get into a restaurant. You can walk in and sit at the bar and use Cover, you could call in for a reservation, you could even have a standing table where you've sat every Tuesday for years. And everyone in the restaurant can pay with Cover at any time, it's not limited to the number of people a host wants to let in.
In this sense the comparison is like Sosh to American Express. One is about curating great experiences and the other is the best way to pay when you're out.
EDIT: and to make it clear, I'm also a huge fan of Sosh. That was a compliment there.
@megerman@loris 2010 Startups: Uber calls you a black car, we're a platform for transportation, we accept any kind of vehicle.
(Just saying everyone is a potential competitor).
Very excited to see this launch, but how will Reserve differentiate from Open Table? Open Table has the same features (reserve a table; pay for your check; great iOS app) and has an incredible selection of restaurants (quantity and quality).
For restaurants that already use Open Table, will they be willing to implement another service? Is it even a significant burden for them? There's already a few other competitors vying for adoption, including Resy and Cover (both of which seem to be focused on high-end restaurants, like Reserve). And is the high-end restaurant market itself a big enough opportunity?
Reserve has an incredibly successful team behind it. I would love to hear how they are navigating these issues.
@GeoffreyWeg Reserve is free to restaurants, and this was something that was really important to us since the restaurant industry generally has very slim margins (3-5% last I saw reported). In terms of tech integration, we worked very closely with our restaurant partners to make sure our tech was lightweight and very easy for our partners to use. Especially since Reserve diners have a default payment card linked to the app, the payment piece can actually become simpler for a restaurant and involve fewer trips for the server. The response from our partners has been really great, and its been terrific to work with them so far and get their feedback on the service and technology. And to your final question, we're really just getting started. Part of the vision is to see this be a service people want to use every time they go out to eat, and continuing to build out great partnerships is a big part of that.
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