Why Is It So Hard To Get a Restaurant Reservation?

0:00Hello, Terms of Service listeners. Today's episode is going to be about why it has become so difficult to make a restaurant reservation. There are all kinds of platforms that are supposed to help you do this, but it feels more competitive than ever. And so to test this out, we are going to try to make reservations at some of New York's hardest to get into restaurants. I'm going to start by seeing if there are any online reservations, online tables at a car bone, which is notoriously difficult to get into. And then I'm going to call. Okay, so pulling up, Brezzi, I'm looking for next Wednesday. I want to take the team out. There's going to be four of us. Nothing. Nothing coming up. Okay, I'm going to try to call and see if they can help me on the phone. Thank you for contacting major food groups. We do not accept reservations or cancellations over the phone. Okay. So, we'll put that on the list. Next I'm going to try Ambassadors Clubhouse.

1:00Thank you for calling Ambassadors Clubhouse New York. To make a reservation, please visit our website at Ambassadors Clubhouse.com or log onto the Rezzi app. Okay, so Ambassadors Clubhouse says to go online and look at the Rezzi app. I just did that. Nothing available. Now I'm going to try Polo Bar. Thank you for calling Polo Bar. We accept booking of to one month ahead by the calendar date. Please press one to speak with a reservation. All right, let's see. We're maybe going to talk to a human. That's nice. This is where I often fall off and think, I guess I just don't want to eat at this place badly enough because we're almost on four minutes. At least we're not waiting in a physical line. Okay. We've had seven minutes. This is the third time the song's playing. I think it's time to call it.

2:02See, this is the problem that I have with the current state of reservation cultures. Sometimes you do plan a dinner with friends a week in advance and you like to get in somewhere nice, but it feels like even though these are some of the most notoriously hard to get into restaurants, even for kind of regular mid-level restaurants, it can be really difficult to find a four-person reservation in New York City at six or seven p.m. on a weeknight. And that is what I want to talk to Stephanie Wu about today. She is the editor-in-chief of Eater, and so she certainly has a lot of experience with restaurants and reservations. My conversation with Stephanie right after this short break. When you need to build up your team to handle the growing chaos at work, use Indeed Sponsored Jobs. It gives your job posts the boost it needs to be seen and helps reach people with the right skills, certifications, and more. Spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes. Listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsor job credit at Indeed.com slash podcast.

3:05That's Indeed.com slash podcast, terms and conditions apply. Need a hiring hero? This is a job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs. Well Stephanie, thanks for doing this. Yeah, I'm excited to be here. What is your relationship with restaurant reservations right now? Love, hate. I think that as a diner, I find them deeply necessary. I say that because I'm a planner, I like to know where I'm going, I like to show up somewhere, and pretty much be guaranteed that I'm going to get to eat at the place I want to eat at whenever I can. That being said, there's a lot to be said for spontaneity. And I will say sometimes when I travel, I tend to make less reservations because I want to be able to stumble past somewhere and be able to say, wow, it looks like everyone

4:05and there's having a really good time. Let me pop in and try that. Of course, if there's a great meal I want to have, I will always book it in advance. But here at home, I tend to like to be as planned as I can be. And then I do think about restaurant reservations from the restaurant's point of view, of course, where they've become just an incredibly useful tool to help plan the business, figure out staffing needs, figure out how much food do I need to order? New walk-ins, I think I'm going to be able to get. And so it's really changed the way that restaurants are able to plan their own businesses as well. So in that sense, I think extremely important part of the dining ecosystem. Yeah, totally. Why has making reservations become such an important part of eating out? When did this start? Yeah. Like so many things, there was a massive shift in the pandemic. As you might recall, there was a moment where there were indoor capacity limits and reservations

5:08really became for restaurants a way to just plan, okay, how am I going to plan out my dining room today? Who's coming in? Am I meeting the capacity limits? How much food do I need to order at a time when so much of the country, the world, was still hesitant to dine out? How many staff do I need today? How many turns am I going to get? And it became, okay, we all need to plan ahead a little more. That was a mindset shift that really happened and the pandemic. And of course, as things started loosening up, that didn't go away because the restaurant business is, you know, razor thin margins, the more they can plan, the better of a grip they can get on their business. And so that was a really a massive shift for the restaurant business itself. And I think that's continued because there's a sense of, okay, if I can guarantee I'm going to get this many customers in a night, I can plan ahead. I know what I'm doing. And if people can't, people cancel, I know this opens up. And it just is a little bit more of a, a little contract between restaurant and diner

6:11that can help make things a lot easier. What is the average person's experience trying to make reservations these days? It's not great. And I think there's quite a few reasons for that. So we have always been, I think, especially in New York City, a place where getting the hot restaurant reservation is, there's a sense of status attached, right? I knew about this restaurant before anyone else. I was able to be awake at midnight and get this reservation. So there is that sense that really comes with, I know the cool places to be. I want to get there first. I want to be able to tell my friends about it. And so there's really been just the sense that, okay, if you want to get into the hot restaurants, there's a lot of planning to do and you need to, you need to be really thoughtful and think ahead. I would say that's the average eater user. I don't know if that's the average average person's experience. It does feel like, even if it's not carbon, I was just trying to make a reservation at

7:12carbon for the sake of this episode. Even if it's not carbon, like if I want to make a reservation for four friends next week on Friday, a lot of restaurants are going to be booked up. Yeah, Friday nights are particularly tough, as you can imagine. But I do think generally speaking, if you take out what I was trying to get at, is if you take out that layer of the hottest, most interesting restaurants of the moment, the ones that are featured on the eater heat map, it's actually not so bad. There are so many restaurants. And if you know what you're looking for, neighborhood, vibe, time of day, size of group, there's no way you're not going to be able to find somewhere great. And I think that's the thing that often gets overlooked is there's so many incredible restaurants. It doesn't have to be the hottest, busiest one every single time. Yeah, such a good point. And this is obviously taken to an extreme in New York, but is this happening other places? But it sort of feels like this problem, this challenge of getting a table is getting worse

8:12everywhere. I think on your weekend nights, absolutely. Like you'll have a tough time maybe getting into certain restaurants and LA or in Portland or even in DC, places just book up in advance. So there is that idea of the more planned ahead you can be, the better your chances are of going somewhere great. But that being said, I think if you are somebody who cares about food and cares about restaurants, there are so many options where it's easy to walk in or you simply don't know when dinner is going to be. There are so many ways to figure out a great place to eat. Yeah. Well, and it just makes sense to the restaurants also don't want to leave things up to change. They don't want to risk having an empty night in the dining room because that could be a huge loss for them. Right. Not to mention that you don't get, you know, your server is not going to get enough tips and it's just kind of a not great ecosystem. Obviously we've seen the rise of restaurant reservation apps like Rezzy and Open Table exploding in the last few years.

9:14Just talk about how those work to connect customers with tables. Sure. So, Open Table was first and kind of owned the space before anyone else and really was for a long time the only option for restaurants who wanted to reach diners who maybe were unable to find out about them in another way and they really cornered the market really quickly, certainly in this country. Rezzy kind of came up, I think they were founded in 2014 and their niche was we're going to have the hottest, busiest restaurants on Rezzy and that became a way for people to say, okay, then I know Rezzy has the cool restaurants. I'm going to go specifically to my Rezzy app or to the Rezzy website and figure out, okay, where should I eat? And as that landscape has shifted and banks have become involved and credit card companies have become a little bit about how that's happening. Sure. So, Amix acquired Rezzy in 2019. I think it was the first of many acquisitions they've since had including talk and the

10:19fork, which is a European reservation platforms. I'm sure many others. The idea is restaurants are a huge, huge area of spending for people with disposable income. If you're a credit card company, you have the aggregate information of how much money is being spent on restaurants and travel every quarter by all of your consumers. And so by putting themselves closer to the restaurant dining experience, they're able to offer perks to premium credit card customers. So exclusive tables, exclusive events, a concierge that we'll call up a restaurant and say, hey, can you hold two seats for my very fancy customer or whatever it is? And so they saw that there was value in being part of this transaction. And so Amix acquired Rezzy for this reason and they've really built out and grown this relationship since then to try to be even better of a restaurant partner because suddenly, now you've got credit card budgets, right? That changes everything in terms of we can host an event, we can sponsor an ambitious

11:25project or a restaurant wants to celebrate a big anniversary in a big way. Let us come in and up front the costs to really make it easier for restaurants to do these like interesting new things that of course diners want to be a part of too. And then most recently, DoorDash has acquired seven rooms, which is another big reservations platform. And so very much built on will help you get the best data you can so that you can know your consumer is better than anyone else. And so these platforms are quite literally tech platforms, right? Like they replaced the, though of course some restaurants will have it, they replaced the matrady with the phone and the book. Right. And they digitized it and they made it a lot easier to say, okay, Ms. Smith has come here four times in the past six months. Sometimes she comes, we're going to make sure to welcome her because she's, you know, a regular or so and so person always gets a red wine from burgundy. So next time they come, we're going to make sure we talk about the newest burgundy we got

12:28in. And so you tailor it. It's a, it's a way to just be a little bit more hospitable and like put that service up front when you have that digitized information about your diners, which also changes the way you interact and the relationship you can build with your most loyal people. And let's just sort of talk about the basics of these platforms. Restaurants presumably say we have X number of tables. We're going to make X number of them available. We want to have three turns. So here are the times. And then at some given time, these platforms blast those out to the public. Yes. Every restaurant has, like you said, a different amount of tables they want to make available. But generally speaking, they're released, the reservations themselves are released on a rolling basis. So it might be today or let's say tonight at midnight, the tables for the date two weeks from now are going to open up. And so if you're looking for, okay, I know I want to dine out three weeks from now, then

13:29you know you need to wait another week, for instance, to then make that reservation. And some other restaurants will say, oh, I released my tables for the first of the month. And if you're not booking on the first of the month, then you've just lost your chance for the entire month. It can feel like such a game. Like I have to wake up at midnight to book a table three weeks from now. And hopefully I knew that in advance. Yes. Are there hidden features or other sort of like tools when you're using these platforms to have a better time? A better time is subjective. But I will say, I will say as you were saying, kind of noting, just knowing when the reservations go live and what date you're looking for goes a long way, right? You're already probably in the 1% of people who are planning that far ahead and going to get that table. Are there still going to be a lot of people trying? Absolutely. But that's when you say, okay, well, I'm going to look for a Wednesday night at 5.30 instead of a Friday at 7.30, right? You start to know, again, when will restaurants be less busy?

14:32When will they naturally have less people than usual? Friday and Saturday nights, always the toughest. If a restaurant's open on Monday, you're probably going to have a lot better of a chance getting in. And I say this as someone like I worked in restaurants for a long time. I love the service industry. I mean, no shade by this, but it feels like sometimes there were only reservations, the only tables that are released are you can get a two top at 4.30 pm or you can get a two top at 9.30 pm. But the rest are somehow saved for people who are not you plebeian making your reservation on resi. What's happening there? Okay. So usually if you see a restaurant and let's say it's right at that moment that bookings are opening and all you're seeing is early seats and late seats, that's pretty clear sign that the restaurant has said, I'm going to hold back all of my prime tables for whatever reason, whether it's we want to have a table ready in cases of VIP, whether they've got other people they're hoping to invite in, you know, they want to control that prime

15:34time. That doesn't mean though, of course, that every table they've held is going to end up being taken. And so if you do set that notify, you know, I often find that the day before, especially when they're calling people for cancellations, things start opening up, plans fall through, they've held the tables, they can't hold the tables anymore, they're still going to take the business, right? And so it might be held early on only to be released much closer to the dining day because they just haven't brought in the VIPs they thought they were going to bring. Yeah, who are those VIPs? Is that Taylor Swift? Like Taylor Swift probably always has priority access, she deserves it. But oftentimes that's, you know, related to a credit card company and their relationship. So holding back specific tables for diners with a specific type of card, but it could also be a friends of the, of the restaurant staff are coming in or it could be, okay, there's someone else in the industry and we want to make sure to save a table for them. It could be press, it could be celebrities, it could be any range of people.

16:40And and often I think the way to even then try to get in one of those tables is if you call them before those, the reservation window even happens and say, hey, I'm celebrating a birthday, I'm celebrating an anniversary, I'm coming from out of town and you really, you know, cause you still got humans answering the phone at quite a, quite a large amount of these places and explain to them, hey, this day is really special or I can really only come in at this point. Is there any way you can find me a table and you still may not get that 730 prime time seat, but they might say, you know what, we can set aside two bar seats for you and make sure you get to celebrate on your actual birthday or whatever it might be. There have been some creative attempts to get around the gridlock of restaurant reservations. Back in 2021, there was the quick rise and fall of free resi, a telegram chat group where people traded hard to get restaurant reservations. The group booked more than a thousand reservations before getting shut down.

17:41A newer, more above the table venture is Rezax, a reservation exchange platform for New York and London. And there are more premium membership only platforms like Dorcia, which is available in cities around the world. But is this the future of reservation culture? And if you just want to go out to dinner with some friends, do you really need to plan months in advance? That's after the break. When you need to build up your team to handle the growing chaos at work, use Indeed Sponsored Jobs. It gives your job post the boost it needs to be seen and helps reach people with the right skills, certifications, and more. Spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes. Listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsor job credit at and.com slash podcast. That's indeed.com slash podcast, terms and conditions apply. Need a hiring hero? This is a job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs. Propel Fitness Water with Gatorade Electrolites, Zero Sugar and Vitamins.

18:42Propel hydrates better than water to help you get the most out of your workout and get back to your best self. What propels you? Propel with Gatorade Electrolites. Where do you think this is all going? Because on one hand, I hear you that obviously this is a huge benefit to restaurants, businesses. I also know that there is just like so much frustration often with how this process works. If there's a risk for restaurants who have a lot of hype right now and it's so hard to get in, what happens when the hype moves on? Will this system change or is this just kind of what we've got? I think that's a very real risk that restaurants think about, which is how do I make sure not only am I hot right now, but hopefully I'm hot for a long time, right? How do you do that? You make sure everyone who does make it in has the best experience they can. It does go back to that service and that hospitality of, we'd love for you to come back. Join us again when we've changed the menu because it's a different season or join us for

19:42this special event we're having. There's a lot of marketing tactics now for, don't just come in because we just opened three weeks ago, come in in six months, come in in a year, come back and celebrate something else with us. It's cultivating that relationship at a time when consumers have so much choice. You could go anywhere, what makes you want to go back somewhere. It's because you want this restaurant to still exist. It's in your neighborhood. You think it's adding to your neighborhood. It's adding value to your everyday life. It's not just that special occasion restaurant and I find that, in fact, of course, the most expensive restaurants, you're just not going to go back to that often. It's that neighborhood wine bar or the bistro where it's Thursday night and you've got a friend in town and they are like, take me somewhere cool and you're like, well, we're going to go to the place I love the most because I know they're going to treat me really well. They're going to have a seat for me and we're going to have a great time. That is what I think everybody wants to build despite this constant chase is you want

20:47to be a regular. Restaurants want regular. You want to be at a place that knows you and sees you and treats you in a way that makes you feel really good. Yeah, I mean, as we're thinking about sort of like takeaways for people, it strikes me that investing in being irregular so that the maturity who welcomes people, whether you have a reservation or not, recognizes you. That feels like a potential takeaway here, right? And I think a pretty unavoidable part of reservation culture is that there's a lot of jerks out there, right? And so don't be the jerk. Tip your bartender as well. If you're sitting at the bar waiting for your table to open up, don't be rude to the host. You know, understand that everyone's doing a job and they would love to get you in as soon as they can. But everybody sees how crowded the dining room is or how crowded the way on the sidewalk is. And there's plenty of other places to go, for instance, and say, okay, it's going to be a 45 minute wait. I'm going to go to the wine bar next door, have a drink while I wait. You're going to text me when the table opens up, right?

21:47Understand that everyone is just doing their jobs and would love to have you in and being a jerk isn't going to speed things up in anyway. Yeah. Okay. So you're a pro at this. You want to go out to eat with four people in New York City tomorrow. Okay. What are you doing? Okay. If I know where I want to take them, then I'm going to start just kind of like going down my mental list of restaurants that I want to go in and start saying, okay, let me see if these places have a table open on the night that I'm trying to take. I'm going to try to pull it into. I, I would definitely look at the reservation platforms and see, okay, am I seeing anything immediately interesting in the neighborhood? Or in whatever neighborhood I'm trying to go to, I might look at the eater app and say, okay, here is what's near me. And I know these places are good there approved. I can read the little review and makes it really easy for me to make a decision. If I'm really struggling and there just seems to be nothing, then I'm going to say, hey,

22:48Hey guy's okay, we're going to meet up at this place or someone's going to put our name down, we're gonna find another bar to hang out at while we're waiting, we'll probably make it in by whatever time, if that's acceptable, we're gonna roll with it. Yeah. Okay, if you could get a reservation anywhere in New York City or anywhere in the world tomorrow, where are you going? Oh my gosh. I have this really great Asian inspired be sure on my list called Somsi that I have not in too. Okay. The many of my colleagues have been and they really adore it, but it's from the team that also runs Atoboy and Atomix, so they've got in a fantastic track record in the city, and it's cozy, the food looks really great, and the dining room looks really nice and welcoming, and so that's that's really high on my list. Fun. Okay, I love it. Haas Nackbar, I love, have not gotten into Haas Beach Road yet, so that's my. So I've actually had a ton of look with Be Show Ha more recently, because I think that's the other key tip is if you can wait until a restaurant has

23:51really found its groove, Be Show Ha opened, I think, late last year, then it's really even a better time to go because they know what they're doing. They're not kind of slammed with that weight every night. They opened Haas Nackbar and then Be Show Ha so that they could take more reservations and make that more of a reservation-friendly space, and so with Be Show Ha, I've had a lot of luck rainy weather night. Oh, there's going to be cancellations and things are going to open up, looking a few weeks ahead for a weeknight, or I think I went on, might have been like the night of governors ball or something, right? So think about it at a night when the city's attention is somewhere else. Superbowl, Oscars night, Thanksgiving, right? That's when all the hot tables open up, and you really can have a way more choice than you can on a typical weekend night. Love it. Well, Stephanie, thank you so much for doing this. This is so fun, and I think it'll be really useful for people. I hope so, because we are really here to just support

24:51restaurants, and I think at Eater, we've been doing this for so long, right? Thinking about the restaurant industry, thinking about the community of diners and insiders who want to see the restaurants in a city thrive. I think cities live and die by restaurants, and you strengthen your restaurant scenes by going out to eat, supporting independent restaurants, and really showing that support by putting your money in the pockets of these small business owners. And that's a big part of what we do. That's our North Star at Eater, and I think that's the North Star for so many like-minded diners too, who just really value going out to eat and having an amazing time. 100%. Thank you so much. Thank you. I appreciated the reminder from Stephanie that reservation culture does actually have a lot of benefits for diners, and especially for restaurants, and trips of making business more sustainable, ensuring workers can earn the money they need, and preventing food waste. If you are looking to treat yourself to a night out at a more popular restaurant, step one is to pick a few top contenders, and if they offer reservations online,

25:54spend a few minutes looking at how far in advance they open up spots. If planning ahead doesn't pan out, you might have luck calling up a restaurant the day you want to dine. Maybe you will snag someone else's last minute cancellation. I also have to say a few days after my conversation with Stephanie, I walked by the restaurant that she recommended, Som C, and the maternity offered my husband and I a bar seat reservation for that evening just a few hours later. So, Sarah and Dupati can still work. As you can imagine, Stephanie recommended an excellent restaurant. And of course, there is always something to be said for being a regular, sticking with your favorite local spots and supporting small businesses. That's it for this week's episode of Terms of Service. I'm Claire Duffy. Talk to you next week.

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