Mealpass, a startup by MIT grads, is starting Wednesday in Boston. You pay for a pass, pick the lunch option between the evening before and the morning before lunch, and pick up the meal in person. I guess if people eats every day, it works out to less than $5 a meal. I’d be interested in their restaurant lineup and available dishes.
Apparently they already started a similar program in Miami. Anybody from Miami tried this?
The concept reminds me about a place near my high school that let students ‘preorder’ lunches.
This sounds like a great idea if you work near the places that offer food, but since I work in the Longwood Medical Area, we have very limited options, none of which would be improved by a slightly cheaper option.
Too bad their website doesn’t show any of the participating Boston restaurants. I’m in the no man’s land corner of Charlestown/Somerville and we’re all dying for more lunch options, but I doubt any of the places would be easy for me to pick up in person.
They have a list/ map on the site now. All within 1500 ft of State St T.
Al Capone’s
Al’s State Street Cafe
Archie’s New York Deli
Ari’s Barbeque
Avana Sushi
Barry’s Bootcamp
Beantown Hoagie
Beantown Pastrami Co.
Black Seed Cafe & Grill
Bonapita
Boston Kebab House
Cafe 26
Cafe Hemshin
Chicken and Rice Guys
Cocobeet
Falafel King
Fisherman’s Net
Freshii
Gene’s Chinese Flatbread
Gourmet India
Great Taste
Hennessy’s
Herrera’s Mexican Grill
Hollywood Deli
Hungry Traveler
JM Curley
KOY
Kwench Juice Cafe
Max’s Deli Cafe
Milk Street Cafe
Nunzio’s
Ogawa Coffee
Oliver Street Cafe
Paddy O’s
Pavia
Pedro’s Tacos
Philadelphia Steak & Hoagie
Piperi
Potbelly
Red’s Best
SA PA
Saladworks
Scali Deli Cafe
Sebastian’s
Shawarma Falafel
The Fill-A-Buster
The Merchant
The Point
The Prime Shoppe
The Red Hat
Thirst Juice Co.
Tossed
U&D Kitchen
Uno Dué Go
Wheelhouse
Ziti’s Italian Express
with all that snow did you have to walk out in the cold each day to get your lunch? i cant imagine doing that in the winter unless it was like a one block walk maybe.
mealpass is not offering a deal worth buying. you get too little food for too big a commitment, hassle, and sacrifice.
little food
really it should be called snackpass. or kids-meal-pass.
for people who consider joining they are buying a fantasy.
for $5 you dont get a normal sized lunch or quality meat.
use your head. lunch doesnt cost $5 and most likely mealpass is paying restaurants just $4.
what can you get for $4.
no man can do this. maybe a tiny 90lb woman can eat this little but this is certainly not a normal lunch.
no drink is included and with most of the places you cannot eat in their restaurant with your $4 snack; you have to leave with a baggy. I have other complaints like who wants to decide on this lunch snack by 9am (or waste your precious time doing so first thing in the morning). better to go to a place and just pay the normal price or if you care about money (and you should) then bring your own lunch. sorry I must pass.
fake photos
the photos mealpass uses are fake to me in that they are taken really close up to make the food look bigger. to me that is deceitful. also I have seen restaurants put several meals on the same plate for the photo because they dont want to have just 1 tiny sandwich on a plate. that is also deceitful.
another groupon business model
i thinki it is more like groupon than it is like classpass yet your not getting a money deal like you are with classpass if you go a lot. for $5 you are getting no more than $4-5 worth of food.
restaurants that signed up for Mealpass are destroying their brand.
nobody is going to go back to your restaurant at full price.
you are training customers that your food is not worth it.
they may come for your $5 meal snack but not more.
mealpass is the groupon deal already rejected by restaurants.
i think you make some valid points but it’s not clear to me from your post if you actually tried the MealPass meals or just are inferring from the price that you won’t be happy with them.
I posted below over on chowhound last week. I’ve eaten at Wheelhouse, Falafel King, Uno due go, gene’s flatbread, and hungry traveler since then. Everything has been full size.
I purchased and am REALLY happy with it after 3 meals. All the restaurants change up what they offer every day and I find the pictures to actually be pretty accurate. One thing that I don’t like is having to decide on the restaurant by 9:30 in the morning as my mood changes through out the day but scrolling through the options has been fun.
Friday - Al’s - Steak Bellino - Full Size and made to order Monday - Black Seed Cafe - Falafel Plate - Huge and made to order Today - Schwarma Falafel - Soujouk Wrap - This was on the smaller side. Do not come here enough to know if their wraps are typically this size. This was premade but fresh.
I had a free one week pass to Mealpass as part of a Public Relations push, I can confirm this was not food for a man and on Chowhound several posters (female) wrote of smaller portions given out by restaurants, Its pretty reasonable to expect they would do this as did groupon restaurants back in its day. bit.ly/1PphJub
What constitutes “a man”? I daresay that there are “women” that need as much caloric intake as “men”.
This is such a dumb, sexist approach to describing food portions that it deserves all the ridicule it gets.
