“In today’s newsletter, Adam Iscoe goes inside the wild world of restaurant reservations—and offers some simple (and other far less simple) tips for getting the hottest tables in town”
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Interesting, thanks. I’m both fascinated and kinda repelled.
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Again, Yogi Berra’s sage observation nails it: “Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.”
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Also fascinated & repelled. Yeah it’s supply & demand in action… and FOMO too. Pity.
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Let me get this straight–People are paying $300 for the reservation from a reseller, and it doesn’t include the food?
That seems so odd to me.
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“Odd” is putting it nicely.
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Hope it’s in the print edition as well. Saving a few for traveling.
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Some people have too much money and see eating at trendy restaurants more as a “check list exercise” instead of enjoying great food
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You know that trope about some people having more money than sense? That.
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You are correct.
I could never do that… the expectation of perfection would be so great, a letdown is all but guaranteed.
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Or you convince yourself that the meal was amazing, even if it wasn’t.
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Agreed. There are so many restaurants in NYC I couldn’t fathom paying a premium to eat at a specific one.
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There’s nothing surprising in the story. Paying for a reservation is the modern day equivalent of slipping a c note to the maitre d’. What this tells me is that more restaurants will go the route of requiring payment for the meal upfront like Alinea and Saga or at least the non-refundable deposits that have become so much more prevalent. Restaurants are missing out on the money by allowing intermediaries to take advantage the way the story describes. But you can’t eliminate the scalpers.
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Except this allows re-selling of reservations. And having a bot snap them up.That’s relatively new.
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Yes, I was thinking this as well, also because this seems more prevalent in some European places (eg Amsterdam). Then the reseller needs to take the risk into account that he cannot resell his reservation before it expires. The restaurant can even move the expiration date of the refund to say a week before the meal, making it even harder for the reseller.
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Aye-- we’ve had ticket scalping & paying someone to wait and/or hold spot in line since I dunno, the fall of Rome maybe. IMO most of the people are “FOMOS” so they can win bragging rights. Which I commented to a friend is “insanely stupid”. For the rest OK good for them if they can afford it & it’s that important.
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Right, but this isn’t exactly ticket scalping. A ticket has a cash value - someone paid money for it. A reservation does not. An unused reservation just gets “re-absorbed.”
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