CAMBRIDGE, Mass.—The restaurant experience in today’s high-tech world has seen the advent of pagers that buzz when your table is ready and innovations like Textaurant (textaurant.com), which lets you see your wait time, choose a table, queue in line, and be paged remotely on your mobile device before arriving. The newest service now lets you text for your check when you are in a hurry, order another round of drinks, appetizers, deserts, and even contact your waitstaff in the event of a wrong order when they are out of view.
TextMyFood, LLC of Cambridge, the company selling the service, has successfully tested it in Boston-area restaurants at Grand Canal and Charlie’s Kitchen. Guests can send a text message from their cell phones to the system’s touch screen display station. The waitstaff can view the message, along with how many minutes have elapsed since the message was sent. The waitperson may acknowledge the message with a returned text message, send a wine list if was requested, or attend to the request in person. The system can also be used as a promotional tool that sends out messages to patrons when they opt to receive them.
A Zagat Survey revealed 63 percent of avid diners believe it is rude and inappropriate to text, talk, e-mail, and tweet in restaurants. But TextMyFood uses precisely this modern communication to address perhaps an annoyance to an even greater number of restaurant goers—poor service.
Bob Nilsson, president of TextMyFood says they use the popularity of texting to reach clients.
“With the proliferation of texting, particularly amongst young people, it is such an appealing and an integral part of younger generation’s lives today.” There are now over 2.4 billion active text-messaging users, according to the company, and although young professionals are the predominant users of text messaging, many older professionals use it, too.
Text ordering is good for short orders but cannot replace human interaction, and only works for certain size venues.
“The system is best suited for restaurants with 25 tables or more and it helps waitstaff to balance out lax service on one hand and overly attentive, annoying service on the other,” said Nilsson. “It can also shorten the number of trips a waitperson has to make to service his guests.”
TextMyFood, LLC of Cambridge, the company selling the service, has successfully tested it in Boston-area restaurants at Grand Canal and Charlie’s Kitchen. Guests can send a text message from their cell phones to the system’s touch screen display station. The waitstaff can view the message, along with how many minutes have elapsed since the message was sent. The waitperson may acknowledge the message with a returned text message, send a wine list if was requested, or attend to the request in person. The system can also be used as a promotional tool that sends out messages to patrons when they opt to receive them.
A Zagat Survey revealed 63 percent of avid diners believe it is rude and inappropriate to text, talk, e-mail, and tweet in restaurants. But TextMyFood uses precisely this modern communication to address perhaps an annoyance to an even greater number of restaurant goers—poor service.
Bob Nilsson, president of TextMyFood says they use the popularity of texting to reach clients.
“With the proliferation of texting, particularly amongst young people, it is such an appealing and an integral part of younger generation’s lives today.” There are now over 2.4 billion active text-messaging users, according to the company, and although young professionals are the predominant users of text messaging, many older professionals use it, too.
Text ordering is good for short orders but cannot replace human interaction, and only works for certain size venues.
“The system is best suited for restaurants with 25 tables or more and it helps waitstaff to balance out lax service on one hand and overly attentive, annoying service on the other,” said Nilsson. “It can also shorten the number of trips a waitperson has to make to service his guests.”
