
Ask HN: How do companies like Doordash/Postmates get their restaurant info? - akadeb
Is there an open source database of all restaurants in the US that is always updated with new chains&#x27; locations? Does the SEC keep this information?
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troydavis
No and no. Most buy the data from one of a bunch of vendors (like
[https://www.factual.com/](https://www.factual.com/),
[https://developer.foursquare.com/comparison](https://developer.foursquare.com/comparison),
[http://thewebminer.com/geo](http://thewebminer.com/geo), and a bunch of
smaller list providers), scrape it from other consumer sites (at least when
they’re small), or wait for users to submit the location in order to write the
first review (Yelp does some of this).

There are some state-specific data sources, like
[https://catalog.data.gov/dataset/retail-food-
stores](https://catalog.data.gov/dataset/retail-food-stores). Most food
licensing is at the county level, though, so there’s not a single government-
maintained nationwide data source.

