I actually had something similiar planned for Android Competition, but instead of reservations, users could make takeout orders, based on current resturant sales, location to a particular store, and type of food the user wanted. Would make money by charging resturants to be included in the program, for updates/sales, and for analysis based on their customers habits. Works great for Asian and pizza places.
Only problem, Asian and pizza places are usually so cut-throat, I don't know if I'd have the salemanship needed to get them to buy into the idea.
You order and pay online (which is nice for deliveries); they either phone in your order or use some kind of Internet or fax device to send it in (I'm not sure about the details of the restaruant communication). This is perfect for a local pizza/grill place (of which there are a huge amount of in Denmark); when you sell a pizza for 50kr there's not much margin for complex IT or even a simple web page. The pizza place takes care of the delivery.
They get most of their money from restaurants but seem to offer some monthly subscription with a few extra features and small discount at certain "VIP" restaurants.
What's wrong is they don't have much competition. There's always some market share available if you put in the legwork and sign up the restaurants OpenTable misses. There's always room for improvement, too.
I think someone could take the dining reservation concept pretty far as well. A dining reservation + yelp like review site could work well. Design wise, I could see someone doing really exciting things with a site in this sector.
Hi My name is Sachin Chopra, founder of tablerush.com, which is on the same lines as opentable, but offers more value and services than that and we are looking for funding. you can contact me with your profile at sachin@tablerush.com and we discuss this further.
We are doing one called TableRush.com in India - but we are not the founders. We should launch in a few months and then follow up with a Symbian mobile application.
don't miss that opentable is not just for consumers. to get restaurants on their system, opentable offers tools that help restaurant managers measure their staff and customers. i've heard the system captures and provides data (e.g., repeat visits by customers, tips by customer and waitress, table turn timing by waitress, etc.) that can help managers get real business benefits like growing revenue
i wonder what other appointment industries (e.g., hair salons, dentists) have a similar opportunity to help consumers and business managers
Much of OpenTable's revenue comes from POS systems that improve restaurant efficiency. Their installed systems and their knowledge of operations are both strategic advantages that are very difficult to beat from a standing start.
