Fine dining restaurants researching guests to make their dinner unforgettable

https://www.sfgate.com/food/article/data-deep-dives-bay-area-fine-dining-restaurants-20404434.php

by borski • 1 year ago

118 251 1 year ago

sfgate.com

pseingatl• 1 year ago

Just like China's social credit system.

bigyabai• 1 year ago

Well sure, but for private enterprise.

ethan_smith• 1 year ago

There's a fundamental difference - restaurants checking if you like wine on Instagram to enhance service is optional and consequence-free, while China's system is mandatory with significant legal and financial penalties.

steveBK1234• 1 year ago

Surely once this becomes the norm and more business do it, it will only ever be used for good.. right.. ?

bluescrn• 1 year ago

Until they start denying people service because they expressed support for the wrong political party or took the wrong side on a divisive social issue.

general17262• 1 year ago

That's like wishful thinking that Youtube Premium is not going to have ads when it was being first implemented. It has ads now.

satvikpendem38• 1 year ago

Their social credit system doesn't actually exist in the way most people think it does, it was a top down mandate that each province was expected to implement in their own way, often without coordination.

https://youtu.be/Kqov6F00KMc

borski4• 1 year ago

Except nothing like it? This article isn’t about filtering guests out, but about creating additional tailored experiences to those who do attend.

general17262• 1 year ago

Road to hell is paved with good intentions.

alganet3• 1 year ago

It is expected that filtering based on digital content will become a thing for a while. It's one of those obvious, but misguided, uses of recent technologies.

I don't know about restaurants, but in regards to other kinds of silos, it is likely that those filters will go down once quality data availability becomes a problem.

In the restaurant analogy, you can say that if the salloon is empty, they'll let people in because they can't survive without them.

NoPicklez4• 1 year ago

They aren't not letting them in...

alganet3• 1 year ago

I don't know what to say. Please, read again, with a more abstract mindset this time.

allears• 1 year ago

I would never eat at a restaurant that would let people like me in.

(Thanks, Groucho)

prasadjoglekar• 1 year ago

The title seems ominous but the article itself is about how a fancy restaurant will go out of it's way to make you feel special. They're perusing your social media for clues.

In the past your spouse or kid would call and let the maitre'd know it was special; now I guess it's a job for someone on staff.

steveBK1234• 1 year ago

Until some YC backed SaaS LLM AI automates the process and it becomes table stakes. Then they find other uses for it..

hungmung• 1 year ago

I'm waiting for fully automated writing style recognition that finds all your throwaway accounts and sends you a shakedown letter.

closewith• 1 year ago

Unlawful in the EU, thankfully. The US seriously needs to revaluate it's data protection laws.

brookst3• 1 year ago

Are we really doing the slippery slope dangers of a high end restaurant going out of their way to delight?

CoastalCoder3• 1 year ago

and it becomes table stakes.

I see what you did there.

jjmarr• 1 year ago

Reminds me of The Menu.

satvikpendem38• 1 year ago

Reminds me of The Bear which has scenes like this. It is quite common in higher end restaurant, like those at the Michelin level to customize the experience for each guest (at least to a small degree, not necessarily changing out the entire menu for them).

yieldcrv5• 1 year ago

Going to The French Laundry has many similar to The Menu and felt like it was what the movie was satirizing

fnord77• 1 year ago

author doesn't understand the definition of "vetting"

which is par for the course for sfgate/chronicle

dang• 1 year ago

Thanks! We've changed the title above to use a more representative phrase from the article.

throawayonthe• 1 year ago

it's now a vaguer title, perhaps even more ominous because personally my immediate thought was "oh they're collaborating with advertising companies aren't they" before actually clicking on the article

mousethatroared• 1 year ago

Still creepy.

chasil4• 1 year ago

Restaurants concentrate too hard on the things that are not food.

If a restaurateur and/or the head chef has any pretensions of greatness, then they must master two French dishes, Coq au Vin, and Boeuf Bourguignon.

Before investing in anything else, these are tollgates.

munificent5• 1 year ago

I respect that you at least literally admit that you are gatekeeping.

npinsker• 1 year ago

Sounds like someone has never had Massaman curry

WorldWideWebb• 1 year ago

That’s complete rubbish. What of the sushi chef who has no knowledge or experience with French cuisine or someone who has mastered how to make a great taco? Would you not consider them masters of their craft, because I sure would.

ChrisMarshallNY7• 1 year ago

Good luck with that.

Pretty much the only social media I participate in, is ... here. I guess the Bay Area might take HN seriously, but I live in NY.

Spivak• 1 year ago

The example in the article is about getting to know your patrons so no social presence would be fine, but for what you're talking about with actual filtering no social presence would be an immediate rejection so I wouldn't be so smug.

ChrisMarshallNY7• 1 year ago

Not smug. I just don’t do social media. I know many folks, with lots of money, that are similar to me.

If SMBs want to reject us, because we aren’t posting every meal on TikTok, then they only have themselves to blame.

shiftpgdn• 1 year ago

That's ok, you'll get the same treatment everyone else got before they started this trend. "Normies" with their lives on the standard socials will get extra attention or special treatment at no detriment to you.

steveBK1234• 1 year ago

Social Credit Score, but privatized

kube-system• 1 year ago

Of which, the name comes from the US concept of “credit score” which was always privatized.

yieldcrv5• 1 year ago

Americans only care that the organization that can kill and arrest isn’t controlling all facets of life

But are tolerant that corporations do the exact same things in their society

NoPicklez4• 1 year ago

How is it a credit score? The restaurant isn't stopping anyone from coming in, but trying to personalise the experience to them.

EA-31672• 1 year ago

Like many here, before I read the article I assumed this was intended to be some sort of filtering mechanism... which is a bit dystopian, but IMO the truth is much MUCH more bizarre.

We're talking about a fancy restaurant that researches you and your social media to better cater to you and make you feel "special". I think I'd prefer that this just be an extension of the velvet rope, bouncers have been around for ages, but this feels genuinely creepy.

“The information is used as a precursor to gain more of an understanding of who our guests are,” general manager Akeel Shah explained to SFGATE. “We may not even use the information, but it gives us a better way to tailor the experience and make it memorable.”

Eewwww, no. Just no. It really feels like someone watched 'The Menu', missed the entire point of the movie, and just thought "Hey wouldn't it be neat if WE knew everything about our customers before they arrived?"

volleygman180• 1 year ago

I haven't seen The Menu, but try watching The Bear instead. They demonstrate this level-of-service & mentality and it's much more sincere than you think.

EA-31672• 1 year ago

The Menu is... overly sincere, I won't spoil it, but it's the "Restaurant as cult environment" movie. In fact the question of lacking sincerity is framed as "the audience casually disregards the immense effort and dedication requires to achieve what you demand."

...Now that's probably using restaurants as a metaphor for the film industry, but either way the point holds. I'm not put off by insincerity, it's forced, false intimacy as a product or a service goal that bothers me. Good food, good (not fawning) service is more than enough for me, I don't need this kind of race-to-the-bottom Michelin stars seem to inspire.

ksaun• 1 year ago

Specifically, the episode "Forks," in season 2. IMO, this episode can be enjoyed by someone otherwise unfamiliar with the show.

maxglute• 1 year ago

intended to be some sort of filtering mechanism

It's can be, at least anecdotally from people who work in prestigeous restaurants, i.e. places with year+ backlog. Owner/operator (frequently back of house) has strong politics and tell front of house to lose resos for certain client profiles.

dceddia3• 1 year ago

These comments are such a great pointer to the way outrage is engineered.

fsflover• 1 year ago

Can you elaborate?

vicurve• 1 year ago

You know how you sometimes read a title or a topic and you can infer the kind of commentary a particular topic will have? Even going so far as to expect words like “enshittification” to be used for both stating a point as well as for in-group signaling? Sort of like how opinions are front-loaded even if the article was read? (And very often the opinions are things we’ve heard before from many other people, this is a given).

Well, we’ve entered a period in manufactured outrage on the internet where an audience is primed ahead of time with talking points and perspectives that are deemed allowed, and then these reflexes are triggered over and over by the same kind of articles. And it’s the frenzy that counts.

It used to be confined to FB and other places but the average commenter has changed and so the average commentary has changed.

Articles are increasingly becoming rage bait, moreso than clickbait. I do not know what the appeal is yet but I imagine it’s some mixture of impulsivity that online commenting has enabled, combined with commenters thinking their take is valid/important/whatever. Maybe narcissistic but I can’t say for sure. At any rate, it’s another good way to destroy a community - especially one with self reinforcing mechanism like voting that basically ensures you’re on rails (with apologies to dhh)

dceddia3• 1 year ago

The title implies (well, I'd say explicitly states with the word "vetting") that restaurants are trying to filter guests, maybe to avoid troublesome ones with uncouth posts online or something. And many of the comments are replying to that interpretation, based on the unfairness suggested in the title. It's not only clickbait, it's outrage bait, designed to spark anger.

The article itself is about how restaurants have gone above and beyond for some guests where they've been able to tell from their social media that they're celebrating a special occasion or some other thing like that. To make the guests' experience better and memorable.

There's a privacy angle to this, should restaurants do that, slippery slope, etc etc... but many of the comments aren't talking about that. They're responding to the inflammatory title.

I don't think we often get such a clear picture into the why behind online outrage and how clearly manufactured it can often be. I think it's easy to believe people are angry for a good reason, to take the anger "on good faith" in some sense. In this case, with the title being so far from the article, it's clear to see what's going on. And makes one wonder about the rest of the outrage out there.

renewiltord• 1 year ago

Haha this is fantastic. I suppose we must have been uninteresting guests to these places because we didn't get this degree of personalization but the food was great. A lot of these 3 Mich experiences are experiences and not just a dining alone thing so I totally get it. Fun stuff!

joenot443• 1 year ago

Honestly, this just seems like really creative and earnest hospitality. To summarize the somewhat fluffy piece -

Kirk also has a gigantic database of each guest — about 115,000 people — and knows how many times they’ve dined at Lazy Bear since it first opened as a supper club in 2009. She then dives into social media and finds extra information that is publicly available to get a sense of who the guests are before they come in. Finally, she puts all the data she’s gathered into a color-coded Google document that every member of the team, front and back of house, studies.

“We get hundreds of emails a day, and the intimate details that some people are willing to share, sometimes we’re like ‘Holy crap. I can’t believe you told us that,’” Booth said. “But then there’s the fun, the literal joy, our team feels when they get to make these special touches with those details.”

That sounds great to me! I think some commenters are imagining a kind of Black Mirror meets Berghain meets social credit scenario, but it seems like really none of those things. Cynically, one could perhaps paint it as another clever way for Bay Area folks to convert capital into emotionally emulated human experiences, though even amongst that list I'd consider it one of the more wholesome.

borski4• 1 year ago

I completely agree with you.

jqpabc1232• 1 year ago

Seems like the potential start of a dystopian nightmare to me.

Wouldn't be better for all concerned if a 2 star restaurant worked at providing better food and service instead of privacy invasion and exploitation of the vain?

AznHisoka2• 1 year ago

There are exactly 2 restaurants I recommend to people, and invite family/friends to when they’re visiting.

Absolutely none of these restaurants know who I am, do anything special for me, or even know my favorite dishes.

The only thing they have in common is they consistently make delicious tasting food. And they probably focus a lot on doing that. Its that simple.

CoastalCoder3• 1 year ago

I assume you're referring to Jacques Imo's in New Orleans, then :)

peferron• 1 year ago

Would you also recommend these 2 restaurants if they ignored you for 30 minutes before taking your order, then brought your drinks late after you've already finished your meal? There's a lot more to a good restaurant experience than consistently making delicious tasting food. It's definitely not that simple.

zacharycohn2• 1 year ago

For people who go to these restaurants, this is better service. You wouldn't find this happening at Red Robin. This is what they are paying for.

If it's not for you, that's fine.

sublinear5• 1 year ago

I think you totally could replicate these experiences without the restaurant involved. Fun surprises are nice, but the absurdity of having the restaurant provide these kinds of experiences seems tacky.

I don't think I'm alone in wanting the restaurant's personality to be just as much a part of the experience as my own personality. Otherwise, what makes this place more special than any other wanting to pull the same gimmicks?

briangriffinfan3• 1 year ago

If it's a person who wants to personally make my experience better, sure, yay.

If it's a manager who wants to use AI to maximize my engagement, fuck that.

jqpabc1232• 1 year ago

A baby penguin is not service --- it has no impact on their 2 star rating.

Unless they are on the menu, penguins have no part in the restaurant's mission. It is simple pandering to those who psychologically crave attention. It is put forth as a substitute for the lack of better product and service.

sublinear5• 1 year ago

Despite much hype, past a certain point even the highest end food really is... just food.

The service is what people really pay for, and there I agree that there should be much more interesting ideas to elevate the experience than bringing in a baby penguin. I don't see anything in the article as particularly creative.

JumpCrisscross3• 1 year ago

past a certain point even the highest end food really is... just food

That point is still well up there. The difference between hours-picked tomatoes and Aramark sludge is worth paying for.

smitelli• 1 year ago

I gotta say, I don't have the right personality traits to enjoy this kind of personal attention a lot of the time.

I've had experiences where the counter staff at my daily breakfast place started to recognize me and know what "usual" my order was going to be without my having to say it... and it really weirded me out more than anything else.

Sometimes I just want to be a faceless nobody, forgotten day after day by the businesses I visit and the public spaces I navigate.

mingus883• 1 year ago

Yeah I’m heavily introverted and feel the same way. It establishes a kind of social pressure that if I fail to hold up my side of the relationship I just get anxious

satvikpendem38• 1 year ago

If you go so often that people remember you, I mean, what do you expect, that they somehow block the memory of you from their mind?

JumpCrisscross3• 1 year ago

I don't have the right personality traits to enjoy this kind of personal attention a lot of the time

Have friends who work at the Four Seasons. This—low service interaction—is a common type of personalised attention patrons want.

I don’t think there is a social media cue for it. But even as someone who’s fairly extroverted, I got a note indicating I should be left alone if dining alone and reading.

ufmace• 1 year ago

Yeah I get what you mean. I think I'd be a lot more weirded out than delighted if a restaurant I was going to stalked my social media (such as it exists at all), attempted to deduce things I would like from it, and presented me those things at a meal.

rglover• 1 year ago

So this is basically a modern approach to Danny Meyer's (Union Square Hospitality Group [1]) "collecting the dots" he described in his book Setting the Table [2].

His suggestion was to have staff listen to conversations (and have conversations with guests) and then record any interesting "dots" like a child having a graduation coming up or an anniversary just around the corner. That way on their next visit the staff could be well-prepared.

Click-bait headline makes you think otherwise, but this is just standard hospitality stuff.

[1] https://www.ushg.com/

[2] https://www.amazon.com/Setting-Table-Transforming-Hospitalit...

bapak2• 1 year ago

I don't know if the times have changed, but if the staff at the restaurant I've been twice knows something I did not tell them, I would not be particularly comfortable with that.

dfxm123• 1 year ago

You (the general you) tell the world a lot of things that can be looked up via your email address. Most restaurants take reservations through a system that asks for your email address.

I was at a restaurant a while back and looked over at the hostess' iPad. It had my Twitter avatar on it. I never told them my Twitter handle, but it is associated with the email I used. Do public musings count as telling someone something?

Maybe the next restaurant you (the personal you) go to will look up your email address, find this post and just serve you food.

altusbrown• 1 year ago

If I caught the staff doing that at a hotel or restaurant, I’d black list them. Fuck that.

defrost3• 1 year ago

The eavesdropping part is creepy, otherwise this is more or less part of what makes a good and valued concierge.

dfxm123• 1 year ago

but this is just standard hospitality stuff

Aside from telling the host that you're celebrating your birthday or an anniversary when you make the reservation and getting a special dessert for the occasion, have you ever been at a restaurant where such dots were collected, connected and acted upon?

I haven't, and I've been to 1 & 2 star restaurants.

CGMthrowaway• 1 year ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clienteling

Anyone in service-oriented business is or ought to be familiar with the general concepts. I have a whiteboard next to my desk with the names and ages of people's kids.

And for those worried about the creepiness of it all, privacy and discretion are also core concepts of service/hospitality when done well.

randycupertino• 1 year ago

I used to work with the lady who fashioned herself a "networking genius" and her secret was keeping a giant one-note with pictures of everyone's pets. She took their pet pics off facebook and instagram and would ask about how they were in meetings. One time she was screensharing and I saw it and asked her what it was. My dog was in there.

reverendsteveii• 1 year ago

Click-bait headline makes you think otherwise, but this is just standard hospitality stuff.

It's so standard that it's actually part of the training at that universally-known 0 michelin star italian travesty, the olive garden. When I worked there we called it "surprise and delight" because I'm sure if we called it collecting the dots we had to pay Danny Meyer. We were taught to observe our guests and even ask some questions in order to gather intel and then confer w the MoD in order to brainstorm ways to make the guest's visit special. We didn't have the resources to do things like the Pequod's scene from The Bear but what we could do we took great pride in doing. Our store was in the area where a soup called stellini is available. It's basically a chicken noodle soup w little pasta stars, spinach and meatballs, derived from a Pittsburgh-area specialty called wedding soup. Idk who in an olive garden in another state let slip that their large party was from Pittsburgh but the GM from that store called us and we overnighted a bunch of stellini to that restaurant (at corporate's expense, of course) just so they could have the same experience at this other store that they do at home.

satvikpendem38• 1 year ago

It's funny to read these comments, of course HN would react this way but since the vast majority of restaurant patrons are so-called normies, it doesn't make much sense to cater to HNers. In fact, most normal people actually prefer that restaurants know their interests and cater to them, it leads to their higher satisfaction and makes the restaurant experience (which includes more than just the taste of the food, for most people at least) more memorable overall.

sublinear5• 1 year ago

I don't see what's so normal about any of this. In the past your friends would just mention a few hints while making the reservation... and people still do this now.

If they need to scan your social media, that speaks volumes about how you socialize and the quality of those interactions. Plenty of "normal" people don't want this either. The thoughts mean more coming from your friends than a creepy restaurant.

cyberge99• 1 year ago

I wonder if there’s ever been a case of mistaken identity. A bear lover instead of a penguin lover for example.

JumpCrisscross3• 1 year ago

I’m genuinely confused by people who find it creepy that their public social media be scanned and analysed. You made it public!

satvikpendem38• 1 year ago

You're proving my point. Only do people on HN care, I've never heard of anyone "normal" expressing concern over this sort of restaurant policy, and doubly so if they made their entire account public in the first place. By all means, friends can mention a few hints, but that doesn't mean that restaurants won't do their own research.

If they need to scan your social media, that speaks volumes about how you socialize and the quality of those interactions.

No, it doesn't, and I don't see how you came to the conclusion that if a restaurant had to scan my social media that it says anything about how I socialize. People don't just socialize only on social media, you know.

zzo38computer2• 1 year ago

I would prefer the restaurant to know that which is relevant, which is I would tell them anything which is relevant (for the specific order I am making at that time, which might or might not be the same next time), when I go to that restaurant. They do not necessarily need to know my name in order for this to work.

satvikpendem38• 1 year ago

Read the article, it's a surprise for a reason.

olalonde• 1 year ago

Maybe I'm just getting old and grumpy, but these places feel designed for snobs, not normies.

satvikpendem38• 1 year ago

Many people do hold that opinion of fine dining restaurants, yes, but normal people do go to them is only because there aren't enough snobs to sustain them.

tekla• 1 year ago

That's most of HN

satyrun• 1 year ago

I am not sure snobs is the right word. It is just a different experience.

I like opera and I like metal but while both are music, it is a completely different live musical experience.

rsynnott2• 1 year ago

Not sure I totally buy that. If anything, I’ve found laypeople to be _more_ creeped out by targeted advertising, in particular, than tech people (with the caveat that this is in Europe, and I do think there’s a cultural gap there; Europe’s stricter regulation on this sort of thing doesn’t arise in a vacuum).

satvikpendem38• 1 year ago

Yes, it's different in America. Yet even in Europe will Michelin star restaurants do things similar to the article.

bigiain• 1 year ago

I’ve found laypeople to be _more_ creeped out by targeted advertising, in particular, than tech people

"It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it" -- Upton Sinclair

Tech people are many orders of magnitude more likely to be getting paid to be "the creeps" by targeting the advertising.

bluealienpie• 1 year ago

I'd prefer having consent of when and where my data is used.

satvikpendem38• 1 year ago

You consent implicitly and explicitly when you accept the terms of service to make the account.

gspencley• 1 year ago

I'm your typical HN, tecchie, paranoid, privacy-obssessed "don't track me" nerd.

But I have absolutely no problem with haute cuisine restaurants doing this.

There's a few reasons that make this special, and in a completely different universe than being tracked online.

1. Most people, my wife and I included, seldom go to haute cuisine restaurants. When we do, it is a very special, once in a lifetime experience.

2. Restaurants are not staffed by hackers and advertising engineers. They are going to start with opt-in questionnaires that you will fill out when you make your reservation. That questionnaire will often come in one of two forms: a) they will just ask you verbally when you phone or b) they'll send you a package when you make your reservation. That package is usually pretty special unto itself. It's going to feel like a welcome package, and they are going to invite you to share anything that you think is helpful, entirely voluntarily. Typically they'll ask about food preferences and dietary restrictions... but I mean, they'll get a lot just by giving you a text field that asks "Are you celebrating a special occasion, or anything else you want to share?" You're free to put whatever you want in there, and leave anything else out.

3. Now we get to the social media part. This is doing a little bit extra above what most haute cuisines have done in the past. But remember - they can only find what you make public. They're not like, DM'ing people on your friends' lists etc. or hiring a private investigator to stalk you.

Once you're in the door, the idea of remembering that you were there before and jotting down your preferences etc. so that if you return they can make you feel even that more special... this isn't McDonald's, or even a fancy steak house, that we're talking about. This is a place that most people - if they go at all - are going to go ONCE. So people who return are extremely special and to show them that level of "we give a fuck about you" is what sets these restaurants apart.

One experience that my wife and I had was at Victoria & Albert's at Disney's Grand Floridian resort. We spent $2,000 on that meal. Why? Because it was our belated honeymoon. We were highschool sweethearts, got married and had kids really young and were extremely poor for most of our marriage... so we saved up and it was once in a lifetime. For that money... this level of service is a huge part of how they go above and beyond to make their patrons feel like it's worth it. If most people felt freaked out by it, that some personal boundary was being crossed ... it would be the last thing they do. But they realize that your typical dining experience is pretty impersonal. That if you're going to shell out that much money on a dinner... it needs to be more than just the world's best food.

satvikpendem38• 1 year ago

Thank you for this comment. I've been to a lot of Michelin (and other fine dining) restaurants and this is how I've seen it play out too. People are generally delighted when service like this happens, not creeped out as lots of commenters here seem to imply.

And this, "they can only find what you make public. They're not like, DM'ing people on your friends' lists etc. or hiring a private investigator to stalk you," has been exactly what I've been saying on this thread too, but somehow people think they should be able to keep their profile public yet not have people read through it; that's literally what the word public means.

astrange2• 1 year ago

Good opportunity to learn about SingleThread, which is a 90s-style throwback to when it was impossible to learn anything about Japan so people just made things up. Like, they call their customers "chairman of the board" because they just heard a random word somewhere?

Japanese customer service ("omotenashi") is mostly about not listening to your customers. You get exactly what they want to give you and that's it. If you have a dietary restriction they may just kick you out because they won't/can't change the menu.

op00to3• 1 year ago

Japanese customer service (“omotenas”) emphasizes anticipating needs and delivering respectful, consistent service, not improvisation. It can feel rigid (no menu changes), but it’s not about ignoring or dominating it customers. If a place can accommodate a food sensitivity, they usually will. If they truly can’t, they’ll tell you clearly rather than risk doing it wrong. It’s a cultural focus on doing things properly and fairly, not a lack of care or some sort of holier-than-thou feeling.

astrange2• 1 year ago

Yes, the dietary restriction thing has become less of an issue, as there's more immigrants/tourists and more interest in vegan food recently.

But Japanese businesses can be very risk-avoidant, so they're relatively happy to not make a sale if it could possibly cause any trouble, compared to what Westerners might expect.

Hnrobert42• 1 year ago

Privacy concerns aside, I would be mortified if a restaurant did something special for me. I don't want extra attention. I don't want to have to pretend to be excited about a beverage I don't really care for or a gift I will just throw away.

Now if you will excuse, I see some clouds at which I need to shake my cane.

CoastalCoder3• 1 year ago

What if their special thing for you was to treat you like a truly genetic customer?

I.e., like what Leslie Knope did for Run Swanson on his birthday.

joshstrange• 1 year ago

I.e., like what Leslie Knope did for Run Swanson on his birthday.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=apg09bolUIc

magicalhippo• 1 year ago

Many moons ago I was celebrating an anniversary with my parents and sister at a smallish, but very good, restaurant downtown.

As we were chatting while waiting for the dessert, the whole restaurant started singing "Happy Birthday", as the waiter (and owner) came with the dessert, sparkler and all.

I sooo wanted to just disappear.

Turned out my mom had told the waiter/owner about the occasion, and he had unbeknownst to my mom gotten all the other guests in on it.

Nice thought, just totally not my thing.

maxbond9• 1 year ago

Didn't worry, they'll find this comment and stick you at an okay booth, provide okay service, and pretend not to recognize you next time you come in. It'll be perfect.

fragmede• 1 year ago

Do you also give a fake name to the barista at Starbucks so they don't track you? Other restaurants can't even be bothered to do that much personalization, and just give you a number (and treat you like one).

NoPicklez4• 1 year ago

I guess then you wouldn't go to such a restaurant.

I dare way there is a way to completely opt out of it as well.

userbinator• 1 year ago

It must be emphasised that they're doing this with public information and presumably whatever else you've implicitly consented to giving them, so I don't see a problem with that. Nonetheless this isn't the experience I'd want from a restaurant, and fortunately there are plenty of others to choose from.

asdf69692• 1 year ago

Maybe I’ll start taking pictures of the owners kids playing in the yard so I can establish a better relationship with the business and get better service.

yapyap• 1 year ago

Replacing real intimacy to a paid service, neat.

(imagine I’m the dog sitting in the burning house saying this, it’s sarcasm)

Ccecil• 1 year ago

The movie "LA Story" predicted this in the L'Idiot scene.

https://youtu.be/k3FvhR0n8x8?si=YjNzYF60aCeRvZE3&t=68

rsynnott2• 1 year ago

This is disconcerting, and I don’t like it, though I suppose I’m not really the target audience.

Barracoon• 1 year ago

Lots of people saying they don’t like the idea of this here. How many people works at companies whose bottom line is driven by researching website visitors to make their ads unforgettable?

BiteCode_dev• 1 year ago

In fact, many people on HN work for Google.

PeterStuer• 1 year ago

Does that imply you have to like it or be labeled a hypocrite?

Life isn't a series of black or white choices, but full of multifacetted grey areas where some bad will always be mixed in with the good.

I can very much dislike restaurants sleuthing me even if I have sites with add revenue.

I do not care for their imagined 'marginal service improvent potential'. For excellent service and good food, you do not need to know anything about me beyond my reservation and any food allergies me or my party might volunteer.

not_a_shill• 1 year ago

Of course you can like your targeted ads/data collection and not the restaurant's targeted experience...the restaurant isnt paying you!

So yes you're a hypocrite, but no one really cares--most people are.

slightwinder• 1 year ago

Ads are automated, no human involved into the actual research of a specific visitor. It's still creepy, but less personal. Some people can accept this line. But I also guess, with AI this line might be moved again.

The deeper reason is probably, machines are following rules, and they do it equally, focus on their specific job, without any hidden agenda. Humans are different, they have personal opinions and their own agenda, they can even be abusive. This is taking control from the people, and many people don't like losing control.

barbazoo• 1 year ago

Both kinds of people are here. People who complain about social media, arms, pollution etc and people whose job contributes to it.

There’s no point in expecting a homogeneous experience here.

m3kw9• 1 year ago

They been doing that for decades

nobodyandproud• 1 year ago

Terrible. I go to fine dining in order to partake in the chef’s vision.

bz_bz_bz2• 1 year ago

I once dined at a Michelin starred restaurant that ended the meal with a surprise for us that made me feel that they must have had listening devices in the establishment (it was based on a comment made when no server was around). In the moment, I was very impressed (and figured maybe it was a common thing in eastern bloc countries lol), but I could definitely see how others would find it creepy.

Edit: removed Bear comment as I misread the article.

aaronmdjones• 1 year ago

Life imitating art

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05hTBAOnDQE

zelos• 1 year ago

The penguin example seems kind of overstated, since from the sound of it the restaurant basically just donated a few dollars to WWF, but it's dressed up as how they "adopted a living animal for a guest" and no one's done that before.

munificent5• 1 year ago

That's because this article is an ad for that restaurant.

gadders• 1 year ago

Common Cog business newsletter did some articles [1] about how this was implemented in Eleven Madison Park, starting in 2001 when Will Guidara [2] took over.

[1] https://commoncog.com/hospitality-solution-business/

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Guidara

kjellsbells• 1 year ago

I'm going to sound like a grinch here, but the flip side of researching the guests to provide stellar service is that the people who don't show up in the persons of note list may end up getting crappier service. It's like the notorious practice of fashion people not qualifying to buy an overpriced handbag until they've proven their loyalty to the brand by buying previous overpriced handbags.

The reason people come back from overseas trips raving about some cute little trattoria or izakaya joint is rarely because the owner sponsored a penguin, but more because the host achieved a genuinely human connection with the diner.

heeton• 1 year ago

Having been to a place that does this, before I had an online profile: I think this is only one side of their approach.

During my visit the team were super attentive and conversational and picked up on insanely small details. I’m sure if you weren’t a person of note, you’ll still get the same service but they have a different starting point to deliver it.

Atotalnoob• 1 year ago

The restaurants at this tier aren’t giving anyone bad service.

Service is a big component of being a Michelin starred restaurant.

randerson• 1 year ago

I dined at a fine dining restaurant in the Bay area that had obviously Googled my name in advance, and found a semi-famous person who shares my name. As I arrived the maitre'd said some things that made no sense, like she hoped the conference I was in town for was going well. But she looked visibly confused, and as a waiter walked me to my table I could see them huddling and glancing at me. Later on I searched and found that my namesake was in fact in town.

randomcarbloke• 1 year ago

hash collision

xhkkffbf• 1 year ago

Hah....but these kind of places serve something better than hash.

interestica• 1 year ago

Sounds like a (fusion) menu item.

https://www.seriouseats.com/the-food-lab-how-to-make-the-bes...

derwiki• 1 year ago

Great idea! I will now be Michael Bolton for the purposes of restaurant reservations.

bz_bz_bz2• 1 year ago

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=YX7R9M-Taik

m463• 1 year ago

The endgame is that you get a custom menu with customized prices.

pyuser5832• 1 year ago

I have a name that’s completely unique, except for some well known European scholar in a highly specialized field of medicine.

One day the scholar visted my city to give a lecture, and I seriously considered attending and causing some type of trouble.

But whatever fun I would have it’s not worth sitting through a lecture on some chemical process in the lower blah blah blah blah.

pfannkuchen2• 1 year ago

Are you probably related then? Or is it just that your first name is extremely unique?

qbantek• 1 year ago

That whole story sounds like hell to me. Another invasion to the little privacy we are left with.

Const-me• 1 year ago

The last few times I reserved a table at a restaurant, I only gave my first name. They never asked for my full name, would be hard for them to find me on social media. However, I'm an immigrant with a locally uncommon first name, YMMV.

Fine dining restaurants researching guests to make their dinner unforgettable

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