Yelp Inc. (NYSE:YELP), the company that connects people with great local
businesses, today announced continued growth and momentum in its
restaurant services offerings, with Yelp’s reservation and waitlist
software reaching a new system total high by handling nearly 4.5 million
diners during Mother’s Day weekend. The number of diners booking
directly through the Yelp app nearly tripled year over year from
Mother’s Day 2018. The number of diners seated via Yelp in the first
quarter grew 43% from the fourth quarter of 2018, and grew 240% compared
to the first quarter of 2018.
With the availability of Yelp Reservations and Waitlist, Yelp is
providing restaurants with the technology and products to meet the
evolving demands of diners who expect ease and convenience when eating
out — whether they’re making a reservation, walking in, or ordering food
delivery. As the platform continues to evolve beyond helping diners
discover where to eat, to making it easy for them to communicate and
transact directly with businesses, Yelp continues to become a more
valuable partner to restaurants.
“Consumer dining trends, coupled with our own data, clearly demonstrate
that diners not only want convenience and ease, but they also
increasingly prefer a one-stop platform for all their dining
transactions,” said Devon Wright, General Manager of Yelp Restaurant
Marketplaces. “We’re thrilled by the continued momentum and adoption of
our technologies among both restaurants and diners, and look forward to
continuing to partner with restaurant owners to help them deliver the
best possible experience to their customers.”
“Our restaurant keeps getting busier and busier, and we haven’t been
doing any marketing or advertising outside of what we do with Yelp, so
we know it’s because we’re on Yelp Reservations and Waitlist that people
are finding us,” said CJ Zheng, owner of Chow House in New York. “The
waits keep getting longer, and we’re just happy we can provide an extra
data point for our customers to help get them through our door at their
convenience.”
“Running a small to midsize restaurant with finite availability, we are
often challenged by flow optimization and capacity issues,” said Eric
Tjahyadi, owner of Bone Kettle in Pasadena, CA. “Yelp Waitlist empowers
my team to confidently take reservations booking to the next level
without fear of over or under booking. It seamlessly enables us to
capture last minute diners as we optimize availability and flow. It also
helps us achieve a three-turn night consistently during busy dinner
shifts, something that was previously hard to achieve due to the
persistent issues of last minute cancellations and no-shows. All and
all, it really transforms our business.”
In addition to Yelp Reservations and Yelp Waitlist, the company offers Yelp
Kiosks to streamline both digital and physical restaurant management
processes. According to Yelp data, diners seated through the Yelp app
return to the same restaurant twice as often as other diners; Yelp’s
wait time algorithm is approximately twice as accurate as host
estimates, leading restaurant partners to experience an increase in
revenue; and the app’s On My Way feature helps restaurants seat 10% more
diners during non-busy hours.
About Yelp
Yelp Inc. (www.yelp.com)
connects people with great local businesses. With unmatched local
business information, photos and review content, Yelp provides a
platform for consumers to discover, interact and transact with local
businesses of all sizes. Yelp was founded in San Francisco in July 2004.
Since then, Yelp has taken root in major metros in more than 30
countries.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190528005098/en/