“I assumed at the time, about a year before we opened, that I would simply adopt the ticketing software from a theater system, sports ticketing software, or event tickets to use at Next. But it was immediately clear that none of these would work. Restaurants have a very different type of seating template than a theater show or sporting event. None of the ticket software systems met even half of our needs. I then contacted a number of the existing reservations software companies to ask if they wanted to either open their API to us, or partner on creating a ticketing extension to their system. All said no. Actually, no is too kind a word. Dismissive is far more accurate. One of the big players told me, “We studied that years ago and concluded no one wants or needs it.” - × × ×

“I showed Grant how to click on a table on the calendar page to ‘turn on’ a ticket for a table. He did and it turned from YELLOW to GREEN. I then refreshed the page and it was RED. “What happened,” he asked? “It sold.” He did it again, this time 2 months out on a Wednesday night at 9:30 PM. Same result, instant sale. “There are 8,432 people on the system hitting the refresh button right now chef. As soon as you unlock one, it sells. Here, look.” I opened another window with our credit card processing transactions listed. $ 57,293 in sales in the first hour of the system. $ 358,483 in the first 24-hours. Two days later $563,874 of revenue was in our bank.” - × × ×