This is the complete transcript of The Recommendation Economy Comes to Restaurants — Pat Venn, PRIMA (RTG Ep. 356), recorded in late July 2026. Pat Venn is Chief Operating Officer of PRIMA and the former Head of Enterprise at Tock.
Episode Summary
Pat Venn came into hospitality technology from consulting sales, joined Tock after hearing founder Nick Kokonas describe the product on a podcast, and spent years growing its major markets before leading the global enterprise team through acquisitions by Squarespace and then American Express. He is now Chief Operating Officer of PRIMA, a Miami-based network that raised a $5 million seed round in August 2026.
In this conversation with Jeremy Julian, Pat lays out the case that restaurants cannot answer two basic questions: how do I drive more business, and how do I drive the right kind of business. He explains why no-show rates of 15% to 20% collapse to near zero when deposits replace credit-card holds, why most loyalty programs fail because points do not travel between brands, and what it would mean for a restaurant to know a guest’s value before the table is sat. PRIMA’s model is affiliate marketing applied to the physical world: hotels, residences, concierge networks, travel advisors and creators get access to a curated roster of restaurants, and every booking carries an attributable source. Pat also addresses the obvious objection — whether paid recommendations stay honest — and walks through what onboarding looks like for a restaurant, where PRIMA is live today, and why he thinks the recommendation economy eventually extends well beyond dining.
Jump to a Section
- From Consulting Sales into Hospitality Technology (0:01)
- What Tock Did That Other Reservation Platforms Weren’t Doing (1:53)
- Why Deposits Solved the No-Show Problem (4:17)
- What PRIMA Is Trying to Solve for Restaurants (6:25)
- The Affiliate Model, Applied to the Physical World (7:51)
- Why Standard Loyalty Programs Fall Flat (10:12)
- Scoring the Diner So Loyalty Travels Between Restaurants (12:10)
- The Capital Grille Regular the Restaurant Across the Street Can’t See (15:41)
- Where Marketing Dollars Go, and Building the Rails of Attribution (17:39)
- Why a Paid Recommendation Still Has to Be Trustworthy (24:07)
- What Onboarding Looks Like for a Restaurant and a Hotel (27:10)
- Mila Miami, Network Density, and Where This Goes Next (32:22)
From Consulting Sales into Hospitality Technology (0:01)
Jeremy Julian (0:01): Welcome back to the Restaurant Technology Guys Podcast. I thank everyone out there for joining us, as I like to say. I know you guys have got lots of choices out on the internet to spend your time, so thanks for hanging with us this week. Today I am joined by a founder, or I guess co-founder — I know your title is not quite co-founder, Pat — but joined by somebody that has been in the industry for a while. He’s done some really, really cool stuff, and I think our listeners are going to enjoy it. But Pat, before we jump into where you’re at now with PRIMA, why don’t you give our listeners a little bit of background? Where did you come up through the hospitality industry, and what was your latest role right before you jumped on with PRIMA?
Pat Venn (0:37): Yeah, well, appreciate it. Thank you for having me on, Jeremy. So I came in through hospitality on the tech side. I did consulting sales for quite some time and it was as boring as it sounds. And so I was at kind of a crossroads and asked myself, you know, what actually interests me? And in my entire life hospitality has been a big part of it. I’ve kind of grown up in hospitality, I love going out to eat, all that kind of stuff. So I just looked at the space and heard a podcast that Nick Kokonas, the founder of Tock, did, and found it to be an incredible idea. So I reached out, was lucky enough to get a job there, and was at Tock for a number of years. My role was really on more of the sales side and growing all of our major markets. And then through that we ended up selling to Squarespace right during or after COVID, because Tock did quite well during that time with the pivot we had. And then found our way into American Express through another acquisition. And once I was there, I led the enterprise team. So I led all the big restaurant groups, hotel groups for Tock and then Amex Global Dining.
What Tock Did That Other Reservation Platforms Weren’t Doing (1:53)
Jeremy Julian (1:53): Love it. For those that are not familiar, or have heard of Tock but don’t really understand what it is — because I want to lay the framework for where you’re at now — what is Tock? What did it do, and how did it iterate through the years that you were there into what it ultimately became before you left?
Pat Venn (2:09): Yeah, so Tock is very interesting in that it was the platform that kind of zigged when everyone was zagging. And I say that because Nick Kokonas, who was the founder, had owned the Alinea Group and kind of built Tock for his own restaurants, because back then things like no-shows were a major problem, but also the inability to showcase the restaurant, the experiences and events that they have was fairly limiting. And so he had built Tock as a solution to his own problem, and in creating and building Tock, built a solution that eliminated no-shows but also did a very good job at showcasing everything a restaurant has to offer.
Pat Venn (3:07): I think especially in today’s day and age, what’s quite interesting is this plan experience. And I know experience is like a huge buzzword — everyone’s probably tired of hearing it — but everyone is kind of searching for that thing to do. It’s why I think influencers are as successful as they are. And so the general premise is people can’t buy what they can’t see, you can’t attend what you’re not aware of. And so what Tock did a really exceptional job of was creating a virtual storefront for the restaurants that showed a cool chef’s table or a prix fixe meal or a wine dinner that was upcoming.
Pat Venn (3:33): And then had payment tools that eliminated no-shows, because it turns out when you do something like put a deposit down or force full payment up front, no-shows are much less likely to happen. Whereas something like a credit card hold does not do the trick and is actually not very hospitable, because people get fees or dings after they don’t show up. So it was a very fun, innovative company to work for. It was very product focused, which I always appreciated. And we were quite successful in the fine dining, Michelin, and winery space, and it’s because we solved the big problems that they all have.
Why Deposits Solved the No-Show Problem (4:17)
Jeremy Julian (4:17): Well, and I think part of what I appreciate you sharing — because when I saw the methodology, I’m not going to lie, I was like, is that really going to work? But the thing I loved about your guys’ worldview, and I guess I’d love for you to confirm this, is it felt like it was much more restaurant focused, whereas the competitors in the space, the OpenTables of the world, were much more diner focused and could — I don’t want to say care less, but didn’t care nearly as much about the brand as they did about the diner. And so Tock felt like it was for the restaurants to be able to protect their asset of the reservation. I’d love a little bit of opinion on that before I jump into what you guys are building at PRIMA.
Pat Venn (4:57): Yeah, I think that’s right. I think the reservation platforms now are all becoming a bit more operator focused, which is great just more broadly speaking. But tool-wise, the platforms that existed at the time certainly didn’t think about how do you make it so that you can build a platform where that restaurant can run its restaurant as a business, not as a hobby.
Pat Venn (5:25): And I think at the end of the day, no-shows are the things that absolutely crush a restaurant, especially a busy one. And so if you’re able to eliminate what is typically a fifteen, twenty percent no-show issue, if that goes to zero to one percent, that’s a lot of revenue that you’re actually then producing and keeping for the restaurant itself.
Jeremy Julian (5:56): Yeah, and that’s insane. I didn’t know it was fifteen to twenty percent. I’d love for our listeners that are in the restaurant space but don’t run a fine dining establishment — we’ve all been there where we’re like, well, but there’s OpenTable, why can’t I sit? And we’ve all struggled with that. We show up to a brand, we want to eat, they’ve got a table, but now they’re waiting to see if the no-show shows up. They’re texting, they’re calling. It creates a lot of friction, to your point. And so I love that you guys were able to solve that.
What PRIMA Is Trying to Solve for Restaurants (6:25)
Jeremy Julian (6:25): So now fast forward to today, Pat. You’ve left American Express Dining and have jumped on the team with PRIMA. What is PRIMA and what are you guys trying to solve for? Because it sounds like you’re taking a lot of the experience that you had and thinking about it differently. I’d love to get a high level view and then we’ll dig into how you guys are going about it.
Pat Venn (6:48): Yeah. One of the benefits that I had with my job is I’ve had the fortune of talking to thousands of restaurants. And what’s interesting is although every restaurant is very different and they’re run very differently with different people and different personalities, you kind of hear the same themes time and time again. And two of those are, how do I drive more business and how do I drive the right type of business? And the problem is nobody knows how to solve that. Nobody knows what is actually effective at driving more customers, driving more butts in seats, and nobody knows how to target the right type of diner.
Pat Venn (7:19): What’s very interesting in restaurants now — you go to New York and you see the restaurant that you’ve got to book four weeks in advance to even think about getting a spot. But the problem with that is that restaurant that’s booking four weeks in advance, the type of diner that is going to set their alarm clock and snag that reservation at midnight is not the one that’s going to come in and spend. It’s the twenty-something that wants to go in and post on Instagram and say, look where I’m at, and will get a salad and a Diet Coke and sit at the table for three hours. That actually hurts the restaurant. And so even the busy restaurants have this problem of finding the right customer. And so at the core, that is what PRIMA aims to solve.
The Affiliate Model, Applied to the Physical World (7:51)
Pat Venn (7:51): Our founder, Alex Zhardanovsky, back in the day created the first affiliate marketplace. And all that meant was you had all these websites with ad space, you had all these advertisers looking to get onto those websites, and there was no way to actually talk to one another. And so he created the solution that just connected these affiliates, these advertisers, with the websites. And the entire premise of PRIMA is taking that model but putting it into the physical.
Pat Venn (8:42): And so what we’ve done is created this network of valuable diners, people that we can then give access to the restaurants, where number one, they know who that customer is and where they came from, but number two, ensure that it’s the right type of guest that they’re looking for. How we do that is what makes us very unique, because there’s a lot of players that would take a membership approach, or it’s straight B2C and they’d go and find a bunch of people to sign on and build a network in that way.
Pat Venn (9:11): We’ve taken a completely different approach in that it’s all affiliate-based. And for those that aren’t familiar with affiliates, all that means is we go to businesses that have a supply of diners, or a supply of people that would be valuable to any type of business. And so that could be a four or five-star hotel, that could be a high-end residential building, that could be a concierge network, that could be loyalty-driven programs. There’s many different corporations that fit that bill.
Pat Venn (9:40): We give them access to our platform, which has all the restaurants in our network. And by giving them that access, they then can promote PRIMA as an amenity or benefit, because we’ve curated the best restaurants and experiences in that city while providing additional access, exclusive access, that they wouldn’t be able to get publicly. And so we’ve really now created this model where through our affiliates, through our partners, we’ve grown this network of a lot of people that then drives great diners into the restaurants.
Why Standard Loyalty Programs Fall Flat (10:12)
Jeremy Julian (10:12): I love that. You alluded to it, and I think a lot of people go, I just need a loyalty program. And I actually did just a solo episode recently on how not all loyalty programs are created equal and they don’t really fit for many brands, but people think, I’m just going to launch a loyalty program and I’m going to start collecting email addresses and start sending them out. For those that are watching on video, they see you shaking your head. Why does that not work? It might be part of your arsenal, it might be an arrow in your quiver if you’re the right brand and it makes sense, but it’s not right for everyone. And a lot of these brands that you’re talking about are certainly not the right kind of brands — those high net worth individuals, those people that have deep pockets that are looking to spend, they’re looking for something extra. They’re not looking for a free cup of coffee or a free chocolate lava cake at the end of their meal. I’d love for you to talk through why just standard loyalty doesn’t work and why PRIMA really sets itself apart in a different way.
Pat Venn (11:12): Yeah, I have a lot of thoughts on loyalty generally speaking. I think a lot of companies rush to loyalty because they look at their competitors and they’re like, we’re not differentiating ourselves. And so they build these programs or things that they think the customer wants, but a lot of it just falls flat, or it just looks the same as everything else. And so they’re still in the same spot that they were before. I think loyalty now, a lot of what people are really looking for is access at the end of the day.
Pat Venn (11:41): They want access, they want to feel special, and they want to feel like whatever they’re using, whatever they’re putting into it, they’re getting a huge benefit out of it. It’s very similar to airlines. I think airlines have actually done a very good job in the loyalty space, because if you’re on United and you’re a 1K member, you have a lot of access that you wouldn’t have gotten if you were a silver or platinum or whatever it might be.
Scoring the Diner So Loyalty Travels Between Restaurants (12:10)
Pat Venn (12:10): So I think loyalty itself, the big problem company to company, is it does not travel with you. And one of the things that we’re looking to solve with PRIMA itself is every customer or every person that we have, we can actually start to understand loyalty business to business, restaurant to restaurant. And when you start getting a lot more data points on who that customer is — how much do they spend? How well do they treat staff? How well do they tip? How often do they go out to eat? How often do they show up when they say they will?
Pat Venn (12:39): When you can get all that information, you can start to really profile people themselves and the type of diner they are. And when you can do that at scale, you’ve actually then created something for the restaurant in which they know who that customer is and where they are on that loyalty scale before actually coming in. And so to the guests, it’s huge, because they’re incentivized to do the right things — when they’re at a restaurant to treat staff well, to not just no-show a restaurant, to give them a courtesy call.
Pat Venn (13:09): And to the restaurant, they’re actually able to then understand how to fill their room, or how to perceive value for a specific guest, even if it’s their first time in. And so that’s the bigger picture that we’re looking for. I think for us, the high value, high net worth person is where we’ve gotten our start. But that by no means is where PRIMA wants to end. We want everyone to be a part of our ecosystem, but at the same point, there’s a value that is assigned to that person, because if you’re trustworthy and if you’ve proven yourself time and time again, every restaurant in every city would take you last minute. And it’s that lack of visibility and understanding, and how loyalty is not actually transferring business to business, that creates this friction right now that we’re trying to fix.
Jeremy Julian (14:00): Yeah, I never even thought about the idea of measuring the guests and how the guest engages with the brand, and being able to do the double-sided marketplace almost. The restaurant now knows this person’s not going to be the one that’s going to get the HR complaints because he’s hitting on the cocktail waitresses, or he’s a poor tipper, or he constantly sends his food back and is complaining all the time. Or the opposite — he’s one of those people that always shows up on time for his reservation, always is in and out in the time that you need him to be. Because those people are a lot more valuable. Is that kind of what you guys are seeing through the data?
Pat Venn (14:32): Well, and think about this. How would a restaurant fill their room if they knew the value of the diner that was making the reservation? It certainly wouldn’t be releasing your reservations four weeks out. They’d rethink how to attract the right people and make sure the right butts were in the right seats at the right time. Because at the end of the day, the most embarrassing thing in the world is a bad Uber rating, right?
Pat Venn (14:57): And Uber has done a very good job at assigning value to a customer and creating the right behavior so that that Uber rating goes up, not down. And if you can apply that to the restaurant space and add loyalty behind it, where the better patron you are — again, it’s not just about spending money. It’s how well do you treat people? Trust is a big part of it. There are many different components that come into what makes somebody a quality diner one way or the other. But the better you are, the better access you get. You can actually get to the point in which what people want out of loyalty, which is true benefit and access, are the things they want to do.
The Capital Grille Regular the Restaurant Across the Street Can’t See (15:41)
Jeremy Julian (15:41): One of the things that we talk about in our business on the SaaS side, and I’m certain in affiliate marketing, is the whole idea of cost of customer acquisition. It sounds like you guys are figuring out how to solve that customer acquisition thread in an offline world, but kind of an online world. I’d love to talk about what that looks like, because to your point, all restaurants are looking to figure out how do I get the right butts in the seats and how do I get them to come in more frequently.
Jeremy Julian (16:10): Awareness is a big piece of it — letting them know you’re there, letting them know that it’s available. But we all know, especially those most loyal guests, those best patrons, typically spend. I heard from a recent podcast guest, he said what he calls the elites, those high-value guests, are nine to ten times more valuable than even your regular. I sit in a CEO group once a month and one of the guys gets treated like a king at Capital Grille because he’s there every month. And he’s like, dude, I spend so much money here — but he’s bringing groups of ten or fifteen people in. And if they don’t treat him like a king, him going away is a pretty big deal for Capital Grille.
Pat Venn (17:06): Well, so that’s again the age-old question: how do you actually identify that person? What’s interesting is that the king of Capital Grille, if he goes to another steakhouse, he’s nobody.
Jeremy Julian (17:17): Yeah, Flemings is right across the street and we’ve gone to Flemings once. And I’m certain they noticed it, because it’s every fourth Friday of every month we’re at that same Capital Grille for lunch. It’s eight to ten people, probably a thousand dollar check, even at lunch. So sorry, I’ll let you keep going. But yeah, we’ve gone once to Flemings and I’m certain it impacted that week, that day’s sales on that one store.
Pat Venn (17:39): But Flemings had no idea before he walked in, right? And so how would that treatment have changed if they actually knew how that person came in? Exactly right. If they knew, they could potentially move him from one to the other.
Where Marketing Dollars Go, and Building the Rails of Attribution (17:39)
Pat Venn (17:56): You mentioned cost of acquisition of a customer. Restaurants just don’t know where their marketing spend is going and what’s working. You have influencers — how much does an influencer bring in? Nobody knows. Google ads, social ads. There are so many different things that a restaurant does to try to attract a customer, and yet they have no real idea what is actually working. And by and large, the biggest of any pie is always recommendations, right? Like if I’m going to a city and I have a friend that says you’ve got to go to this restaurant, I’m much more likely to go to that restaurant than I am pulling up an OpenTable or a Resy or any of the sites and just deciding where to go at that moment. And again, you cannot attribute that recommendation.
Pat Venn (18:24): And so when we’re talking about PRIMA, and why I bring up affiliate marketing and attribution, at the core of what we’re really trying to do, it’s bringing visibility to understand where that customer came from. So if I’m staying at a five-star hotel — if I’m staying at the Waldorf Astoria in New York and I go to a restaurant, if I go to American Bar, what’s cool about PRIMA is if I book through Waldorf Astoria to American Bar, American Bar knows that came from Waldorf Astoria. They know exactly where that business came from and the value that business then has to that restaurant.
Pat Venn (19:22): The same thing can be applied on the influencer side, or just people themselves. If an influencer posts, hey, go to this restaurant, but there is no link or action or storefront on their own social that drives that customer to that restaurant, there’s no attribution. So we are really just creating the rails of attribution, where that influencer could, on their Instagram or their Linktree, have a PRIMA storefront that has their favorite restaurants in the city, and anything that then books through that link, the influencer gets attributed to and earns.
Pat Venn (19:52): So I think at the end of the day, when it comes to acquiring a customer, I just don’t think restaurants really understand at all where their customers are coming from or what that dollar value even looks like. And it’s because the actual attribution of things has been impossible to do in the physical world. Things like recommendations, or I stay at this hotel and the concierge says go here — no, that’s not tracked right now, and that’s what we’re really fixing.
Jeremy Julian (20:26): I’ve got two real quick side stories, Pat, before we keep going. The first of which is I was at a business dinner a couple of months ago and the guy that was the host — and it was probably a dozen of us — said, you know, everybody stop, pull out your phone, give me your Uber rating, read it out loud. And I don’t know if you’ve played that game, but it was kind of funny. And he happened to have the worst rating of anybody. And I’m like, why do you have the worst rating? And he’s like, I got drunk and I did something stupid. And it turned into a fun story. But from a business setting I thought it was a really cool game. Have you ever played that?
Pat Venn (21:02): I have played it. My Uber rating wasn’t great at one point because I was young in my twenties. But it is now at a point where I’m proud to show it and I’m not so scared to play that game.
Jeremy Julian (21:17): Good. The other one was funny enough, I was in Cabo about a year ago, Cabo San Lucas, down in Mexico, and I’d gotten off the tour bus. I was there with a customer and I don’t know, forty of us that went into the downtown area. And to your point on recommendations, we asked the bus driver, what’s the best place to get tacos? He gave us a place. Then we asked somebody in town, and they said we’ll walk you there. And they walked us there.
Jeremy Julian (21:44): And the guy that I was with, he’s like, well, why did they go to such lengths? I’m like, because he got paid by that restaurant to bring us to the best tacos in this downtown area, because he knew that if you brought us there, it would drive the business up for that guy. So you talk about that in the physical world, but that doesn’t happen here. That was in Cabo, that just happened to be a guy that was — because we’d specifically asked for the place that the bus driver had told us to go to. And he’s like, no, no, no, no, no. You don’t want to go to that place. That place is for the tourists. I’m going to take you to the real place that’s the best tacos in Cabo. And he took us to a place maybe a block away. And my buddy who I was with is like, how did that just happen? And I’m like, dude, because he got paid. Not only is he expecting us to buy him tacos, but he also is getting paid from the restaurant owner to do that. So to what you guys are building, I know that’s kind of a silly story, but it feels like you guys are doing both sides of that equation. Is that a fair analogy, even though it’s pretty rudimentary?
Pat Venn (22:34): Well, that’s the point. That recommender, if he’s recommending or she’s recommending things that aren’t good, guess who is not going to trust that recommender? So at the end of the day, with PRIMA itself, and to talk about the wider vision, our wedge to start is certainly just connecting great diners to great restaurants and making sure that there’s attribution to that particular diner and where they came from, so that the restaurant understands.
Pat Venn (23:00): But the rails of what we’re actually building here is the ability to attribute the physical world through recommendations or things of that nature. We call it the recommendation economy. And all that means is any person that recommends anything should have attribution. And restaurants again will pay for that attribution in the same way that they pay for Google ads. There’s no difference, except they know exactly where the customer came from and how valuable that specific channel is.
Pat Venn (23:29): And so most of it’s just visibility. And to create that visibility, you just need to build the rails beneath it, in which you have these demand partner silos, these pockets of places in which people are looking or booking. If you just add a rail underneath that, that then directly attributes where that person came from and the place that they actually went to, everyone wins. And so that’s exactly the point — we’re building both sides.
Why a Paid Recommendation Still Has to Be Trustworthy (24:07)
Jeremy Julian (24:07): Talk to me real quick, Pat, about how do I keep it open and honest? In a Google world, we know that we get ads and it’s the three-point font that says it’s an ad and you may or may not know. And again, I’m saying this out loud for our listeners — they’re like, so you’re going to pay to have these people come in and say the right things about my food or whatever else. So I’d love for you to help overcome the opposite side of that, that says it’s slop, it’s crap, that people are doing this, or you’re just paying for them to say good things about you but it’s not necessarily where you want it to be. Because I’m certain I can hear people saying, this is never going to work. People aren’t going to really do that.
Pat Venn (24:46): Well, in the same way that people want their Uber rating to be high because they don’t want to look like bad patrons — in the same way that on the restaurant side you’d want your PRIMA score to be as high as possible because that gets you access to things or builds loyalty — on the recommender side, it’s the exact same thing. It all comes down to the actual experience that that person has.
Pat Venn (25:16): I think the problem now — we’ll use influencers as a really good example. There’s no more toxic relationship than influencers and restaurants right now. Because the influencer comes in and they say, give me a free lunch or give me a thousand dollars. And the restaurant’s like, for what? And the influencer’s like, well, I’m going to promote your restaurant and I’m going to drive you business, so you should pay me. And the restaurant goes, how do I know? And that’s such a problem. And the funny thing is influencers are driving business, but they can’t track it.
Pat Venn (25:45): There’s no way to attribute that booking. And so I think a lot of people understand, in the same way that LTK and ShopMy exist — those are affiliate marketplaces for influencers. And when you go to an LTK page and you go to an influencer and you see that they’re selling some spray tan — not that I’m a spray tan guy — but you purchase that link, you know the influencer gets a kickback.
Pat Venn (26:15): And if people are willing to do that and book that page because they trust that influencer — if it’s built on the trust element, and people that you actually trust their recommendations and who they are and what they would actually send your way — you have no issue giving them that kickback as the consumer. And so I think it all stems to that trust factor, and making sure that the right people are getting served the right recommendations by people that are actually in their trust.
Jeremy Julian (26:47): Love it. Thank you for overcoming that, because I could see people saying that. It’s amazing how many people I hear that have found out about products like you guys are building from the podcast. Because I’ve built 300-plus episodes talking about things that they go, that really helped me when I checked it out. They will end up buying and it’s good for everybody.
What Onboarding Looks Like for a Restaurant and a Hotel (27:10)
Jeremy Julian (27:10): You’ve talked a lot about where you guys are at today, Pat, and where the vision is at. Talk to me a little bit about what engagement looks like. I’m a brand — I’m the Alinea Group and I want to figure out PRIMA. I’m Thomas Keller and I want to figure out PRIMA. Even a lesser brand that’s kind of a casual dining brand. What does it look like? How do they engage? Where are you guys at geographically? We’re recording this in late July of 2026, so if somebody’s listening to this six months from now, chances are you guys have grown beyond that. But what does the engagement look like and what can they expect the experience to look like from your team?
Pat Venn (27:47): Well, our goal is to be in the hundred biggest markets across the globe, hundred and fifty markets. Right now we are live in New York, Miami, London, Paris, Ibiza, as well as soon to launch Barcelona, Madrid, Philly, Boston, DC, Chicago. So we’re growing quickly. The challenge with PRIMA certainly is that it’s market to market.
Pat Venn (28:15): But our ability to stand up that market is relatively quick, because to the restaurant, we are not adding new tech. We are not asking them to rip anything out. We live on top of the system which they use, and they only pay when there’s performance. So there is no subscription model, anything of that nature. It’s true affiliate marketing in the sense that if business is driven their way and it’s quality business, that’s when payment occurs. And the kickback happens in that obviously we take a cut of that payment, but we also then kick back to whoever drove that business, in true affiliate marketing fashion.
Pat Venn (28:44): So again, the markets right now: Miami, New York, London, Paris. On the restaurant side, it’s about a ten-minute call and it’s just plugging into our network. It’s really that simple. So we just take their basic hours of operation. We ask them, all right, when you see you’re sold out, how many additional covers or diners can we sell at whatever slot, whatever that looks like, and they’re set up and they’re live.
Pat Venn (29:12): On the affiliate side — and this is where whether you’re a four or five-star hotel, you’re a concierge network, you’re a travel advisor, you are a loyalty program, you are a corporation that is big T&E spend — it can look all different types of ways. But in that case, you’re actually then able to leverage PRIMA and our inventory by promoting us as an amenity or benefit to your guests, tenants, diners, or whoever might be a part of your overall program. That’s set up very quick still.
Pat Venn (29:41): But the cool piece is, if you’re that five-star hotel, what better amenity than providing your guests a digital link or an email or text that says, because you’re staying at this property, you have access to the best restaurants and experiences in town. And the kicker being that they’re still making a kickback when the link is actually being utilized by the guests. So it’s a win-win, because the guest is like, oh my God, I’m staying at this hotel and I’m getting into this restaurant that I could never get into. And to the hotel, they’re still actually able to earn on the demand that they’re driving for the first time. Because a hotel specifically, they spend so much money getting people to the hotel. The second that person leaves those four walls, their earning potential goes away. We fixed that.
Jeremy Julian (30:46): I love that thought. Real quick, so as a guest, how do I know what brands are available? Do you guys have that publicly? Or does it have to come through an affiliate? How do I learn — hey, I’m going to New York next month, I’m listening to the show, how do I go experience this as a diner?
Pat Venn (31:07): Yeah, so go to our website, primaapp.com. Generally speaking, it does have to come through an affiliate to get that level of access. But you can go to our website, and if you’re a user or diner and you want access to it, you can always do an inquiry and we’re happy to accommodate and give access. When it comes down to the value to the diner, obviously number one, we’re curating all the best restaurants and experiences in town, but then there’s the access on top.
Pat Venn (31:34): The one thing I haven’t mentioned on the whole earning piece is the ability for that hotel — I mentioned how they leave, go beyond the four walls, they can finally earn. The cool thing about how our model is built though, is anyone that brings people into our ecosystem and onto our rails makes an earning off that person for the lifetime that they’re using the platform.
Pat Venn (32:04): So the entire idea here is it builds and builds and builds, and that work compounds and compounds, because anyone that brings people in or recommends a restaurant or whatever it might be, then earns in the same way on a tail of however often that consumer is using the platform.
Mila Miami, Network Density, and Where This Goes Next (32:22)
Jeremy Julian (32:22): That’s awesome. Do you have any success stories, Pat? Is there a restaurant that comes to mind that’s like, hey, they got on and this is what it looks like for them? You talked about some of the early success of Tock and just dropping from twenty percent. Where are you guys at on that journey? I know you guys are early in your growth, but talk to me about what people can expect if they hit a home run.
Pat Venn (32:47): Well, my favorite is Mila in Miami, which is the highest grossing restaurant in the country. When we started with them, it was very like, we’ll start off small, yada yada. Now they take just about every reservation we send their way, because the guests that we’re sending them are coming from the Faena, the W, the One, the Ritz, the Edition — all of these incredible hotels across Miami.
Pat Venn (33:14): And so for them we have created this VIP channel of sorts, in which they know people coming from our network are ones that are worth taking, in the sense of making room for, and that are going to come in and spend and have a great time. And so they’ve been an exceptional partner to us. We’re certainly in the network formation stage still, and what I mean by that is Miami’s where we got our start and it’s kind of where we call home, although I’m in Chicago.
Pat Venn (33:42): New York and London and Paris are in the early formation of really getting going. But the beauty of how every network works is it compounds more the more people that come on, because the more people that come on, the more people that refer, the more people that are a part of this recommendation economy, the more it grows.
Jeremy Julian (34:01): Love it. Where’s it going? You talked about the vision for where it’s at. I’d love for you to get close to wrapping up with where’s it going? Three years from now, when you jump on the podcast and talk about all of the incredible success, where do you see that vision for the group and for what it is that you guys are building?
Pat Venn (34:19): Yeah, I think there is definitely a fine line between staying focused but also marching towards the North Star. When we’re talking about five years from now, it kind of alludes to what I was really getting at with the recommendation economy. We want as many users on the platform as possible. And it’s not just restaurants — it’s experiences, it’s events, it’s ticketing, it’s anything that anyone wants to experience, should be an offer that they can book through PRIMA itself.
Pat Venn (34:49): As it grows and grows, and again, like this is where we definitely want to stay focused, but what we’re building the rails to do — any vertical really could be a part of a recommendation economy. If you’re a plumber, you’re a technician, or you’re any service provider, it works in the exact same way. When I need an electrician, God knows I am not just Googling best electrician. I’m asking my most recent friend who I know had an electrical problem. I’m asking, was that electrician any good? And if the answer is no, then on to the next one.
Pat Venn (35:17): So there’s no reason that same premise can’t apply. I know that seems out of scope, but our goal for the foreseeable future is to nail the hospitality space, get as many users on the platform through our incredible affiliates, start to understand the score of those particular people and categorize the value that they would bring to any hospitality business, so that we kind of fix this problem where loyalty doesn’t travel restaurant to restaurant, and instead it does follow with you.
Jeremy Julian (36:01): Love that. You said it earlier, but where do people go to learn more, and how does the engagement look for a restaurant? Because again, most of our listeners are probably restaurant people out there. So I’m a restaurant, I just heard this. How do I get on the wait list? How do I know that you’re coming to my city next?
Pat Venn (36:19): Yeah, so just go to primaapp.com. And on there there’s a way for you to just identify that as your restaurant. Obviously we will answer any inquiry immediately. So happy to — if anyone wants to reach out personally as well, you can find me on LinkedIn or email me, patrick@primavip.co. But primaapp.com is a great place to start.
Jeremy Julian (36:44): I love it. Pat, thank you for doing what you guys do. I love these stories of people that are looking at a problem and saying, hey, let me go build something to solve a problem that restaurants have struggled with forever. And the fact that you guys are doing it in such a unique way is really, really cool. To our listeners, guys, I know I said it at the onset — thank you guys for hanging out with us this week. If you haven’t already subscribed to the show, please do so, and make it a great day.
Pat Venn (37:07): Awesome. Thanks, Jeremy.
Listen to the Full Episode
Show notes, key takeaways, the FAQ and all three players are on the episode page: The Recommendation Economy Comes to Restaurants — Pat Venn, PRIMA | RTG Ep. 356.
