How to get dinner for half-price: discovery platform celebrates tenth birthday

A popular discovery platform that helps its users save money is nearing it’s tenth birthday. Find out more.

A reservations platform that gets diners a half-price dinner if they book a restaurant’s “first table” of the night via its app will celebrate its tenth anniversary this September.

First Table is a restaurant discovery platform founded by software developer Mat Weir in 2014 in New Zealand tourism capital Queenstown and expanded to the Gold Coast in 2015.

Mr Weir, reflecting on the past decade of his company and how far it has come since its beginnings, said: “Imagine a software developer, usually behind a screen, now walking the streets, pitching First Table to restaurant owners in the Gold Coast. It was a huge leap out of my comfort zone.

“Looking back, I am amazed at what we’ve accomplished - since we launched in Queensland we’ve delivered over 80,000 off-peak reservations, filling 231,000 covers for over 100 partner restaurants,” he said.

Paula Castro Alonso and Chris (Squid) Bradley at Shiraz Persian restaurant. Wednesday May 29, 2024. Picture, John Gass

First Table’s Australasian business development manager Chris Bradley said First Table was more than just a discovery platform, which helped restaurants get an early table booking to look busy straightaway

“We actually collect data, we collect customer details, and the venues can re-market to them. We help [restaurants] grow their online reviews - we load a page up for the restaurant and that goes into all our marketing channels, our apps.

“Probably 95 per cent of venues, when they actually take the time to learn what we do and don’t judge us by our cover, really want to work with us,” he said.

Award-winning Shiraz Persian Restaurant and Bar owner Erfan Jalilian has been a First Table partner restaurant since 2018.

“I first decided to join First Table in 2018 as I saw it as an opportunity not only to fill tables that were available but also to attract a new audience to experience Shiraz that may not have known about my restaurant and Persian cuisine.

“Since 2018, we have had over 1100 bookings from First Table, a total of over 3200 guests,” he said.

Originally published as How to get dinner for half-price: discovery platform celebrates tenth birthday