Driving sales is a bit of a cliche metaphor, but what if it wasn't a cliche at all?
In the driver's seat is sixteen-year-old Daniel Singer. Yep. Sixteen. He operates Cake.af, a website/app meant to drive customers to your restaurant when business is slow.
“I love food, discovering new restaurants and sharing them with friends,” Singer said. “It’s a great way for restaurants to have customers on off nights when they aren’t normally at capacity and for people to discover new, local restaurants. It’s a win-win.”
How it works is simple. Diners Text 🍰 (that's a cake emoji if you can't see it) to 574-742-4191. They get a text message with sign-up info and then an invite with restaurant info. If accepted, an Uber will pick the guest up and drive them to the restaurant for free. The restaurant pays for the Uber.
"Getting free rides and great food is lit, fam," Singer said via a press release. For those who don't speak teen, lit is a good thing. Just trust us.
Free? There's gotta be some catch, right?
Of course. Singer sure as hell ain't paying for the rides out of his college fund. Participating restaurants pay for the Uber trip for the guest and are charged $3 per diner by Cafe.af. The Cake.af team targets restaurants where the bill would be in the $20 to $35 range per guest to make the margins work, Singer said.
“We’ll see if restaurants will want to pay for the service on a consistent basis,” added Singer. “But is different than an ad being they only pay because someone actually showed up.”
Cake.af is available in select cities including New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco with expansion to Austin, Boston, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles’ South Bay and Chicago. So the usual haunts. Restaurants interested in participating can email team@cake.af.