Now it's supposed to be my day off, but it was busy last night and the waiter who was supposed to get Monday off had to work, and we're all on guard, it could happen to us, business has been strange...
...we thought it was Graduation, but only for a couple of the tables, the rest, well, the 7th Wave, the peculiar synchronized arrival of old and new customers, walk-ins, the restaurant filled, some loathsome political figures, some pleasant-enough regulars, an odd night, busy, busier by far than the weekend...
...and tonight, looking busy as well, my evening off is not assured. As if to make certain I'd show the owner tells me he's booked an appointment with me to meet a rep from Open Table, they've been harassing us for our business, he isn't sure. He knew it was my day off, pretends he didn't, I say nothing, I'm counting the days...My job is to get all the information and translate it for him. A couple of things, most of our customers (existing) are way outside of technologies age bracket, and most certainly the owner is. However "Simple" and easy it is to use it's probably not of any use here...
...the Nephew, he invites himself to sit in. Of anyone here, he should be the most technologically savvy, he spends days gaming on end at home, days on end at the restaurant on his cell-phone, and however we implement this he'll be in charge, I have plans, I'm comfortable with this, especially when he hijacks the conversation to ask questions...
I don't have a lot. Costs? $.35 cents per online reservation made through our website, $2.50 per person per online reservation made through their website. No hardware required, other information, unfortunately they can't tell us how many new customers this will bring us (the most important question in my books, otherwise we're paying them to do what we already do well enough ourselves...). I gather everything we need, tell them to get back to us in a couple of days. The nephew continues, talks, asks questions for about 10 more minutes.
When we're done, we're not so busy, I'm going home. I review the information with the owner, the nephew, he has some questions for me. It turns out he didn't listen to, didn't understand a single thing she said. He only understood the $200.00 set up fee (which, like any cable/internet company they said they'd waive, this is the BS "loss leader", the free incentive, like when your cable company says they'll install that cable/internet/satellite dish for free, a regular $1,000,000.00 value, it's all BS), didn't understand they'd waive it, didn't understand how he'd be getting the reservations, didn't understand anything, and he will be the one in charge...He think's it's a good idea. I'm happy and agree...
"We'll implement it in September" I tell him, and he's excited...
Me, I'm leaving, my regular scheduled day off now once again my own, yet I'm feeling somehow that it's a bit of a reprieve...