This New App Has Your Dining Plans Figured Out
Tiger Mama, one of the restaurants featured in the Date Seat app. / Photo by Tony Luong for “Restaurant Review: Tiger Mama“
The next time you’re indecisive about where to get dinner or drinks around town, you’ll be relieved to know there’s an app for that.
Date Seat plans to launch in the App Store on Monday, August 15. The free, iOS search engine lets users pick the right Boston restaurant for a date, or similar outing, by categorizing places by noise level, post-work drinks, summer night spots, classy date places, etc. Once a user inputs a few options, the app will respond with suggested restaurants and bars that fit the given criteria.
The new app is the brainchild of cofounders Jake Hajec and Michael Laskowski, who launched their LLC to help Bostonians navigate the city’s expansive restaurant scene. The two curated their own restaurant list for app, which features spots like State Street Provisions in the Seaport, SRV in Back Bay, and Tiger Mama in Fenway. A full list of participating restaurants can be found on Date Seat’s website.
“Jake and I went to over 200 restaurants within Boston and took hand-written notes on each and every one,” Laskowski says. “It’s taken quite a while to collect the data, and I have a pile of papers stacked up in my room, but that’s what it takes when you have an app like this.”
To make sure Date Seat remains current with Boston’s burgeoning restaurant scene, Laskowski and Hajec also created a biweekly auditing process to keep tabs on area openings and closings.
“It takes us less than an hour to audit over 200 restaurants together,” Laskowski says.
When the app launches, it will service neighborhoods like Fenway, the North End, Beacon Hill, and Seaport, though Laskowski plans to broaden that reach to nearby areas soon. Date Seat will launch in two other cities later this year (look for a Facebook announcement about that on September 15).
In the meantime, find your perfect patio in the Financial District, or the best place for a raucous night out in the South End, when the app debuts on August 15.
