Debby Soo, OpenTable CEO, joins Yahoo Finance’s Alexis Christoforous and Brooke Dipalma to discuss restaurant innovations and safety measures amid the pandemic.

Video Transcript

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: For those restaurants able to survive the pandemic, the tide may finally be turning. Indoor dining is starting to make a comeback as more people get vaccinated. Joining me now is the CEO of OpenTable, Debby Soo. We're also joined by Yahoo Finance's Brooke Dipalma. Good to have you with us, Debbie. Thanks so much. Some fascinating things here in this survey that you talk, along with the folks at the James Beard Foundation.

What stuck out to me-- 54% of respondents say they plan to dine out at a restaurant with table service this year at least once a week. That's pretty encouraging, isn't it?

DEBBY SOO: That's exactly right. And thanks for having me. You know, we've been saying, the light at the end of the tunnel-- it's coming, it's coming. And I'm happy to say that we're getting really close to it. Like you said, we recently conducted a survey at OpenTable with our friends at the James Beard Foundation and found, exactly like you said, over half of the survey respondents are saying that they're planning on dining out, you know, at least once a week for the remainder of the year.

So the end is near. It's really encouraging to see. You know, we've gone through a long and hard winter. It's starting to warm up. Indoor dining, as you said, is opening back up. And so it's a great-- it's just great to see, because the restaurant industry has gone through so much during this pandemic.

BROOKE DIPALMA: And Debby, Brooke here. You have a real pulse on the restaurant industry. And last year at this time, reservations declined steeply due to the onset of COVID. What major cities are you seeing perhaps the quickest recovery in? And what exactly does that recovery look like?

DEBBY SOO: So the recovery looks really different, depending on what city, what state, even what county you're looking at. In the US at the state level, we're seeing places like Nevada, and Oklahoma, New Mexico, Texas really start rebounding. Big, major cities like San Francisco, New York, LA are still down, but you're seeing those numbers, week over week, increase. So that's really encouraging to see.

We anticipate that, as vaccinations continue to roll out and people get vaccinated, that those numbers will continue to increase.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: Debby, what are some of the trends you're seeing take hold in the restaurant industry that'll stick around well beyond the pandemic? I'd have to think contactless as much as possible is going to be a big trend.

DEBBY SOO: Yes. So we've seen-- you know, I think we're going to see a couple different trends continue. So the first is, when we did the survey with the James Beard Foundation, 91% of our survey respondents said that they would like the delivery and takeout options that are available to them to continue, even after the pandemic is over.

We saw about 84% of survey respondents say that they want to continue to see restaurants offer outdoor dining. And on OpenTable, we're seeing the percentage of outdoor dining has probably increased about 12x in recent months. So there's a lot of demand for outdoor dining. And lastly, during the pandemic, restaurants were scrambling to pivot their businesses and figure out how to survive. And many of them had to really double down on their investment in restaurant tech.

So to your point, Alexis, you know, things like contactless pay, online waitlists, ordering through a QR code and looking at menu items-- I think those are all trends that we're going to see continue to persist, even after this pandemic is over.

BROOKE DIPALMA: And speaking of doubling down by these restaurants, in order to use the OpenTable platform, it does come at a cost for these restaurants, and many of whom are still struggling. And so what exactly is the incentive there for these restaurants to join the platform? Speaking of, many of my favorite restaurants are not yet on Open Table.

DEBBY SOO: Yes. So during the pandemic, OpenTable waived our fees for the majority of the entire pandemic. I think for restaurants right now who are not on OpenTable, there are a lot of reasons to join. Reservations-- and online reservations, in particular-- have never been more important. Right now, as restaurants are trying to grapple with their P&L and plan for the upcoming week, it's really important for them to know and get a good gauge on the demand that's going to be seated at their restaurant.

So I think that's a huge reason. Another reason is we've seen diners want to go to one place, one place where they can see which restaurants are open, which restaurants are taking reservations, what safety precautions various restaurants are taking. And you can see all of that on OpenTable. We are really here to help restaurants open back up, to take advantage of this uptick in dining activity that we think will continue to persist.

And so there are many reasons to be joining us, but we're really in it together with our restaurant partners, and we're doing everything we can to help them come out of this crisis.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: And you know, as part of the effort to do that, Debby, I know that you've also come up with some innovative tech ideas to help not only your business, but of course, the restaurants that are on your platform. You have something called Experiences. You also have a Takeout product. Just tell us briefly about those.

DEBBY SOO: That's right. So we recently launched Experiences, and what that means is that could be a chef's table experience. It could be, you know, a movie night outdoors for the whole family. Diners can go on our website or apps and look up various experiences that restaurants are offering. They can prepay. So that's another way for restaurants to get, you know, a good handle on their P&L.

As you mentioned, we also launched Takeout. So from the comfort of your own home, on your OpenTable app, you can scroll through various restaurants' menus, order, and pay, all on OpenTable. We've also recently launched contactless pay, QR codes, check in when you get to the restaurant, looking at the menu on your phone. So every opportunity to decrease that contact between restaurant and diners, we're going after.

And we've had great success so far. Diners seem really open to it. And even in that survey that we were just talking about, over 70% of diners said that they want these types of contactless features to continue. And restaurants are loving it, too, because it helps them manage their restaurants more effectively.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: All right. Debby Soo, CEO of OpenTable, thanks so much for being with us. And Brooke Dipalma, our thanks to you, as--