The question comes up regularly in NZ hospitality circles: how does First Table compare to LocalFeed? Both help venues fill off-peak seats. The similarities mostly stop there.
Here is the direct comparison, numbers and structure, not marketing language.
The Core Model
First Table: Diners pay a booking fee ($10–$15 NZD) to the platform and receive 50% off their food bill. Drinks are excluded. Venues have no say in the discount level — 50% is the platform’s fixed model.
LocalFeed: Venues list their own offer — a two-course lunch, a cocktail-and-dessert deal, a Sunday special at a price that works for the venue. No mandatory discount percentage. The venue sets the offer, the price, and the available slots.
The difference is who designs the deal.
What It Costs the Venue Per Cover
Using a standard NZ restaurant scenario: $90 food spend per table of two, 30% food cost.
| Full price | First Table | LocalFeed offer | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Food revenue | $90 | $45 | Venue-set (e.g. $65 two-course) |
| Food cost | $27 | $27 | Venue-set (e.g. $22) |
| Gross on food | $63 | $18 | $43 |
| Gross margin | 70% | 40% | 66% (example) |
With First Table, the venue absorbs the entire 50% discount. With LocalFeed, the venue prices the offer to maintain workable margins.
Customer Data
This is where the models diverge most significantly.
With First Table, every booking goes through the platform. The diner’s name, email, and visit history belong to First Table. Venues receive a booking notification. They do not receive the contact.
With LocalFeed, the booking data belongs to the venue. If a diner books through LocalFeed on Tuesday, you can email them Thursday. You can put them on your newsletter. You can invite them back.
Over 12 months of 50 covers per month, First Table leaves you with 600 customer interactions and zero contacts. LocalFeed leaves you with 600 contacts.
Platform Cost
First Table: No fee to the venue per booking. Revenue comes from the diner’s booking fee. The cost to the venue is entirely in the food discount — roughly $45 of margin per cover at standard spend levels.
LocalFeed: Free to list until 20 bookings. $10 per week flat fee after that. No commission per booking. No mandatory discount.
At 50 covers per month, First Table’s margin cost to the venue is $2,250/month in lost food gross. LocalFeed’s cost is $40/month.
Slot Control
First Table operates on a fixed model: specific time slots offered at 50% off food. You can choose which slots to open but cannot change the offer format.
LocalFeed lets you define different offers for different slots and days. A $38 two-course lunch on Tuesdays. A drinks-and-tapas package on Thursday evenings. An à la carte dinner with a complimentary dessert on Sundays. The format is yours.
Diner Discovery
First Table has an established diner audience in NZ. Diners open the app specifically to find discount dining. If discovery is your primary problem and you have no other solution, First Table puts you in front of people who are actively looking.
LocalFeed’s discovery model is different. Diners browsing for something good to do this week, not specifically hunting for 50% off, find your offer alongside others at various price points. The audience is not discount-motivated by default.
Which Model Builds a Better Business
First Table is a fill tool. Used carefully, for genuinely empty slots, with a plan to convert discount diners into returning customers, it can work. Without a conversion plan, it delivers covers, not customers.
LocalFeed is designed around the direct relationship. The offer you design, the price you set, the customer data you own afterwards. It is not just fill — it is acquisition.
The question is what you are building toward. A venue that fills on a platform’s terms indefinitely, or a venue with a growing direct customer base that fills its own quiet slots.
LocalFeed is free until 20 bookings. No commission. Your offer, your price, your customer data.