Who hasn't turned to Yelp, Zomato or any other user-generated restaurant review site in a time of need? Perhaps you were spending time in a foreign city, or you were stuck in a moment of desperation with mum and dad. For better or worse, sites like Yelp have filled a hole in the market. Yelp alone receives around 145 million unique hits per month, so, as a business it seems to be doing something right.
One person you’ll never see reviewing restaurants on Yelp is renowned chef Anthony Bourdain. If we’re looking for a word to describe Bourdain’s feelings towards Yelp, ‘hate’ might be accurate.
This Business Insider video, depicting Bourdain ranting about the website and its users, says it all.
“There’s really no worse or lower human being than an elite Yelper,” he says, wearing that classic Bourdain deadpan expression. “They are universally loathed by chefs everywhere. They’re the very picture of entitled negative energy.”
Wow, Anthony – please tell us what you really think.
Of course, the problems with Yelp and other review sites are widely known (if only provable with anecdotes).
There's a perception that only people with something bad to say will leave a review. These review-aggregators are seen to be breeding grounds for bullies and trolls. Some businesses claim they've been 'ruined' by Yelp, which, when you think about all the indie venues running on a proverbial fume of an ‘online presence’, is heartbreaking. Worst of all, some sources believe that Yelp filters out the good reviews, leaving the bad ones extra visible.
There’s really no worse or lower human being than an elite Yelper. They are universally loathed by chefs everywhere. They’re the very picture of entitled negative energy.
Still – do Yelpers deserve a Bourdain bashing?
Yelpers have been known to highlight lesser-known gems, showing preference for independent restaurants over bigger chains. One point to the Yelpers: they’ve even been known to alert fellow users to unhygienic restaurants in San Francisco – perhaps they’re not all bad.
There’s no convincing Bourdain, though.
“You open a restaurant, you struggle for a year to put together the money, you work your heart out and then 10 minutes after opening, some miserable b------ is tweeting or Yelping, 'Worst. Dinner, Ever'. It’s like, dude. That ain’t right.”
“Most of the Yelp reviews are wrong. They just are. Yelp is great for finding information if you forgot the address of a place,” he said in an interview with Fivethirtyeight. But for the most part, no chef is going to take a Yelper’s review seriously, even though they might read them.”
He's since adopted a more pro-Yelp perspective, admitting in an Eater interview last year that the site can be useful. "As we open up more places, the more I see that people use Yelp as their North Star for culinary guidance," he told The Eater Upsell podcast.
"Instead of bitching about [Yelp], which I am fantastic at, why don't I engage them? That's what we've tried to do." So the chef has run events for the site's reviewers and concedes that "Yelp is probably going to be one of, if not the only, source of food criticism. It’s like a Rotten Tomatoes score for restaurants".
So Yelp isn’t going anywhere soon.
Which side of the debate are you on?
No reservations about Anthony Bourdain
Barack Obama enjoys a $6 dinner with Anthony Bourdain in Vietnam
