Zest, the restaurant discovery app that launched earlier this year, is already thinking about a future where mobile apps are no longer the primary interface. On Thursday, the startup introduced a new feature: a personal AI-powered “restaurant concierge” that lives in your text messages, similar to other popular AI agents like Instinct or Poke.
The launch reflects a broader shift in how startups are thinking about AI, as conversational AI agents take on tasks that had previously required users to launch stand-alone mobile apps. For Zest, that means bringing its restaurant recommendations into texts, then allowing users to immediately take the next step of booking a table.
“The agent is the product now,” explains Zest founder and CEO Mario Gomez-Hall. “You text it, and it answers from your own history and your friends’. It doesn’t need weeks of conversation to learn you because it starts from where you’ve actually been,” he said.
Originally founded in November 2024, with $1.8 million in pre-seed backing from Alexis Ohanian at 776 and Steve Jang at Kindred Ventures, the app’s unique feature is that it links up with users’ credit cards to track where they’re actually eating out to get a sense of their tastes and interests. With this data on hand, Zest can make tailored suggestions of what places you might like to try next, whether that’s in your own city or suggestions of places to try when you’re traveling.
The credit card data used by Zest’s app is imported and other fintech and budgeting apps. Zest says it focuses only on those transactions in the food and drink categories when making its personalized map and lists
The startup’s latest idea is to tackle the same problem — where should I go to eat? — from a new angle. It will now make its suggestions from inside a text message thread and can turn to AI to do things like check availability and make the reservation for you through connected services like OpenTable, Resy, and SevenRooms.
To work, users will text the Zest concierge at (212) 470-6067. What’s even better is that Zest can be dropped into a group chat, where it can blend everyone’s tastes to find places the whole group will love. Here, it can also settle indecision with an in-thread voting feature and then can book a table for the group without leaving the conversation.
Users can ask Zest for recommendations based on a number of factors, like cuisine, craving, occasion, dietary restrictions, or neighborhood, and can ask questions about the restaurants, like how busy the place may be, or whether it offers Wi-Fi, and more. Plus, you can ask Zest to send you the menu to help you make a decision.
In TechCrunch’s tests, the AI worked fairly well, offering a list of suggestions for new places matched to our tastes that also fit particular conditions, like time of day, party size, location, and other factors. While finding an open table is something other apps have offered for years, there’s a convenience factor in being able to just text back and forth about the various options and have it tell you the available booking times.
The company began testing the concierge last month, but decided to hold the launch until it could add the booking capabilities; over time, the startup is considering moving Zest beyond restaurants to offer recommendations for businesses, shopping, and more.
“Booking and ordering are the first revenue lines. Zest books your table through OpenTable or Resy today, with food ordering coming, and there are transactions there to participate in,” said Gomez-Hall. “The reason that gets interesting is that Zest learns your taste faster than a general assistant does, because it starts from where you’ve actually been instead of asking you questions. That’s worth something well beyond dinner,” he added.
