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Chope Launches New iPhone App, Ready to Take Your Reservations

Singaporean online reservation site Chope has recently launched its new iPhone app – and it’s looking absolutely beautiful and sleek. It comes as a pleasant surprise to know that the app is powered by social food journal startup Burpple, which designed and developed the application. Arrif Ziaudeen, CEO and founder of Chope, was highly enthusiastic when he showed the app (pictured below) to me during our chat over coffee. It has a list of approximately 130 restaurants that users can browse from, discover restaurants nearby, find out more information such as the address, type of cuisine, opening hours, and it even includes suggestions (in the “What We Love” category) from the team at Chope. Of course, when you’re all ready and satisfied with your selection, you can start booking from the app itself, anytime and anywhere. How convenient is that? The iPhone app comes in handy for folks who are time-starved and highly mobile. It basically aims to be a “one-stop shop,” for diners, with all restaurants listed and specially curated by the Chope team. Arrif also tells us that the team takes a lot of pride in its selection, and makes sure that the restaurants are of quality for its users. So now you can say goodbye to miscommunication while booking over the phone and look forward to making reservations on your mobile, even at the wee hours in the morning. This is a pretty smart move because it basically taps into the additional pool of users who would do their research in the middle of the night when these restaurants are usually closed for the day. Once the booking is done, according to Arrif, the booking information will be seamlessly keyed into the table management system (pictures below) at participating restaurants. Users can even indicate if they want indoor or outdoor dining. Apart from having Burpple as its mobile strategic partner, Chope is also working with TimeOut Singapore to reward readers who book via its website with a 20 percent discount off of their bill.

Chope’s revenue model basically comes from their 130 restaurant customers, who are charged a subscription fee for using their table management system, and a booking fee for each diner coming through their platform. The team is currently receiving around 15,000 bookings (and growing) per month, which is a pretty impressive figure for a small country like Singapore. They are targeting the foodies who would love to try out the newest and hottest restaurants on the Singapore dining scene. I tend to delete a lot of apps, but because I’m a foodie and I do make reservations, Chope is definitely something I’ll keep on my mobile. As for you readers, if you have an iPhone, you can download the app from the iTunes App Store.