NEW YORK — A former Microsoft product manager who once worked for Michael Dell’s hedge fund aims to do for restaurants what Expedia does for airplanes: fill empty seats during off-peak hours.
Dazhi Chen, a Harvard Business School alumnus, has amassed a staff of 20 from postings on Craigslist.com and is betting half a million dollars that his website, DailyGobble.com, can challenge LivingSocial and Groupon to become a premier-dining discount destination. The site debuted Friday.
Chen’s challenge is ensuring DailyGobble.com stands out among hundreds of online coupon sites, led by Groupon and LivingSocial. The 330 restaurants posting discounts on DailyGobble.com so far are Chen’s proof his concept has potential. Within a year, he projects quarterly revenue of as much as $7 million and net income of $250,000.
DailyGobble’s pitch to restaurateurs is that they pay only for coupons diners use, and they can limit discounts to specific times of day when tables typically sit vacant.
DailyGobble charges eateries fees of 5 percent of food sales to list deals — a smaller cut than most other coupon sites take — and requires discounts of at least 20 percent, Chen said. Diners get rebate checks in the mail after spending enough to amass $25 in savings or can send funds to a PayPal account.
