How The Boiling Crab sat 106k diners & managed 363k takeout orders with Yelp Guest Manager

The Boiling Crab, a casual, international seafood chain that serves up fresh Cajun-style seafood boils, leverages Yelp Guest Manager’s takeout and FOH software to manage the flow of its guests, streamline communication, and improve the wait experience for guests. The restaurant chain offers a unique, fun, and free-for-all dining experience in which guests are encouraged to don plastic bibs, feast with their hands, and leave their signature on the wall.

We’ve been able to really benefit from Yelp Guest Manager because it organizes the waitlist very well for us and lets us communicate directly with our guests via text on the status of their table.

— Nana Lau, Training and Development Manager

For many years, The Boiling Crab had a “if it’s not broke, don’t fix it” mentality when it came to using pen and paper to manage their waitlist. The popular restaurant chain’s first-come, first-serve seating policy was put in place to reduce no-shows, speed up turnover, and seat more guests. It went hand-in-hand with their “whole party must be present to be seated” policy. As the brand looked to modernize operations, they soon recognized that a digital waitlist system could help streamline that process while also improving the wait experience for guests.

With a unique model, Yelp helped create a bespoke system for The Boiling Crab to meet their specific needs. Like so many restaurants during the pandemic, The Boiling Crab needed to quickly shift towards an off-premise model. Yelp Guest Manager collaborated with The Boiling Crab to develop a takeout software communication engine so their staff could seamlessly communicate with guests whether they were waiting to dine in or carry out. This is exemplified by Nana Lau, Training and Development Manager, who said, “We’ve been able to really benefit from Yelp Guest Manager because it organizes the waitlist very well for us and lets us communicate directly with our guests via text on the status of their table. In effect, it has allowed for more accurate forecasting in addition to smoother and quicker table turns.”