80% off Restaurant.com: $25 Certificates for $2

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Restaurant.com is offering a 80% off with the coupon code SAVE, resulting in a $25 “certificate” for just $2. Offer good until end of today, November 30th. I just checked it and it still works:

Despite my initial skepticism about these things, many readers responded that they indeed found these certificates very useful in savings some money.

Here’s a example positive scenario. You find a restaurant on the list that you like that usually runs around $20 + tip per person (~$48 for a couple). You buy a $25 certificate for $2, which usually comes with a $35 minimum purchase + 18% required gratuity on full price.

Dinner for two = $40 regular menu priceMinus $25 certificate = $15

Plus cost of certificate ($2) = $17

Plus 18% gratuity on menu price = $7.20

Total price w/ tip = $24.20, or $12 a person + taxes

In that case, you can save around 50% on the total bill. These might make good gifts to the right person, but I wouldn’t pass them off as worth face value! 🙂

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Comments

  1. Don’t be skeptical. I’ve been using these for at least 5 years and I have never had a problem. The servers are always kind when handling it at the end of the meal.

  2. I ordered 8 certificates at 90% off last September. We’ve used 5 of them so far. All in all, the businesses that participate at Restaurant.com seem to be (1) involved with other promotions, and (2) tend to have high standard menu prices or aim at the tourist/impulse market.

    While we got our money’s worth I would NOT return to 3 of the 5. Example: We ordered two Indian items including curry, but the place charged several dollars each for orders of naan (flatbread) and rice! All the other places nearby that sell curry give the rice away, if not the naan too! In the end, the Restaurant.com discount merely brought the total ticket down to a fair price rather than a rip-off price. One place that we liked (and would return) had a large banner behind the bar saying “Half price entrees…” so I’m not sure the coupon saved anything in actuality.

    It seems the best restaurants nearby don’t need to offer any promotions for us to visit–just good food at fair prices all the time.

  3. We have had trouble with these. A few places don’t accept them, even though they are advertised on restaurant.com. The others in our area are not the sort of restaurants we want to go to (they appear unsafe).

    If anyone knows of a restaurant near Akron that is not just a low-end bar and accepts these, let me know.

  4. Sounds like some people are surprised by menu prices, and they shouldn’t be. The restaruant.com website has menus for all the restaurants right on the site, so you can get an idea what their prices are, and what food they offer, and what’s ala carte, before you buy the certificate. A few restaurants, maybe 10%, don’t show prices on the menu – but if the food looks high-end and there are no printed prices, it’s really not that great a leap to assume the restaurant has high prices.

  5. I buy the certificates to a little French bistro that I really like. Hmmm.. maybe it’s time for another purchase? 🙂

  6. I used one of these a month or so ago, purchased a $25 card at 90% off with a $35 minimum purchase and 18% required gratuity. It was convenient to be able to print it off 10 minutes before going out to eat.

  7. Can you use these certificates for delivery and/or take-out?

  8. Barry wrote: “Sounds like some people are surprised by menu prices, and they shouldn’t be. The restaruant.com website has menus for all the restaurants right on the site, so you can get an idea what their prices are, and what food they offer, and what’s ala carte, before you buy the certificate. A few restaurants, maybe 10%, don’t show prices on the menu – but if the food looks high-end and there are no printed prices, it’s really not that great a leap to assume the restaurant has high prices.”

    If you are referring to me then you are entirely wrong. I eat out quite a lot and am not talking about menu prices (but I did see the prices online before ordering the certificates). This issue is value rather than cost. I live in major high-end tourism area with numerous dining choices and have found good value at $50 per person and poor value at $5 per person. The key is having quality and service that matches the price.

    A place that survives on one-time-hits from tourists due to a good location, an ad in free magazine, or a restaurant.com certificate is the last place I want to visit. And often, the places that aren’t doing so well must resort to promotions to survive. I have 50 to 100 choices within walking distance so why should I pay $30 for meh food when I can pay $20 for better stuff? These days I’m more likely to pick one through word of mouth (e.g., yelp.com reviews) than any sort of promo.

  9. While these certificates can be a good deal for local restaurtants I recieved this EMAIL from MYMONEYBLOG.COM on Tue 12/1/2009
    6:14 AM. The expirations date was for Monday November 30, 2009. The CODE SAVE was not valid as i tried it on several local restaurants to order some certificates for Christmas.

    If these codes are valid for a specific date it would benefit a lot more people with more timely e-mails to take advantage of this promotion. This is the second time I have recieved a LATE promo code to use for Restaurant.com via this website.

  10. John wrote: “I eat out quite a lot and am not talking about menu prices (but I did see the prices online before ordering the certificates). This issue is value rather than cost.”

    If the issue is that you think some of the restaurants you went to because you had purchased the certificates served food that didn’t meet your expectations, then you’re perfectly correct not to go back – in which case the restaurant’s intent in offering the certificate failed, because a one-time visit is a loss leader, with real profits to come from subsequent visits at full price. If you’re saying that all the restaurants offering certificates on restaurant.com are slop-serving dumps aimed at one-time hit and run tourist clientele, then I can only say that doesn’t match my experience at all.

    Restaurant.com’s services are sold by independent salespeople, and I’m sure the quality of the restaurants they target can vary from area to area depending on the individual salesperson. But I can say, in my personal experience, I’ve never used a certificate at one that I considered primarily aimed at tourists – if anything, most of the ones I’ve visited are in fact aimed directly at local customers. That includes restaurants in what I would identify as “major high-end tourist areas” like Las Vegas and the Gaslamp district of downtown San Diego, and along the Gulf Coast. Your mileage may vary, of course, but while I’ve seen a few places on the website that I’d identify as “touristy”, I have not found those to be a significant percentage of the total offerings.

  11. So….what happens when restaurant.com goes out of business? Because 80% makes me very leary.

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