- Choice, a Czech B2B SaaS platform for restaurants, raised $2.5 million (€2.3M) in a new investment round.
- J&T Ventures, a Prague-based venture capital fund is the lead investor of the current late-seed round, with previous investors Reflex Capital and Presto Ventures joining the investment round.
- The funding will be used to scale the service to four new markets in Central and Eastern Europe and to continue growing in the existing strong markets – namely Poland, Czechia, Slovakia, Estonia, Latvia, and Ukraine.
Choice is an online B2B subscription-based service that allows any restaurant to create a website and set up all necessary restaurant-related business tools on a single platform with joint administration: website, applications, online menus with QR payments, table reservations, a CRM system, and much more. Additionally, the platform can be easily integrated with popular POS systems and marketplaces such as Wolt, Bolt, Glovo, Foodora, and Uber Eats.
The main benefit and differentiating factor is that Choice can cover all channels that restaurants use to interact with their guests on a single platform, with a single client database.
Thanks to these advantages, Choice allows restaurants to digitize approximately 80% of their customer base and collect data on their preferences and frequency of visits, as well as other useful information.
“Ninety-nine % of restaurants don’t know their customers. This is a real challenge for restaurant owners because they don’t know who their most loyal guests are, how often they visit the restaurant, what their preferences and allergies are, or how many people stop visiting the restaurant and for what reasons. Choice was created with a mission to help restaurants digitize their customer base and increase customer retention and satisfaction. We can already see the positive impact of this digitization on the development of establishments in various European cities and how it allows us to improve their services,” says Alex Ilyash, CEO and founder of Choice.
Choice works with more than 16,000 restaurants worldwide and 5,000 paying clients are actively using the platform. In 2023, over 2 million orders totaling $42M were made in Choice’s partner restaurants. Currently, the company’s MRR (monthly recurring revenue from subscriptions) is over $150,000, with the plan to increase this number to $450,000 by the end of 2024.
“At Presto, we’ve always believed in Alex’s ability to surround himself with brilliant people and lead them to success. On top of that, Alex brings exceptional business acumen and the ability to recruit, nurture, and manage salespeople, even in brand new and challenging markets. Thanks to this, he has propelled Choice to new heights – the company continues to accelerate its growth and is becoming a CEE market star in their sector. We’ll certainly hear a lot more about them,” says Premysl Rubes, Founding partner of Presto Ventures, the lead investor of the previous seed round.
“We invested in Choice as we like the company’s excellent operations and strong founder who we believe can deliver on the ambitious vision in the upcoming months. Furthermore, we’re convinced that Choice will win the market as it offers complex products that cover all restaurant needs, compared to competitive products that only focus on certain features. This combination creates a distinguishing USP which makes Choice the number-one choice,” explains Adam Kocik, Managing Partner at J&T Ventures.
“We’re happy to continue supporting Choice, as we see their exponential growth and tremendous potential,” comments Ondrej Fryc, Managing partner of Reflex Capital.
Enhanced restaurant-customer interactions
Choice’s solutions cover all channels that restaurants use to interact with their guests. Their range of services encompasses various channels crucial for enhancing guest experiences, including website building capabilities, front-store functionality tailored for takeaway and delivery services, efficient table reservation systems, QR code-based payment and ordering options, customizable loyalty programs, and integration with popular marketplaces.
According to Ilyash, there is still a very big opportunity for digitizing the industry.
“In my opinion, the gastro industry still has a huge space for digitalization. I also think that in the horizon of 5 years, traditional menus will eventually be replaced,” Ilyash tells IT Logs, adding that most of the restaurant’s operations are already fully automated.
“POS and cash register systems primarily automate and digitize restaurant’s back-office operations, activities related to internal operations of the restaurant. At Choice, we focus on covering everything related to the restaurant-and-guest communication, becoming their main solution for the front-office operations,” Ilyash adds.
In 2022, the company received its seed investment from a group of Czech investors – lead investor Presto Ventures was joined by Reflex Capital and Purple Ventures. As of December 2023, the company reached $2M ARR.
