Blog Wields Power in Restaurant World
|
(AP)
Lockhart Steele, left, and Ben Leventhal,
co-owners of the web site, Eater.com,
dine during an... |
NEW
YORK (AP) - Ben Leventhal and
Lockhart Steele are a pair of bloggers
fighting a guerrilla war against the city's
publicists. Nearly every day, the two
provide restaurant information on their
popular Web site, Eater.com., posting
tidbits that publicists aren't ready to
release and traditional journalists haven't
managed to print.
Thanks to an army of hungry tipsters,
Leventhal and Steele are irking restaurateurs,
chefs and reporters alike with their timely
scoops. They have broken stories about
restaurant closings and the comings-and-goings
of chefs, and their success has led to
a new venture in Los Angeles.
There is also talk of stalking San Francisco's
eateries and possibly delving into one
or two other major cities.
The ascendancy of Eater.com is yet another
example of the transformation in how news
is disseminated in a blog-driven world.
With sites like Eater.com, Chowhound.com
and Thestrongbuzz.com, no longer do restaurant-obsessed
New Yorkers have to wait for a weekly
food and dining section in a newspaper
or magazine to get the lowdown.
"I don't see Eater as a lone crusader,"
Steele, 32, said. "I see it as more
of a larger trend toward the democratization
of dining information."
Leventhal and Steele's site attracts tens
of thousands of readers a day and led
the influential Food & Wine magazine
to call Eater "required reading"
and dub them "intrepid web masters"
for shaking up the eating scene.
"Eater is one of the sites that got
it," said Pete Wells, editor of The
New York Times Dining section. "They
are using the medium to do things other
media can't do as well. A big part of
it is tapping into the online army that
will do a lot of work for them. I'm really
impressed with how much information they
are able to gather with almost no visible
signs of reporting."
Leventhal and Steele came to meet about
three years ago. Leventhal was doing a
weekly newsletter about restaurants and
nightlife. Steele had created a site in
which he detailed places to dine in lower
Manhattan.
Over a vodka-fueled discussion at a swank
New York bar, the two soon decided to
pursue Eater with a rough recipe based
on what their sites had in common. The
site launched in July 2005.
"We didn't know what to do with the
restaurant bits," said Steele, who
is also the managing editor of Gawker
Media. "We were able to take that
to Eater and amplify it."
Eater's mission is simple: to report on
the life cycle of restaurants - not whether
the food it serves is savory. These guys
are not food critics, and photographs
of food rarely appear on the site.
"No food porn," said Leventhal,
28, who also works as editorial director
of Curbed.com.
The site's main attractions are clever
but not snarky: the "Plywood"
report (restaurant openings), "Adventures
in Shilling" (PR antics) and the
dreaded "Deathwatch," in which
the site proclaims a restaurant moribund.
The last stage is "Shuttered"
- its meaning obvious.
While Leventhal and Steele are old-fashioned
gumshoes - pounding the pavement, taking
pictures and knocking on doors to get
the scoop - Eater's success really hinges
on its vast array of unpaid spies.
Many times the nugget comes in the form
of a picture, providing irrefutable proof
that a place is coming to life or dying.
"When we really get a hot tip, that's
like a rush," Leventhal said.
Two of the bigger stories Eater has broken
involved the shuttering of the famous
Second Avenue Deli and Le Cirque losing
its chef. Le Cirque denied the report
repeatedly, but Eater's dispatch was accurate.
Leventhal says Eater tries to get it right,
but the site doesn't always hit its target
accurately. They recently reported a closing
but soon learned the restaurant had relocated
to a larger location. A reader didn't
hesitate to rebuke them.
"It moved around the corner ... you
buffoons," the e-mail said.
Publicists aren't always the biggest fans
of Eater.
Jennifer Baum, an influential restaurant
publicist, says she doesn't read the site
but someone in her firm watches its postings.
She advises her clients not to respond
to Eater, because Leventhal or Steele
will make fodder out of it.
Baum said Eater traffics in rumor and
there's no fact-checking. She says the
site has gotten things wrong about her
clients.
"It's gossip," she said. "They
can write what they want."
But she acknowledges that aspects of Eater
also can affect a restaurant's livelihood
like a bad food review.
"They eliminate the ability for restaurants
to open quietly anymore," Baum said.
"I think they're very powerful. People
read it. People outside the industry read
it. It's great but wreaks havoc at the
same time. You put someone on Deathwatch,
they can feel immediately it's lost because
Eater has said it."
Wells said Eater has managed to loosen
the publicist's iron grip. That's a good
thing, he says.
"Eater has found an end-run around
that system," he said. "As a
person who believes in the freedom of
the press, I love to see someone find
a creative way to break the publicists
lock on information."
Leventhal and Steele don't see themselves
waging war against Baum and others.
"They have a job and we have a job,"
Leventhal said.
"Our job is to honestly chart the
life cycle of a restaurant," Steele
added.
And the two have no intention of quitting.
Their urge to get the scoop is irrepressible.
Earlier this month, walking through the
Meatpacking District on the way to lunch,
they spotted a restaurant they had listed
as "Shuttered." There was a
heavy-duty oven and other equipment on
the sidewalk - evidence of its demise.
Both got excited.
"We should take a picture of that,"
Leventhal told Steele.
"Yeah, I did," Steele said,
his camera in hand. "It's over!"