The New York Restaurant Reservation Scrum

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Scoring a table in New York can seem impossible. One person made $80,000 last year reselling restaurant reservations.

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Restaurant-goers are breaking out the checkbook for a chance to dine at some of the most exclusive restaurants in the city, per The New Yorker:

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• A lunch table at Maison Close sold for $815
• Dinner tables at 4 Charles Prime Rib went for $500-1,000
• A reservation at Carbone regularly fetches $1,000

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However, even with the high demand for reservations, restaurants lose money when restaurant-goers don’t show up for their reservations.

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As a result, some New York restaurants are switching back to the old-school reservation protocol of answering the phone and writing your name in a reservation book. No email, no OpenTable, no Yelp.

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Some popular New York restaurants have stopped taking reservations altogether, sidestepping the reservation scrum. Ugly Baby, a popular Thai spot in Brooklyn, is the latest to no longer accept reservations. Instead, people form a line hours in advance to land a seat at the 5 p.m. opening.

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May the reservation odds be ever in your favor.