Off The Menu Club For Foodies

This review is more of a review of the service and not so much the app. The service is spectacular. I love being able to try new local small businesses every week for one flat monthly fee. Their weekly picks are always appetite inducing and I try to redeem as many as possible. However the one major flaw is that you can only redeem one item per day. This makes it hard for people with busy schedules or time restraints due to work, school, etc. Why not let us redeem multiple items in one day and just mark them as used for the rest of the week? It doesn't make sense, especially when there's an item that's a drink or desert right next to another place where there's a redeemable entree? My friends and I unfortunately miss out the majority of redemptions because of our schedules. Other than that, customer service has always been quick to respond and resolve whatever issue I may be having. Looking forward to next week's picks, and hoping to be able to check out more than one of these business a day.

honestly i was a bit skeptical about the app at first because it’s too good to be true but it Really is super neat!! A downfall is how far some of the places are AND how we can only unlock once a day. It’s hard to go to some of the places when I’m working every day so it would be more easier if i could unlock multiple on the weekend and just have that item be marked as used for the week.... once a day thing is a bit difficult for schedules..... but the best thing about it is that this app has let me discover SOOO many great places that don’t even show up when i search for food on yelp!! I’m grateful for this app! My boyfriend and i are huge foodies / huge yelpers so this app is amazing! I hope they start one in OC for one of my friends too!

I've known about the app for a while and thought it was very exclusive because of the access by invite only. When I applied a few weeks ago, I got in pretty quickly, and it seems like they're opening up a lot more spots now. I wasn't sure about joining in the past since I didn't know how close the restaurants were to me and I try not to drive a lot. When I found their IG account and the places they were offering, I decided it was time to join. The first time I tried to redeem, the item was sold out. I found out after the fact that it was announced on IG, so I'd recommend checking IG or calling the establishment before to confirm the item is still available. If the app could also update when the item is sold out that day, that would be super helpful. The second time I tried to redeem, I went to the wrong dumplings place (that was on me). I even asked them about OTM and they had no idea what I was talking about. 🤦🏻‍♀️ Otherwise, the app has been pretty great so far and the places where I have redeemed have been friendly and welcoming. It does seem that some weeks are better than others in terms of food items. (Still sad I missed out on la birria.) I've also been tipping, as encouraged (or else you'll get kicked off the app apparently), but they don't even seem to notice. 😂

Immediately subscribed when the app dropped, i think with a cross promo with eater. I actually look forward to every Sunday at 10 am when the menus drop to sort of plan my week out. Things that make the app endearing (other than the fact that i work at the major newspaper in LA and dabble in food content) is that I’ve actually met Lawrence, by chance (in dtla), when there was some miscommunication with the vendor. He helped resolve that pretty quickly. Things that could be thought on: decreasing the once a day ticker to once every 8 hours? I understand the necessity to stagger content. There have also been payment glitches where i went to a store and it either time out/cache didn’t save my information. Another thought as you expand is having more localized experiences. Knowing scale, it might be beneficial in creating a tiered system where you can offer a more expensive hyper localized experience, and one for the greater LA. All in all, OTM has exposed different experiences for me: from Nancy silvertons grilled cheese at mozza to Dave’s hot chicken to la birrira. Food has a big part of la culture and my life, and it has only been an added benefit.

I’ve been a member for quite a while and I’m all about what Off the Menu Club stands for. It’s important for me to contribute to charity, especially when it comes to children; Being a foodie like myself, the ability to redeem a free item a day for only 20 bucks is a plus. It has helped me discover tons of restaurants, I would have never discovered otherwise, all over LA. It’s dope! The only thing I would say that needs a little help would be, sometimes I get turned away by some employees who aren’t familiar with the app, and it’s frustrating because sometimes I go out of my way to travel to that particular establishment. Otherwise completely worth the 20 bucks a month!