Star Power
“5 stars. This restaurant served great…” “1 star. Terrible service. Food was horr–”. You’re scrolling through Google reviews, trying to find tonight’s restaurant of choice. It has become a ritual, it would feel unsettling not to seek guidance and reassurance from the number of stars or how ‘POSITIVE’ the adjectives were on Google. We tend to consider service, quality of food, hygiene, price and location. When did the act of filling our stomachs become a tickboxing exercise?
We find ourselves scrolling through a deep hole of reviews trying to satisfy our desires of a perfect dining experience and protect our wallets from overpriced food. Hence, reviews function as verification of restaurant legitimacy and popularity. Other than star ratings, temporal cues are a priority for me when it comes to restaurant selections. A day old review versus a review of its competition written 3 years ago are the usual comparisons I find myself making, and ultimately end up choosing the restaurant with more recent reviews. Newer reviews are indicators of strong management and operation, but more importantly are just more reliable.
As someone who has never left a review for a restaurant, I can’t help but wonder how exactly are these restaurants accumulating thousands of reviews? From my own experience, my family and friends are too ‘unbothered’ or see it as “too much effort”. However, this is not the case for the many who post hundreds of reviews, achieving the status of ‘Local guide’ on Google Maps. This recognition is not limited to certain age groups, genders, nor nationality. Anyone, a local or tourist could simply drop a comment and click on their preferred star number, thanks to the accessibility of the platform. Whilst this availability exists, reviews conducted by different populations tend to vary. Locals usually carry their own local knowledge and past experiences whilst tourists bring knowledge from their origin to conduct thorough comparisons. Nonetheless, how exactly can we examine their reliability? Sites like Google Maps and Tripadvisor tend to have an abundance of tourist reviews, whilst reviews on apps like Little Red Book, typically come from Hong Kong or Mainland Chinese contributors.
It is not unusual for tourists to be first-time visitors to an area, hence there is room for them to leave an over-positive or negative review due to a lack of exposure to the local cuisine and customs. A review for Lin Heung Tea house reads, “So loud and hectic for a dimsum restaurant.” with an atmosphere rating of one out of five. This tourist appears to show limited understanding of the norms of a Hong Kong Dimsum house, as it is not unusual for customers to passionately exchange words with their family and friends, and oftentimes the high volume is a sign of spirit and engagement. Nonetheless, these tourist reviews should not be dismissed as they can make good guides for like-minded tourists who are visiting with their own norms and expectations. The element of ‘first experience’ can make for a useful tourist-centered viewpoint that others without prior local knowledge could refer to.
Yet at the end of the day, we cannot ignore the fact that tourist reviews, magazines and sites are made accessible on a global scale, which poses a risk that the construction of local cuisine is painted through an outsider's point of view. This means it may not be the most authentic representation of the food culture and tradition. Instead, I believe the most accurate depiction should be made by local chefs, restaurant staff, and even regular local customers.
Reviews can seriously make or break a restaurant’s reputation as they tend to offer a more brutally honest and critical comment compared to restaurant’s promotional material. Arguably, positive reviews can act as a form of advertisements for older and local restaurants who do not have access to social media platforms to conduct marketing. In fact, local restaurant owners I spoke to showed appreciation for tourist reviews that have driven large group of customers into their businesses. One manager was particularly delighted when he discussed how his younger customers, on the Chinese app Little Red Book, have created quick and short videos that perfectly capture the restaurant’s delicacies.
Nevertheless, it tends to be a game of luck. When specific local restaurants happen to get viral videos, what happens to the restaurants that don’t have reviews or media coverage of any sort? As a 17 year old, reviews determine a restaurant’s existence for me. We tend to steer away from food options with only a few reviews that paint them as worthless. As individuals, we are drawn to numbers that quantify the value of a restaurant.
To a large extent, reviews create expectations and standards that restaurants must consistently keep up with. Although it may be a strenuous process to fulfill these demands, reviews are the new bread and butter of restaurants, as they influence the choice of potential customers to walk through the door.
