What exactly is OpenSeat?

In summary, OpenSeat is an online meal-hosting platform for connecting people around food and conversation. OpenSeat facilitates the process of hosting events, enabling event creation, easy management of guest attendance and payments, and enabling the expansion of hosts’ existing social networks. By doing so, the platform aims to help people connect with others, build new and pre-existing communities, and provide a means for supporting local economies and lowering the barriers for hosting.

Why OpenSeat?

Our vision

By creating a platform to facilitate social connection through food and conversation around a shared table, OpenSeat's vision is to help build genuine communities around South Africa and eventually worldwide by enabling people to connect – in particular those from different backgrounds and viewpoints

Our ethos

OpenSeat's ethos is centred on several core, interrelated ideas.

The first is that eating, conversing, and community-building are inextricably linked. The second is that authenticity is best achieved through the social rituals of food and sitting together around a table or within a carefully-prepared environment. The third is that good hospitality is an experience that humanises people, conferring dignity on hosts and (most especially) upon guests. The fourth and final core idea is that experiences of physical, in-person community are healthier and more fulfilling than virtual community mediated through online interactions.

Following on from our ethos, OpenSeat-facilitated experiences ideally occur in spaces that are rooted in a particular local community and its culture (culinary and otherwise). As a result, we place a strong emphasis on using home dining spaces for events, recognizing the intimacy and personal connection that can be fostered in these environments. Exclusive spaces like cafes in the evenings or boardrooms after the workday can achieve a similar effect. As such, OpenSeat also seeks to challenge the norms of the hospitality industry and encourage hosts to think creatively about how they can engage with their guests in unique and meaningful ways that further the OpenSeat ethos.

Who are the target users of the OpenSeat platform?

The platform acts as an intermediary for two main user groups: firstly, potential hosts, who may embody some or all of the following characteristics:

• Individuals who enjoy hosting
• Chefs, caterers and food entrepreneurs
• People engaged in community building
• Conversation campaigners
• Venues (with open tables and seats)

Secondly, the platform is aimed at guests, who may embody some or all of the following descriptions:

• Those seeking communities based on mutual interest and values;
• Isolated people
• Tourists or travellers
• Foodies and lovers of diverse cuisine
• Those with a lot of money and those with little
• People seeking diversity, both human and experiential