Paseo

Paseo is by far my favorite Seattle restaurant – a local secret of sorts, until it was featured on The Travel Channel and TLC a few years ago. It’s still a small, Caribbean eatery located in Fremont that sells, without a doubt, some of the best food I’ve ever had. There is no sign on the front of the building and they don’t advertise themselves to the community, yet they still get lines around the block and sometimes run out of sandwiches before customers (I personally have waited over an hour to get a pork roast on multiple occasions).

They have a Facebook page with about 2,000 “likes” though they very rarely post. Mostly people just talk about the food and share recommendations or photos, and while conversations do sometimes sprout from that, I think having a direct connection would be beneficial to their reputation – especially on the occasions that there are complaints or suggestions. I understand that because they are already so popular (they have over 1500 overwhelmingly positive Yelp reviews averaging 4.5 stars) they don’t need to offer coupons or deals via any social media outlets, however I think creating a platform simply to interact with customers would only help raise their reputation as a truly caring, local business.

In the end, I don’t think Paseo is doing a very good job of utilizing social media opportunities readily available to them because they probably believe it isn’t necessary with business already booming (I am assuming this since they are only regularly open Tuesday-Saturday and are able to close the shop for 5-6 weeks around the holidays each year). Regardless of profits though, I still believe that relating to your customers and incorporating a personal feel to your business would only help them in the long run.