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Exclusive: Amex is upgrading Resy to win the restaurant reservation wars once and for all

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24.02.2026

San Francisco restaurant Mister Jiu’s is kicking off its 10th anniversary celebration next month with a three-part dinner series in its Chinatown kitchen. The restaurant will host 10 celebrated Chinese chefs from around the world, including Dan Hong from Sydney, Australia’s Mr Wong, and ArChan Chan from Ho Lee Fook in Hong Kong. Guests, seated in tables of four or eight, pay $285 each for 16 dishes from four chefs, all inspired by classic banquet-style dining.

The even is nearly sold out, and, according to executive chef and owner Brandon Jew, an exciting creative collaboration that the restaurant couldn’t afford to produce on its own. 

The extravaganza is sponsored by Resy, the reservations provider used at Mister Jiu’s and one of two reservations platforms owned by American Express. The payments company acquired Resy in 2019 and competing service Tock in 2024 to help its card members access both tables and special events at top restaurants, like the dinner collabs at Mister Jiu’s. (Amex card members were able to secure bookings to the event 48 hours before everyone else.) The series is among hundreds of events that Resy will put on this year to try to coax more diners into restaurants—and more restaurants onto Resy. 

That platform is about to get a shot in the arm. This summer, Amex will merge Tock’s restaurant inventory with Resy’s, adding roughly 8,000 bookable venues—including 1,200 wineries, a handful of tattoo parlors, and at least one goat farm—to Resy’s app and website. The move boosts Resy’s venue count to 25,000, but will sunset the Tock brand, formally uniting two onetime startups against reservations market leader OpenTable, the incumbent provider they each hoped to disrupt.

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Crucially, it also bolsters Amex’s position amid increased competition: Delivery company DoorDash spent $1.2 billion to acquire reservations platform SevenRooms last year and offers diners delivery credit for booking tables, and Chase Sapphire linked up with OpenTable last spring as part of its larger Visa partnership to offer exclusive restaurant bookings. Chase also has a longstanding partnership with DoorDash, offering Sapphire holders credit.

“Resy will be the singular app for the best culinary experiences used by the hospitality world’s most ambitious operators, with a membership benefit for card members,” says Pablo Rivero, CEO of Resy and Tock and SVP and head of American Express global dining. “And all of that will come together under the umbrella of a new era for the Resy ecosystem.” 

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© Fast Company