Yesterday, Zagat released their 2012 Texas restaurants guide. Here are their top five most popular restaurants.
Abacus Fearing's Al Biernat's Stephan Pyles Del Frisco's Steak
Look familiar? These restaurants have been dominating Zagat's list for years. The survey, a system employed by the authors of the burgundy book, skews towards fine dining and older, more established restaurants. But that may change soon.
Last year we reported on Google's acquisition of Zagat, and tried to predict what the technology powerhouse would do with their newly acquired company. Upon the release of their new guide, I talked to Tim Zagat, and asked him what he thought of his new parent company.
"Oh, it's like a second honeymoon," he gushed. He told me about their new offices, the massage booths, the lunches, the day-care and dog kennels. Google is known for treating its employees well, and they seem to have given their new Zagat pleebs the same treatment. Zagat wouldn't tell me what they're up to, but he did say that working with Google has been eye-opening. "They're entire approach to technology was a complete education," Zagat said.
Zagat has shifted from paper surveys that dominated their content generation to web based queries, but Google will almost definitely continue to overhaul this system. As they incorporate their technology portfolio, they'll build a web based presence that competes with Yelp and Urban Spoon. And the Zagat folks will keep doing what they've always been doing.
"They've been essentially allowing us to do what we like most," Zagat said of Google, "which is create content."
