Ben Leventhal (Founder & CEO, Blackbird)

Bullish:

• $RESTAURANTTECH - AI is seen as a promising tool for restaurant audience growth and marketing, potentially transforming restaurant operations.

  • “I think there's definitely something that we have to look at closely around how does AI become a real tool, for audience growth for the restaurant.”

    Ben·1:05:03
• $BLACKBIRD - Blackbird aims to become a global loyalty and payments platform for restaurants, with its currency 'Fly' potentially becoming the standard for restaurant transactions worldwide.

  • “Blackbird is a loyalty and payments platform, and the currency that you use on Blackbird is called Fly. And Fly, in the future, will be the global currency for all restaurants.”

    Ben·52:28
• $RESTAURANTBRANDS - Restaurant brands are evolving into lifestyle and entertainment brands, potentially increasing their value and market appeal.

  • “Some of these restaurant brands play like lifestyle brands, which is sort of of something I was you know, Eater being about the play by play restaurants, resi pay for play, new things, you know a lot of that sort of like about how restaurants are entertainment.”

    Ben·47:29

Bearish:

• $LEGACYPAYMENTS - Traditional payment systems are taking a significant cut from restaurant transactions, which is unsustainable given the thin profit margins in the industry.

  • “Anytime restaurants are transacting in USD, they're losing money by getting it in and out of the system. The legacy players in money are taking a big [cut]. It's usually 3 or 4%. It's a lot. Remember, these restaurants, their profit margins are 3 or 4%. So if 3 or 4% is coming out on top on every transaction, that's insane.”

    Ben·55:16