EquityEats, the recently launched restaurant investment platform, plans to open a pop-up restaurant space to give potential investors the chance to try the food — and meet the chefs — behind the restaurants they’re backing.
EquityEats is in talks to open the space at 918 F St. NW, the former home of LivingSocial’s events space. The deal, first reported by Washington City Paper, is not yet signed.
The five-story building could host up to five restaurant concepts at the same time, according to Steve Lucas, an EquityEats co-founder and vice president of strategy and communications.
EquityEats launched in October with four proposed concepts seeking funding: a bakery, a lobster-and-burger joint, a farm-to-table restaurant and a seafood spot. None of the four initial concepts has yet reached its investment goal, and EquityEats recently extended those opportunities.
The idea for the pop-up space came about in part because EquityEats was hearing from investors that they wanted to sample the product before buying into the concept, Lucas told me. After organizing two pop-ups for EquityEats clients at other venues, they realized how difficult it is.
“If you don’t know the right people, it’s cumbersome,” Lucas said. “It’s hard to convince a restaurant to hand you the keys for the day.”
Revenue from the pop-up dinners will be shared between EquityEats and the entrepreneurs. The exact split hasn’t been determined, but the idea is to let the wannabe restaurants to put some of those proceeds toward their capital raise. Right now, the company doesn’t envision charging rent, though that could change.
Click here for a little more about how EquityEats works and the challenges it faces in raising funds because of Securities and Exchange Commission rules.
In its past life, 918 F Street played host to dozens of pop-ups and one-off special events — including a “speakeasy” bar concept — during LivingSocial’s time there. The daily deals-focused tech firm moved out this past summer after it shuttered its events business. EquityEats is negotiating directly with the landlord, Douglas Development Corp.
EquityEats envisions keeping the bar that LivingSocial installed for new bar concepts. The company also plans to make space available to other budding restaurateurs not using EquityEats to find funding.
The company isn’t yet saying what the first round of pop-up restaurateurs in the space will be, but we’re betting that at least a couple of their current investment opportunities will be among them.
“I would say we haven’t fundamentally changed the [investment] model,” Lucas said. “We’ve supplemented the model with something that is going to help generate positive data for us.”
