Shorefoodie.com offers pretty much what its name suggests: a thorough (and free) guide to restaurants and food events up and down the Shore.
Jim Flynn, 64, of Brielle, created shorefoodie.com.
“As a consumer," he says, "I was frustrated with trying to find what I was looking for at any given time in a restaurant. One day I might be interested in a raw bar, and another day I might want a restaurant that has water views.
"There was no way to really search for those kinds of things.”
Flynn is also founder and chairman of Jersey Shore Restaurant Week, held in April and November. About 70 restaurants offer 3-course meals for $20 and $30.
Shorefoodie.com grew out of Jersey Shore Restaurant Week.
Flynn learned that many Shore eateries simply can’t afford to advertise, especially on a consistent basis.
Now, on shorefoodie.com, restaurants “can promote themselves inexpensively, 24/7,” Flynn says, and diners can scroll through profiles, menus, specials and promotions. They can even make reservations from the comfort of their beach chairs.
The site launched last November and now has 130 participating restaurants–from fine dining spots like Nicholas in Red Bank to Woodchuck’s BBQ in Point Pleasant. It takes less than a minute to register on shorefoodie.com and gain acess to all its search tools.
Search results can be narrowed, or filtered, by location, cuisine, specialties, entertainment, deals, weekly reviews, and special events. There is also a link to another Flynn enterprise, bestweekends.com, where you can start planning getaways to other beautiful places from Nantucket to the Napa Valley. Flynn owns the site and personally writes all its reviews.
Calling himself “a serial entrepreneur,” Flynn brings 20 years of corporate marketing experience to all his ventures and works to maximize the potential of every business he undertakes.With shorefoodie.com, he is working to expand its territory a bit inland and south. By next summer, he expects his restaurant roster to expand greatly and to fly his banners over Long Beach Island as well.
Having racked up what he says are hundreds of thousands of page views already, Flynn says he has created “a great tool–particularly for people who aren’t familiar with the area–to find what they are looking for.
“From a consumer standpoint and a restaurant standpoint, we’ve created something that’s good for everybody."
SUZANNE ZIMMER LOWERY is a food writer, pastry chef and culinary instructor at a number of New Jersey cooking schools. Find out more about her at suzannelowery.com.