How Essence Bar & Grill Tripled Its Monthly Covers in Kigali
- Kigali, Rwanda
- Bar & Grill
- Reservation Management, Online Booking Link, Guestbook
Problem: Found on Instagram, Booked One Message at a Time
Essence Bar & Grill is a bar and grill in Kigali, busiest at the weekend, when Saturday and Sunday bring in the most guests.
Its guests find it on Instagram, then message to ask for a table. Every booking meant a conversation, and a reply that came too late could be a table lost.
There was no simple way to book straight from Instagram, and no record of who had been before.
The Dinesurf Transformation: From Instagram to a Booked Table
A Booking Link for Instagram Guests book straight from Essence’s Instagram. About half of all its bookings now come from there.
Guests Book Themselves More than nine in ten bookings are made by the guest online, not taken by staff over the phone.
Every Guest in the Guestbook Each booking adds the guest to Essence’s Guestbook, so the team can see who is new and who is coming back.
Essence Bar & Grill before and after Dinesurf
Before Dinesurf
- Reservation Process
- DMs and phone calls
- Who Books
- Staff, one message at a time
- Guest Records
- Scattered across chats
- Weekend Tables
- Confirmed by hand
After Dinesurf
- Reservation Process
- Online, from the Instagram link
- Who Books
- Guests, 9 in 10 bookings
- Guest Records
- One Guestbook, 180+ guests
- Weekend Tables
- Booked ahead online
Key Takeaways
3x+ the Covers a Month
Since moving to the Pro plan, Essence books more than three times as many covers a month as in its first months.
Half of Bookings From Instagram
Instagram is where Kigali finds Essence, and now it is where guests book.
550+ Covers Booked This Year
More than 550 guests have booked a table at Essence through Dinesurf in 2026.
Where this fits
