Google has given us a new toy to play with, Insights, and Young Manhattanite has used it to determine that Momofuku is among the top ten rising food and drink searches in the state of New York (aside from Crumbs, it’s the only local restaurant on the list along with terms like “lollipop” and “buffalo wings”). We played with Insights a little bit more, focusing specifically on the Restaurants category, and filtering results down with “nyc.” The results were pretty astounding.
New York States’s top restaurant-related searches of 2008:
Restaurant
Pizza
Pizza pizza
Restaurants
Pizza hut
NYC restaurants
Menupages
McDonald’s
Dominos
Subway
New York State’s top rising restaurant-related searches of 2008:
Bar Boulud +1,800 percent
Red Mango +750 percent
At T +700 percent
Yelp +250 percent
Jimmy Johns +140 percent
Subway menu +120 percent
Five Guys +110 percent
Public House +100 percent
Qdoba +80 percent
Pop Burger +60 percent
New York State’s rising searches of 2008 when filtered with “nyc”:
The Smith nyc +300 percent
Momofuku nyc +100 percent
Anthos nyc +100 percent
Pop Burger nyc +80 percent
Le Cirque nyc +80 percent
Public House nyc +70 percent
Westville nyc +60 percent
Havana Central nyc +60 percent
New York State’s rising searches of 2007 when filtered with “nyc”:
Public House nyc – breakout (meaning “the search term has experienced a change in growth greater than 5,000%”).
Perilla nyc +550 percent
Pinkberry nyc +500 percent
Waverly Inn +250 percent
Landmarc nyc +120 percent
Little Owl nyc +90 percent
Dos Caminos nyc +70 percent
Inoteca nyc +50 percent
Quality Meats nyc +40 percent
Open table +40 percent
New York State’s rising restaurant searches since 2004, when filtered with “nyc”:
Morimoto nyc – breakout
Morimoto – breakout
Buddha Bar nyc – breakout
Buddha Bar – breakout
Buddakan nyc – breakout
Buddakan – breakout
Menupages nyc +300 percent
Menupages +300 percent
Dos Caminos nyc +110 percent
Spotted Pig nyc +70 percent
So, wow, a big shift from 2004–2006, when the Spice Markets and Buddakans were the most searched for restaurants locally, to 2007–2008, when the Momofukus, little owls, and Spotted Pigs are all that. Of course, we knew that already. What we didn’t know is that Public House is the most happenin’ bar in the city. Keep in mind this is only among people who aren’t smart enough to use nymag.com for their restaurant searches!
Google Search Habits of NYC [Young Manhattanite]