Amex eyes 75,000-venue dining network after Tock deal
American Express is integrating its Resy and Tock platforms while pursuing a $700 million European acquisition to create a 75,000-venue dining network that defends its cardmember spending.
American Express will begin merging its Tock and Resy platforms this summer, combining more than 25,000 hospitality businesses into a single consumer booking system. The integration follows American Express’s $400 million purchase of Tock in 2024 and a proposed $700 million acquisition of European platform TheFork.
If regulators approve the TheFork transaction, American Express will expand its dining network to approximately 75,000 bookable venues across 11 countries. The strategy targets a highly lucrative demographic: American Express members spent more than $87 billion on dining in the United States in 2024. Restaurants also represent the largest travel and entertainment spending category for U.S. Platinum Card members.
For investors, the financial appeal lies in constructing a closed-loop ecosystem. By owning the reservation technology, American Express can guide cardholders from discovery to booking to payment, capturing consumer data and incentivizing card retention. The company surrounds both platforms with its existing payment network and card-member benefits.
The operational risk falls to Pablo Rivero, CEO of Resy and Tock and Senior Vice President of American Express Global Dining. He must integrate two systems built for fundamentally different business models. Resy primarily manages standard table demand and waitlists, whereas Tock was designed for complex inventory like prepaid tasting menus, winery tours and deposits.
Preserving Tock’s operational flexibility during the Resy integration is Rivero’s primary technical challenge. Beverage-led and event-driven venues require granular control over their physical space. Barn8, a restaurant at Hermitage Farm in Kentucky, uses Tock to manage its regular dining room alongside chef’s tastings and whiskey events. Restaurant manager Abby Brown noted that previous systems lacked necessary controls. “The flexibility with Tock has been incredibly nice,” Brown said in a case study. “There’s just so much more customization.” In its first year on Tock, Barn8 processed $244,000 in tasting-menu revenue and maintained a 2.4 percent no-show rate.
American Express must execute this transition without forcing diverse hospitality businesses into a single, rigid operating model. Success would mean transforming fragmented reservation software into a unified network that deepens American Express’s moat in high-value dining spend.
