This new Ohio-based app aims to revolutionize how we find our favorite takeout spots

In an age where we’re overloaded with dining options and delivery platforms, what’s actually the best way to pick out dinner? 

One Ohio-based smartphone app thinks they have the answer.

The forthcoming Eat Local Ohio app—which is free and slated to hit app stores this fall—wants to provide a streamlined way to pick out your next meal all while supporting local restaurants. It compiles hundreds of local restaurant options mapped out in easy-to-search categories with user reviews. And while thousands of local restaurant reviews are just an internet search away, these lack an important part of the dining experience: quality photography.

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“Back in 2016, we realized local independents were suffering because the food photos on their social media pages weren’t the greatest,” said Pablo Lopez, Vice President of Marketing & Technology at Hillcrest Foods, the Cleveland-based distributor that created Eat Local Ohio. 

Eat Local Ohio launched roughly five years ago as a free service available to independent Ohio restaurants that provided professional quality food photographs and social media, before leadership saw another important application for the branch.

“Our President David Marzich noticed people were using our Instagram page to make decisions on where they were going to eat, so why not go with that and make it easier for people?” Lopez said.

And the Eat Local Ohio app was born. 

According to Lopez, the platform (which will likely open with over 1,000 listings across Ohio) holds one of the largest collections of food-related content in the state. 

“When my wife and I decide to search for food in our area, the first few places that pop up through a search engine are usually chains. They have more disposable marketing dollars,” Lopez said. “What we really want to do is give our customers and other independents a tool to win against all these chains.”

Interested Columbus diners can text “ELO” to 844-928-4257 in order to join the Eat Local Ohio texting list, meaning they’ll stay up to date on when the app is ready to launch, which Lopez predicts will be in 45 to 60 days.

If you like this, read: This longtime Columbus chef is launching a gourmet sandwich food truck

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