Toronto Food & Place Reviews

Posted on May 9, 2012 16:17 in 4sq, canada, foursquare, google places, toronto, travel, yyz

As you probably know, I was in Toronto for a couple of weeks earlier this year. In a new respectful habit I’m trying to force myself into I’m making my views on locations visited know via Foursquare and Google Places. The list below contains all the name worthy places I’d visited and a short review of each venue.

Toronto Pearson International Airport

Having been to Pearson a few times, I can safely say that it’s becoming a fairly known path for me. There is a large number of places to eat, drink and shop throughout the concourses. All of the airport staff are helpful and willing to assist you with anything you need. There are plenty of facilities around and always within reach of the gates. Enjoy every experience I’ve had with this airport and I’m sure most others do too.

Crowne Plaza Fallsview

While visiting Niagara Falls I stayed at the Crowne Plaza Fallsview hotel. The hotel isn’t similar to others in the area and it retains the old aura of a time gone by. The entrance hall, hallways and fittings all reflect the level of service that is provided by the staff. I spent two nights in Niagara Falls and both were pleasant. The bedrooms were clean, tidy and stocked full of helpful items. The service was great and there is a Starbucks at street level. The location is great to wander around Niagara Falls too, with the Maid of the Mist tours just a few minutes walk across the road.

Niagara Falls

For a very long time, Horseshoe Falls has been on the list of places I’ve wanted to visit in the world. While in Canada this time around I had the chance to actually go and stay in Niagara Falls and see the majestic Falls in all their glory. Along with doing the usual tourist things like Maid of the Mist (see below) it was also good to visit Clifton Hill which is very similar to Blackpool and the old English seafront arcades. The entire tourist area is a delight to walk around in with plenty of places to eat, buy and wander around. I was so awestruck by the sheer size and power of the Falls that I would recommend that every person in the world should go see.

Air Canada Centre

I was fortunate enough to see the Red Hot Chili Peppers play live at the Air Canada Centre whilst I was in Toronto. The venue is in a great location downtown and easy enough to get to by subway, streetcar and by walking. The ACC staff are  extremely friendly and I had the pleasant experience of having ‘Lou’ as our usher for the night. Before the event started Lou spoke to myself and others seated nearby about his experience working at the ACC, he had missed two events in 30 years of working there which is an incredible!

The facilities were great, clean and easy to locate. The merchandise for the concert was easy to find too! 

Maid of the Mist

Along with seeing Niagara Falls, one of the other things I wanted to do was to take a trip on the world famous ‘Maid of the Mist’. Be careful if you want to go and visit this fantastic attraction and head over to the dock early in the morning. The queues build up extremely quickly and you can end up queuing for hours. The whole process was a pain free experience though, although it’s very wet when you’re in front of both the American and Horseshoe falls. 

The trip itself takes around 15 minutes after leaving the dock. If you can get onto the boat quickly then do so, as you’ll want to find yourself a good vantage point. Staff were most friendly and even offered to take photos for me too!

Crescent Beach

Review content.

Old Fort Erie

Review content.

Courtyard by Marriott

Review content.

Coach House Restaurant

Review content.

Teds Collision

Review content.

Steam Whistle Brewing

Review content.

CN Tower

Review content.

Elephant & Castle

Review content.

The County General

Review content.

A&W

Review content.

Frans

Review content.

Pizza Pizza

Review content.

Teriyaki Express

Review content.

Urban Eatery

Review content.

Starbucks

Review content.

BMO Field

Review content.

Tim Hortons

Review content.

Sears

Review content.

Yonge & Dundas Square

Review content.

AMC Cinema

Review content.

The Pickle Barrel

Review content.

Local Businesses Should Harness Locality Services

Posted on May 7, 2010 15:52 in business, foursquare, gowalla, local, location

There is an emerging trend that local business won’t be able to ignore for too long. At the moment, all the rage with mobile devices seems to be location based services and games with Gowalla, FourSquare and Yelp being the primary platforms although Facebook is to launch its own version shortly which may comprise of an amalgamation of all three. These platforms reward users with points, prizes and badges the more they ‘check in’. I haven’t had chance to test out Yelp more yet, so I’ll exclude that from the results below.

There are a few subtle differences between the two platforms, which I’ll detail below. I’ve found that most people seem to use both Gowalla and FourSquare. At the moment, I’m leaning more towards being a Gowalla permanent user. I’ll outline a few differences with the platforms below.

Feature / Terminology	Foursquare	Gowalla	Brightkite
Marking as Present	Check In	Check In	Check In
Most Frequent Visitor	Mayor	Leader	TBC
Media Uploads
API
Userbase	TBC	TBC	TBC
Push Notices			TBC

The way in which people interact with business has changed. The entire customer service model is slowly changing and those who do not update their methods and ways will be left behind. In the US, the adoption of FourSquare and Gowalla has been picking up rapidly whereas in the UK its seen a slower adoption pace. One thing is for definite though, if you decide to provide offers to your customers/users of these services then you will drive traffic to your business and promote a better reputation with the digitalrati of the modern age.

This can provide to be key in the way in which your business is viewed. Trendy coffee bars in town centres are interested in seeing how they can use Gowalla and Foursquare to promote their business better. Promoting via one of these online services is like word-of-mouth on steroids. It’ll quickly get around the services and attract new people when they see their friends at your business.

Cafe’s in the larger cities have already started offering free coffee and a muffin for the Mayor of their location. Believe me, no one will refuse a free muffin.