Why American Express Wants to Buy TheFork: New Cardmembers

Skift Take In acquiring TheFork, American Express wouldn't be merely adding some dining reservations' bookings. Instead, it's adding valuable data about discretionary spend, expanding its global footprint, and enticing nonmembers to become cardholders. American Express sees its pending $700 million acquisition of TheFork from Tripadvisor not just as a way to service cardmembers traveling to Europe, but as a way to add high-spending new cardholders. If the deal to acquire Europe's largest dining reservations platform, TheFork, closes later this year as expected, then it would join Amex's two other dining reservations' assets, Resy and Tock. In Amex's second quarter earnings call last Friday, CEO Stephen Joseph Squeri said the three platforms are "open also to non-card members. And that becomes useful for us from an acquisition perspective because what we'll do within those platforms is special offers for card