Harden's London Restaurant Guide goes mobile

LONDON -- The best-selling Harden's London Restaurant Guide is going mobile. Finding a great restaurant in a specific price range is often a challenge, particularly for travelers. Now visitors and residents alike can take advantage of an insider's knowledge to find London's best places to eat with their Palm or Pocket PC handheld devices, and internet-enabled mobile phones including BREW handsets.

Vindigo, a U.S.-based provider of personal navigation services for wireless and mobile devices, has announced the addition of new content from the best-selling Harden's London Restaurant Guide to its Vindigo 2.0 service. 

Vindigo said its proprietary technology and network of content partners enables it to offer compelling and comprehensive location-based applications to carriers and consumers using Vindigo lets people to explore, enjoy, and connect to the world around them.

Harden's, run by brothers Richard and Peter Harden, was launched 12 years ago with its first and now best-selling guide, Harden's London Restaurants. The brothers have their own approach to developing restaurant reviews, combining their personal dining experiences of all establishments listed with the opinions of nearly 7,000 UK restaurant-goers.

Restaurants are rated on a five-point scale for food, service and ambiance. The Harden's system rates each restaurant against other establishments charging similar prices, highlighting places where diners get the most for their money, whatever their budget.

50 U.S. markets

In addition to Harden's restaurant reviews, Vindigo 2.0 users can access information about the best and closest places to shop and play in London and over 50 U.S. markets. By entering their current location, Vindigo 2.0 users can find entertainment options and local information, including museum exhibits, bars, stores, movie reviews and show times. For U.S. markets, Vindigo 2.0 also includes detailed information about services such as the location of the closest public restrooms, ATMs, gas stations, parking garages and police stations. The service comes with ratings and reviews from brand-name content providers, maps and directions to any listing.

Vindigo 2.0 for Palm Powered and Pocket PC handheld devices is available for download from the Vindigo web site for $3.50 per month or $24.95 for an annual subscription. New users can download a 30-day trial at no charge.

Annual restaurant survey

Harden's Guides is a publishing firm based just off the Strand in London. Harden's London Restaurants is now the longest-established pocket guide to London restaurants. The opinions expressed in the guide are a combination of an annual survey of UK restaurant-goers (almost 7,000 for the year 2003 edition), together with the brothers' own personal experiences of everywhere listed. Their personal visits are always conducted anonymously, and at the firm's expense.

The idea for Harden's Guides came at the beginning of the 1990s, when Peter, 36, was working in New York and Richard, 44, in Düsseldorf. The brothers said both cities had handy, opinionated, pocket restaurant guides of a type which simply didn't exist in London. The time seemed right to launch such a guide. The restaurant scene was just beginning to stir and, with great difficulty, a hundred people were persuaded to take part in the first London-wide survey. For nine months before publication of the first edition of Harden's London Restaurants, Richard and Peter ate their way around the capital: between the brothers consumed 600 meals out in a six-month period.

Last October, Vindigo announced additional support for the Palm family of handhelds, including the new Palm Zire, along with new content and support for additional U.S. markets. Zire handheld users join other Palm Powered handheld users who employ Vindigo to quickly and easily find information on where to eat, shop and play in over 50 U.S. markets and London.

"The Palm Zire and Vindigo 2.0 both deliver practical, affordable, easy-to-use solutions that simplify daily life," said Ken Wirt, senior vice president at Palm Solutions Group. "These products help everyone, from students and professionals to busy moms on the go."