Restaurant technology startup heytruffle, formerly known as RestoHost, has secured new funding from Preface Ventures to expand its managed artificial intelligence phone service across the United States. The Fort Lauderdale-based company did not disclose the amount, structure, or valuation associated with the financing, but said the capital would support deployment among additional multi-location restaurant groups. The announcement also formalizes a rebrand intended to reflect the company’s evolution from an AI voice-answering product into a broader hospitality-focused guest communication service.
A Managed Approach to Restaurant AI
Unlike self-service voice software that requires operators to configure and supervise the technology, heytruffle provides each restaurant with a customized AI concierge and manages the system on the client’s behalf. The concierge is trained on a location’s menu, operating hours, policies, brand tone, and workflows, while a human team reviews calls and makes weekly adjustments to improve its performance. When a conversation requires personal attention, the platform can transfer the caller to restaurant employees rather than attempting to automate every interaction.
Expanding Guest Communication Capabilities
The service supports reservations, catering inquiries, private-event requests, common guest questions, and multilingual conversations, with the company listing English, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and German among its supported languages. Alongside the funding announcement, heytruffle added phone-based order taking for pickup and delivery, extending the platform beyond its original focus on answering calls and managing bookings. It also introduced an OpenTable integration and is designed to connect with restaurant point-of-sale, reservation, delivery, and direct-ordering systems already used by operators.
Early Evidence From Restaurant Operations
Heytruffle highlighted Rreal Tacos, a 12-location restaurant group in Georgia, as an example of how the service can operate across a busy multi-unit business. According to figures supplied by the company, the platform handles more than 20,000 calls per month for the group and helped support the seating of 14,085 guests during a typical month. Heytruffle’s website separately reports that the service recovered 5,513 calls and generated approximately $52,900 in assisted revenue from large-party reservations for Rreal Tacos in May 2026.
Addressing Persistent Staffing Pressures
The company is targeting an operational problem that remains significant even as restaurant hiring conditions improve, particularly when front-of-house teams must prioritize guests already inside the venue. The National Restaurant Association’s 2025 industry report found that 32 percent of operators lacked enough employees to support existing customer demand, while 77 percent continued to view recruitment and retention as a major challenge. Heytruffle argues that handling routine calls can reduce pressure on restaurant staff while helping businesses capture reservations, orders, catering leads, and event inquiries that might otherwise be missed.
Growth Strategy and Market Positioning
Founder and CEO Lucas Espina said the company’s goal is to manage restaurant phone interactions with the same attention operators provide to guests in the dining room, rather than adding another software tool for employees to maintain. The rebrand positions heytruffle around a service-led model in which automation is supported by human oversight, restaurant-specific training, and continuous optimization. Preface Ventures, which focuses on early-stage enterprise technology companies, is backing the startup as it attempts to bring this model to a wider national customer base.
Heytruffle’s financing and rebrand mark a shift from a narrowly defined restaurant voice product toward a managed communications platform covering more of the guest journey. Its expansion will depend on whether the company can maintain restaurant-level personalization, reliable integrations, and effective human supervision as it serves larger groups and more locations. With restaurants continuing to balance labor constraints, guest expectations, and missed revenue opportunities, the company is betting that a hospitality-first approach can distinguish its technology in an increasingly competitive AI market.