EvntBlazr

Students started EvntBlazr.com to dish out reviews of the city’s best bars and restaurants.

In a time of Yelp reviews, Foursquare and social media, everyone wants to tell people where to go in the city. But scanning through pages of angry rants and biased views can be exhausting, and make getting an honest review to plan the perfect night tough.

With the goal of giving readers a fresh and honest eye of Philadelphia, senior advertising major Lauren Kelly and Alicia Fasciocco created EVNTBlazr.com – a website that profiles the best places for eating, venturing and nightlife in Philadelphia.

To stand out from its competitors, EVNTblazr provides specific categories to make the perfect outing – readers can pick from hipster, gay-friendly, dive, college and classy scenes. In addition, Kelly and Fasciocco said their site is different as it categorizes Philadelphia hotspots by specific attributes.

“It’s hard to find outdoor seating, and at the same time you can’t Google ‘gay friendly lunch spots in Philadelphia’ or ‘good for groups,’” Kelly said. “As a college student, it’s hard to find a place that’s cheap, [hip] and good for a first date, but we have all that.”

Kelly believes that their website’s tips and recommendations are relevant for anyone, from college freshman to entertainment-scene regulars.

“The website is a fresh eye people aren’t used to seeing,” Kelly said. “For Temple students, it’s from their perspective. “

In addition, the site is set to regularly feature interviews from local musicians. Although the site doesn’t officially launch with the first feature – with Philadelphia DJ, Deejay DJ – until April, Kelly and Fasciocco have created Twitter and Facebook pages for the website. The site is also fully up and running with about 21 reviews from throughout the city.

The owners hope to increase advertising revenue through word-of-mouth and social media. It is now in the early stages, and Fasciocco believes that more followers will attract advertisers. Although the reviews are honest, Kelly and Fasciocco said that they do not focus on the negative. Instead, they would just like to bring attention to their favorite places in the city.

“We’re not going to bring down family restaurants,” Kelly said. “We would say if something needed improvement, but not in a way that’s bashing the business.”

With hopes of starting a new business, Kelly and Fasciocco said they are excited about the new experiences that the venture will bring. The reviews include both cheaper low-end and expensive high-end establishments.

“We like good service, food and location,” Fasciocco said. “We don’t like to go places where the food sucks but the light is really cool. We go for the food and drink and want the total package.”

“But we’re not above dive bars,” she added.

Kelly also said that they sought out restaurants with specialized menus, good ambiance and a diverse crowd.

“We’re not into chain restaurants,” Kelly said. “We write about somewhere we think our readers would like to go and where we feel like people should go.”

In a year, the owners say that they would like to see the website add more content and  staff writers.

“Right now it’s not generating income,” Kelly said. “But ideally we’d like it to someday be our jobs.”

Danielle Miess can be reached at danielle.miess@temple.edu.