About

Wahaca are the leading Mexican restaurant chain in the UK, with dozens of outlets across the country. Founded by Masterchef winner Thomasina Meirs and business partner Mark Selby, Wahaca have earned their success through innovation, excellent customer service and great food.

What we did

Wahaca invest heavily in music, and Open Ear work alongside their marketing team and dedicated music manager Paola Feregino to deliver music across all touchpoints. These include the annual Day of The Dead festival, which brings acts from Mexico to perform to 30,000 people over two days in central London, with Open Ear DJs playing between bands.

Playlists continually evolve and we are in constant dialogue with Paola and the Wahaca GMs to ensure the restaurants’ musical identity is always on-brand. Wahaca’s music is sourced directly from Mexico, with account manager Oscar Arroyo regularly visiting to source the best new music. We work directly with UK based labels such as Soundway and Sofrito, who specialise in Latin American music re-issues, unearthing hidden gems that fit perfectly in the playlists.

Wahaca then push the music selection via their social media accounts, with SoundCloud monthly top tens, a Spotify playlist and newsletter all used to help push new musical discoveries to their customers.

Customer Connect

Customers can discover the music playing in realtime in any restaurant using the Wahaca mobile app. Built by Open Ear in collaboration with remote payment experts FlyPay, the app allows customers to pay for their meal and at the same time discover what songs are playing in the restaurant.