According to The Australian, “Melbourne pizza aficionado Tony Fazio was hired to run the restaurant, which was located in a basement in a hidden alleyway.”

“Importantly for Yellow owner Sensis, a division of Telstra, an average of 70 per cent of those customers said they found their way to the unsignposted Hidden Restaurant via a paid Yellow online listing, search engine marketing services such as those Yellow provides its customers, or through the local Yellow Pages directory, which was delivered to homes shortly before the campaign began. Blogs, social media and other forms of word-of-mouth accounted for the other 30 per cent of customers during the restaurant’s two-week life, rising to about 40 per cent in the final days as word spread, according to Sensis general manager of brand and marketing communications Geraldine Davys.”

“With the use of printed directories declining worldwide, and Sensis’s paid online Yellow listings struggling to keep up with rival search services, the company decided five months ago to embark on a risky campaign to prove to advertisers that Yellow Pages is still an effective advertising medium. ‘The overall aim of the campaign was to prove the value of Yellow Pages to our advertisers,’ Ms Davys said. ‘What we were trying to do was promote to people: if you had to go and find a business, where would you naturally go and look?’ It’s a crucial time for the directories business. In February Telstra reported the first drop in revenue ever for Sensis, down 8 per cent to $950 million for the six months to December.”