In this episode, we sit down with Christine de Wendel—an entrepreneurial powerhouse with deep e-commerce roots and now leading the charge in hospitality payments. Christine shares how she helped build two “unicorn” European tech companies, then returned to the U.S. to launch sunday, a QR-code pay-at-table solution for restaurants and hospitality venues.
Sunday is designed to make paying at restaurants frictionless: guests scan a QR code on their table, view their bill, tip, split and pay—all within ~10 seconds.
It’s built for the hospitality world—from family-run restaurants to multi-site brands, across multiple countries. sunday
The company is POS-agnostic: it integrates with many different point-of-sale systems so that restaurants don’t have to overhaul everything just to adopt the tech.
Faster table turns: By reducing the time guests wait for the check, restaurants can turn more tables and increase potential revenue.
Improved guest experience: Guests don’t have to flag down a server or wait for the bill—tech handles it.
Increased tips (in certain markets): Sunday has seen high adoption of the payment flow and the technology resonates especially where tipping is standard.
Christine described how one of her co-founders (restaurant operator) put a QR code for payment on tables during the pandemic, connected it to the POS system, and realized this thing worked—waiters were freeing up time, guests were paying faster, the whole experience changed. That “lightbulb” moment is what led them to scale it into sunday.
Selling to restaurants: Even though the consumer experience is compelling, convincing restaurant operators to adopt new tech is harder than one might expect. The operations side often resists change.
Fragmented POS market: In the U.S. especially, there are many different POS systems. Sunday’s strategy is to integrate with many of them rather than require a full replacement.
Scaling fast: Christine shared how her previous experience in Europe scaling e-commerce helped prepare her for rapid growth at sunday. But even so, founding a startup is a “roller coaster”—emotionally and operationally.
International differences: Tipping culture, guest expectations, and restaurant norms vary a lot between Europe and North America—and Sunday adapts accordingly.
Christine’s vision is that in the near-future, one won’t even need to ask for the check—paying at restaurants will be as seamless as other digital experiences (like ride-hailing, mobile payments, etc.). Sunday aims to set that standard.
Vendor partnerships with strong leadership matter: The story behind a vendor (founders, background, vision) can signal how well they’ll support you or scale.
Staffing & training matter: As you evaluate new tools, remember that the human element—servers, training, process change—is as crucial as the tech.
Christine’s background transitioning from European e-commerce to hospitality tech in the U.S. gives a unique international / ops-oriented perspective.
Her strategy of “built by restaurateurs for restaurateurs” resonates especially for independent restaurant groups and alliance-type organizations (like yours).
Her emphasis on speed, simplicity, guest experience and operator economics aligns with some of your core operational values (e.g., service standards, table turns, consistent guest experience).
Check out sunday’s website and map the restaurants using it (you’ll see how it’s deployed).
If you’re a restaurant operator (or advising restaurants), ask: Could this reduce our table wait time for check? How would that affect our service model and team training?
On the vendor-alliance side: Think about how you evaluate payments or tech vendors—this conversation provides a good set of questions for vendor selection (integration, speed, ROI, team support).
