But even hip restaurants need to pay the bills, and that means early and late seatings for the non-A-list crowd. Michael Ridard, partner at Bâoli, a fashionable Miami Beach restaurant, said someone who wanted to eat at his restaurant should aim for 7 p.m. and forget trying to get a 9:30 p.m. reservation, when the restaurant will be filled with A-listers and a D.J. spinning music.

Jason Apfelbaum, whose Manhattan restaurant Sushi Roxx just opened, said he planned to have two reservation times, but guests would be seated in different areas within the restaurant. While he said the average affluent person had no chance of getting one of the 14 seats at the center of the restaurant, which will feature a Tokyo-style cabaret, there are 58 additional seats in the main room and 53 more in a lounge (in other words, the less cool area).

Abraham Merchant, president and chief executive of Merchants Hospitality, said he typically held a private room at his restaurant Philippe in Manhattan for celebrity clients but would open it up to diners who commit to ordering an expensive wine or spending well on the meal.

“Sometimes, people will order a bottle of Château Lafite ahead of time — you’ll get the room then,” he said. “If they’re going to spend $10,000, we’ll give them the room.”

This may seem to be over the top just for the privilege of spending a lot of money on dinner. But Herb Karlitz, who runs Karlitz & Company, a marketing firm geared toward the food industry, said diners frustrated by this process should get to know the person who can wave them in. It’s rarely the one answering the phone and offering the 5:30 p.m. reservation.

“If it sounds like a young kid who’s just a robot, ask to speak to the general manager and be honest and say, ‘Here’s my situation,’ ” Mr. Karlitz said. “That probably works a third of the time, which isn’t the greatest odds, but it’s a third better than you had before.”