Online ordering for dark kitchens

The difficult part of a delivery-only kitchen is not a missing dining room. It is that every order is a bag with a time on it, and the only room the customer sees is the page. If that page is a marketplace, the marketplace keeps the customer. If the page is yours, the next order can come back without a commission.

One plan at £39 a month per location, ex VAT: ordering website, your own branded app (Android & iOS), EPOS till, kitchen screen, SMS and email marketing (GDPR compliant) and loyalty rewards. 0% commission ever, no setup fee, free migration and one month free.

One menu, one door

Chefzi is one ordering page per location. The dishes are the ones you cook under that name. Sizes and sides are choices with prices, so the pass is not reading a comment. When a tray finishes, mark the dish sold out. There is no switch to hide a whole category for the night. Deleting a category removes the dishes in it, so that is for a heading you are dropping.

A second brand, with a different menu and a different name, is a second location and a second monthly fee. Chefzi does not put several brands through one checkout. That keeps the ticket honest: the bag is for one menu, and the driver is not guessing which sticker belongs on it.

There is no dining room to set up. You do not have to turn on table booking. Collection can stay on for riders and for customers who know the unit door, or it can stay off. Say which door, and the name on the buzzer, in the address line. A pin on a map is not a door code.

Zones are the streets you already drive

Draw the area you can reach while the food is still the food you meant to send. A ring that crosses a river or a dual carriageway is a cold bag. Each area has a fee, a minimum and a time, shown before the customer pays. The closer streets can be a smaller fee. The far side should cost more, or ask for a larger basket.

You can turn delivery off and leave collection on, or pause ordering when the pass is behind. Closing time is the cut-off. There is no extra cut-off before that. Chefzi does not supply a courier and does not force a town-wide zone. If you already pay a courier firm, that contract stays yours. The zone fee is the one you set. This page does not publish a recommended pound amount.

Marketplace orders stay on that marketplace. A direct order is the one that used your link. Do not put your link on a marketplace bag.

The pass

Orders arrive in the Chefzi app, on a phone or tablet you already have (Android now; the iOS app is included when it launches). It rings until someone accepts with a prep time or rejects with a reason. Sit it where the packer is standing, on charge, with the volume left up. A phone in a pocket is a bad substitute during service, because the pocket leaves the building.

If the tablet drops offline, the dashboard shows a warning. Ordering stays open until you pause it. A missed connection is not a closed kitchen.

Price

Chefzi is £39 a month per location billed annually (£49 if billed monthly) with everything included. Prices exclude VAT. There is no setup fee and no commission on a direct order. The same fee applies whether the evening is one brand or a long list of the same menu. See pricing, delivery zones and the order app. Registering a delivery-only kitchen is covered in how to start a takeaway. Allergen information for distance selling is in allergen information for online orders. The Welsh display rule is in food hygiene ratings.

Chefzi is for food businesses in the UK. It is not a marketplace or a courier network. It does include a free built-in browser till (Chefzi POS), in beta, at no extra cost.