How local restaurants are thriving with online ordering

What the numbers show

Over the last 12 months, kitchens with fewer than 15 seats saw the strongest online growth. Not because they cook better than the large ones: because they decide faster. Changing a menu, dropping a dish, opening an hour earlier, that is a conversation in a small house and a meeting in a big one.

The counter does not disappear

None of the kitchens we follow replaced their room with delivery. What happened is more interesting: delivery filled the quiet hours. The room lives from 12:30 to 2 and from 7 to 9. Online orders arrive at 11:30, at 3, at 10pm.

Three decisions the successful ones keep making

1. A shorter online menu. On average 60 per cent of the room's. The dishes removed are the ones that arrive badly, not the ones that sell badly.
2. A signature dish that is always available. A returning customer orders the same thing; running out of that one costs more than running out of 5 others.
3. Packaging chosen before price. A spilled sauce cancels that sale and the next one.

What did not work

This deserves saying too. Kitchens that doubled their online menu to "offer more choice" watched their preparation times climb and their cancellations with them. Choice is a cost, and the kitchen pays it during service.