How to Replace Foodhub With Direct Online Ordering
Can you replace Foodhub with direct ordering?
Yes. Plenty of UK and Irish restaurants have cut back on Foodhub, or dropped it altogether, by running their own branded ordering channel instead. You set up an ordering website or app under your own name, then spend your marketing money sending customers there instead of to the marketplace.
None of that is complicated. The setup is the easy bit. The slow bit is getting regulars to change where they tap "order".
Why restaurants move away from Foodhub
Foodhub takes commission on every order. If you're doing £10,000 a month through the platform, the commission line on your statement is a real number, and what it buys you is customer acquisition you don't control.
The bigger problem is who owns the customer. When someone orders through Foodhub, Foodhub gets their name, email, phone number and order history. You get the order. If you want to send that person a midweek offer or tell them about a new menu, you can't, because you never had their details in the first place.
Run your own ordering channel and that flips. You get the customer data. You decide when to contact people and what to say. You keep the margin that was going to commission.
There's a smaller point too. On a marketplace, your restaurant sits in a list next to every other takeaway within a few miles. A customer who searched for "pizza" might pick you tonight and someone else on Friday. On your own site, there's no list. It's just your menu.
What you need to set up direct ordering
You need three things in place.
- A branded ordering website or app. This is where customers place orders. It should look like your restaurant, take card payments, and send orders straight to the kitchen.
- Something to receive and manage those orders. That can be your current POS if it connects to the ordering system, or a new one that does.
- A way to tell customers the channel exists. Email, social media, packaging, signage in the shop - wherever your customers already look.
Most restaurants get the first two sorted quickly and then neglect the third. Don't.
Step 1: Choose an online ordering platform
A few companies sell branded ordering websites and apps to restaurants in the UK and Ireland.
Flipdish is the one we'd point you to first. You get a branded ordering website, a mobile app with your restaurant's name and logo on it, and a POS system that takes both online and in-person orders. Orders from the website and app show up on the same kitchen screen as counter orders, so staff aren't watching two or three devices and retyping tickets.
Slerp, StoreKit and OrderYOYO are other options. They all do online ordering. None of them covers as much of the day-to-day running of a restaurant as Flipdish, which handles ordering, POS, payments, delivery and marketing in one system.
When you compare platforms, ask a few blunt questions:
- What's the monthly fee, and is there a per-order charge on top?
- Do orders go into my POS automatically, or does someone have to key them in?
- Can customers order from an app with my branding, or only from a website?
- Who owns the customer data if I leave?
- How long does onboarding take, and who builds the menu?
The answer to the data question matters more than people expect. If you're leaving Foodhub partly to own your customer list, make sure the new platform doesn't put you back in the same position.
Step 2: Migrate your menu
Your menu has to be rebuilt on the new platform. Usually this happens during onboarding, and the platform's team will help or do it for you.
Treat it as a chance to clean things up. Menus that have lived on a marketplace for a few years tend to collect odd items, duplicate options and descriptions nobody's read since 2021. Cut the dishes that rarely sell. Check that prices are current. Write descriptions that tell people what's actually in the dish. Get decent photos of your best sellers if you don't have them already.
This matters more on your own channel than on Foodhub. On Foodhub, the customer has already decided to order something tonight and is just picking where from. On your own site, they might have scanned a QR code on a bag out of curiosity. A clear menu with good photos gets them to checkout. A messy one loses them.
Some practical things to look at:
- Modifiers and add-ons. Make sure extras like cheese, sauces and drink upgrades are set up as options, not separate menu items.
- Meal deals. If you run them on Foodhub, rebuild them on the new menu so regulars find what they're used to.
- Opening hours and delivery zones. Get these right before launch. Nothing annoys a customer faster than placing an order and getting a cancellation because the kitchen's closed.
- Allergen information. Put it where people can find it.
Step 3: Set up payments
The ordering platform handles payments. With Flipdish, card payments go through its integrated payments system and the money comes to you, instead of a marketplace collecting it and paying you out later minus commission.
Check how payouts work before you go live: how often you're paid, what the card processing fee is, and whether refunds come out of the next payout or get charged separately.
Look at the checkout on your own phone. Most orders come from mobile, so if the checkout is fiddly on a small screen, you'll lose orders. Your restaurant's name should be clear on the payment page. People are more careful about entering card details on a site they don't recognise, and a checkout that looks like it belongs to someone else will put some of them off. Apple Pay and Google Pay help a lot here because the customer doesn't have to type anything.
Step 4: Start small and redirect gradually
You don't have to close your Foodhub account on day one. Most restaurants shouldn't.
Run both channels side by side. Then nudge customers towards ordering direct with a small incentive, such as free delivery on their first direct order or a discount code printed on a flyer in the bag. Every Foodhub order that goes out the door is a chance to tell that customer there's a cheaper way to order from you next time.
Keep the incentive simple. "10% off when you order direct" on a sticker is easier to understand than a points scheme with tiers.
Watch the numbers each week. How many orders came direct? How many came through Foodhub? Is the direct share growing? Once direct ordering is running smoothly and you're comfortable with the volume, you can decide whether to scale back on Foodhub or leave it completely. Some restaurants keep a marketplace listing purely as a way for new customers to find them, then try to move those customers to direct after the first order. That's a reasonable approach if you can make it work.
Step 5: Market your own channel
This is the step that decides whether any of this works. It's also where most restaurants put in the least effort.
A website nobody knows about takes no orders. Customers who've ordered from you on Foodhub for two years won't switch unless you keep telling them, repeatedly, in places they'll see.
- Print your ordering URL or a QR code on packaging, bags, receipts and menus
- Put a sticker on every Foodhub order telling the customer they can order direct
- Post about it on Instagram and Facebook, more than once
- Collect email addresses and send a launch message with an offer
- Put a sign in the shop window and at the counter
- Run a small Google or social ad campaign aimed at people within your delivery area
Repetition is the point. One Instagram post won't move anyone. A sticker on every bag for three months will.
Flipdish's AI marketing tools automate re-engagement campaigns. The system picks out customers who haven't ordered in a while and sends them a targeted offer without anyone on your team having to build a list or write an email. For a restaurant where the owner is also on the pass on a Friday night, that saves real hours.
What about delivery?
If Foodhub currently supplies your delivery drivers, you'll need another way to get food to customers. You can hire your own drivers, use a third-party courier, or use a delivery management system that does the dispatching. Flipdish has integrated delivery management, including dispatch to third-party drivers, inside the same platform as your orders.
If you already deliver with your own drivers, this part is mostly done. You just need the orders to reach them in a sensible way, with addresses and contact numbers, and ideally with tracking so customers can see where their food is.
Doing your own delivery gives you more control. It also means the blame lands on you. A late, cold delivery through Foodhub reflects partly on Foodhub. A late, cold delivery through your own channel reflects only on you. That's a risk, but it's also a chance to do it properly: keep the delivery radius tight enough that food arrives hot, give realistic time estimates, and let customers know when there's a delay.
How long does it take?
Most restaurants can get a working direct ordering channel live within two to four weeks of signing up with a platform like Flipdish. The technical side is quick.
Changing customer habits takes longer, and it needs steady marketing over several months. Expect direct orders to build slowly. Restaurants that keep promoting their direct channel tend to see a clear shift within three to six months. Restaurants that launch the website and then forget about it tend to see very little.
A rough order to do things in:
- Pick a platform and sign up.
- Build and check the menu.
- Set up payments and test a few orders yourself, end to end.
- Sort out delivery if Foodhub was handling it.
- Launch quietly to regulars first, so you can fix problems before the bigger push.
- Start the packaging, social and email marketing.
- Review direct versus Foodhub order numbers every week.
- Decide what to do about Foodhub once direct orders are steady.
The financial case
Take a restaurant doing £8,000 a month through Foodhub at a 13% commission rate. That's £1,040 a month to the platform.
Move half of those orders to direct and you save about £520 a month, or £6,240 a year, before the cost of the direct ordering platform. For most restaurants, the platform costs a lot less than the commission they save.
Move more than half and the saving goes up with it. At 75% direct, the same restaurant would keep around £780 a month that used to go to commission.
The numbers aren't the whole picture. You'll pay card processing fees on direct orders, and if Foodhub was providing drivers, delivery will cost you something. Put all of that against the commission you're currently paying. Also count what you get that doesn't show up on a monthly statement: a customer list you own and can contact whenever you want.
Getting started with Flipdish
Flipdish gives you the ordering website, app, POS and marketing tools to build a direct ordering channel that can replace Foodhub. Restaurants across the UK and Ireland use it, from single independent takeaways to groups with multiple sites.
