Picture two guests. One has ordered from you twice a month for a year. The other tried you once and disappeared. Which of them knows you value their return? In most restaurants, neither, because the first is treated like any stranger. A loyalty programme exists to fix exactly this: to make a regular feel that coming back counts.
Start with one question: what should the guest do?
Before you pick any numbers, choose a single goal. Do you want one more order a month? A bigger basket? Orders on your quiet days? Each goal leads to a different design. If you want more frequent orders, you need a reward the guest reaches quickly. If you want bigger baskets, tie the reward to the size of the bill.
A worked example you can adapt
Say your average order is 200 (in whatever currency you use). Let every 10 spent earn one point, so a guest gets about 20 points per order. Then decide that every 100 points is worth 20 off the next order.
Work out what that means: the guest needs roughly five orders to earn 20 off, which is about 10% of one order's value across five orders. Most restaurants can carry that margin. But if a guest gets a quarter of the bill off after only two orders, you are paying a price your kitchen cannot afford. Test the numbers on a real receipt before you announce anything.
Rules that keep it understandable
- Make the rule fit in one sentence: “Every 10 spent earns a point, every 100 points takes 20 off.”
- Tie points to completed orders, so a cancelled order never earns anything.
- Make redemption direct at checkout, not a code that gets sent and forgotten.
- Make the first reward close, because a guest who feels far away never starts.
- Show the guest their balance after each order, since a programme nobody sees does not get used.
Mistakes that kill a programme
- A big reward that sits far away: a free meal after 30 orders is forgotten before it arrives.
- Complicated rules: double points on certain days, minimum spends, and a list of exceptions make guests ignore all of it.
- A discount that eats the margin: if profit per order is already thin, make the reward an extra item rather than money off the bill.
- Not telling your staff: if a guest calls about their points and the employee has no idea, you have lost their trust.
- Changing the rules every month: guests who collected points under one rule will not accept a sudden change.
How this looks in Ordavya
In Ordavya you set the points rules yourself, points are earned on completed orders, and guests redeem them in the cart. But a tool alone does not create loyalty. What does is a rule that is simple, rewarding, and known to your guests. Start with one rule, watch it for two months, then adjust.