UKHospitality expects roughly six venues a day to close in 2026, with rising business rates doing much of the damage. In a year like that, margin is not one number on a spreadsheet. It is the whole game. Which makes it strange how casually venues hand it away.
What the platforms actually cost
Industry figures put delivery platform commissions between 14 and 30 percent of every order. Booking aggregators take their slice too, in fees or in forced discounts. Pay it on a quiet Tuesday and it stings. Pay it on every order, every week, all year, and it is often the difference between a venue that works and one that joins the closure statistics.
Platforms are marketing. Treat them like it.
This is not a rant about deleting your delivery apps. The platforms are genuinely good at one thing: being found by people who have never heard of you. Industry research says delivery apps now drive much of the first time trial for food brands. Fine. Let them do that job. The mistake is letting the channel that introduces a customer also own that customer forever.
The shift: make direct the easy path
- A website that takes the booking or the order, fast, on a phone, in fewer taps than the app. If direct is harder than the platform, people use the platform.
- Point everything at it. Google Business Profile, Instagram bio, the QR code on the table, the flyer in the delivery bag.
- Capture something. An email address with the first direct order means next month's promotion costs you nothing per cover.
- Give a reason. A direct only dish, a better price, first pick of event tickets. You can fund it out of the commission you are no longer paying.
The maths that matters
You do not need a single new customer for this to pay. Move a modest share of your existing orders and bookings from commission channels to your own site and the margin on every one of those covers comes home. Same kitchen, same staff, same food. Different bank balance.
We say this as operators, not just designers
We are partners in bars, a nightclub and a restaurant, so we pay these commissions too. That is exactly why the websites we build for hospitality are designed as the cheapest till in the building, not as a brochure. We wrote about what makes a restaurant website take bookings if you want the practical checklist.
If too much of your revenue arrives with a commission attached, see how we build hospitality websites or tell us what you are making.