# Websites for restaurants

> Restaurant websites that drive direct bookings: multilingual menus, aggregated reviews, real food photography. studio jem's work in hospitality.

Page: https://www.studiojem.it/en/sectors/restaurants/

Bookings owned by commission-charging portals, menus that change faster than the website, an international clientele to serve in several languages.

A restaurant doesn't need a brochure site. It needs direct bookings, a
menu that's never out of date, and an online presence that matches the
dining room. We know Sardinian hospitality first-hand: a gourmet
restaurant in Olbia, a wine business across three venues between Olbia
and Porto Cervo, a platform that runs a venue's entire flow. Here's what
we built, and why.

## The problem

Bookings flow through portals that take a commission and own the customer
relationship: the venue pays to talk to guests it already won over at the
table. The paper menu changes every season; the online one runs months
behind. Guests — in Sardinia more than anywhere — speak four languages,
but the website speaks one. Reviews sit scattered across Google, TheFork
and Tripadvisor. And no-shows stay a silent cost: tables confirmed by
phone, never honoured, never tracked.

## What actually works

A multilingual digital menu the kitchen updates on its own, without
calling anyone. Booking on a direct channel — phone or WhatsApp — with no
middlemen and no commission. Real photography of the dishes, not stock
images. Reviews pulled together in one place, where customers actually
look for them. And when the business grows — more venues, takeaway,
delivery — tools that keep customer data with the venue, not with a
third-party platform.

## How we built it

For [La Sartoria del Gusto](/en/work/la-sartoria-del-gusto/), a gourmet
restaurant in Olbia, we built an editorial site with dish photography as
the main narrative material: an interactive multilingual menu the kitchen
manages on its own, a wine list with recommended pairings, Google,
TheFork and Tripadvisor reviews aggregated into a single section, and
direct booking via WhatsApp. Today direct bookings sit alongside the
portals, commission-free.

With [hoopit](/en/work/hoopit-app/) we went beyond the website: an
operating system for restaurants and hospitality. Eight modules activated
on demand — QR menus, bookings running 24/7 with automatic confirmations
that cut no-shows by 80%, zero-commission takeaway, WhatsApp automation,
a proprietary CRM. One principle throughout: customer data belongs to the
venue, forever.

[In Vino Veritas](/en/work/in-vino-veritas/) is the most layered case: a
wine shop, wine & cocktail bar and à la carte restaurant across three
venues in Olbia, Porto Rotondo and Porto Cervo. Over 650 labels to make
readable, tastings, and delivery for Costa Smeralda villas and yachts. We
turned it into a multi-location editorial story: each venue has its own
page and its own imagery, and the services — labels, tastings, delivery —
read as chapters of one story, not service pages.

Three different projects, one thread: [websites](/en/services/websites/)
that bring bookings back in-house and, when there's a whole venue to run,
[applications](/en/services/app-development/) that cut the commissions
and hand the data back to the people working the floor.

If you run a restaurant and every booking still comes through a portal, the
right time to change is before the season, not during it. Tell us about your
venue with the [online quote](/en/quote/): fill it in during the quiet week,
not in August.

## FAQ

### Can we update the menu ourselves when the season changes?

Yes — that's the starting point. The digital menu is managed by the kitchen, in several languages, without going through us for every new dish. That's how La Sartoria del Gusto in Olbia works, for example.

### How do we get portal commissions off our bookings?

By moving the booking to a direct channel: phone, WhatsApp or your own booking system. Portals stay useful as a shop window, but the customer relationship — and the margin — return to the venue.

### Do we really need the menu in several languages?

In Sardinia, yes. The clientele is international, and a menu that only reads in Italian makes the floor staff work harder and sells the dishes worse. A multilingual digital menu keeps every version in sync without reprinting anything.

### We have several venues — do we need a website for each one?

No. You need a structure that gives each venue its own space inside a single site. For In Vino Veritas we held three venues together across Olbia, Porto Rotondo and Porto Cervo without flattening them into a list of addresses.

### How much does a restaurant website cost?

It depends on what you need: multilingual menu, bookings, multiple venues, takeaway. The online quote asks them one by one and ends with a figure.