Should your café have an app, or just a web page? An honest answer

We build brand apps, so you would expect us to say every café needs one. Most do not. An app is the right answer for a specific kind of business, and a web page is the right answer for the rest. Here is how to tell which you are.

When a web page wins

If what customers need from you is information, such as opening hours, the menu, the location and a phone number, a good web page does it with no download and no updates. Nobody installs an app to find out when you close.

When an app can win

When there is a moment that repeats, at the counter, for the same people. A stamp to collect. Points to earn. A code to scan. An order to prepare. Something that is faster or better because the customer has your app in their hand rather than your website in a browser. That is the loyalty case, and it is the one GERG was built for.

The home screen test

Picture your most regular customer. Would they keep your app on their home screen, next to the ones they use daily? If the honest answer is yes, because it holds their stamps and their usual order, build it. If they would open it once and forget it, build the web page.

Start with the thing that replaces paper

The best first version of a café app replaces something physical: the paper stamp card, the printed menu, the loyalty card in the wallet. It does one job the paper did, and does it without being lost. Everything else, from tiers to order-ahead, comes after regulars have adopted the first thing.

What it costs you if you get it wrong

An app nobody uses is worse than no app: money spent, staff trained for nothing, and a listing on the App Store with two reviews. A web page nobody needed is a small, quiet waste. Err toward the web page unless the counter test is clearly passed.

If you pass the test

Talk to us. We will tell you if we think you should not build one, too.