Loyalty programme for restaurants
Digital Loyalty Cards for Restaurants
Filling tables on a Tuesday night is hard. TapStamp gives your diners a reason to come back. Customers tap their phone on the NFC pod when they pay, collect a stamp, and work towards a reward. You get data on who visits and the tools to bring them back.
Why paper loyalty cards don't work for restaurants
Sound familiar? These are the problems TapStamp solves.
Once-a-month diners drift before the reward
A genuine regular comes once or twice a month. Asking them to return nine more times for a free main is nearly a year of loyalty before they see anything back. Most will not wait.
Empty midweek tables
Weekends fill themselves but Tuesday to Thursday is a struggle. You need a way to drive footfall on the nights that actually need it.
Chain loyalty apps set the expectation
PizzaExpress Club hit 2 million members. Nando's Chillies is a cultural institution. Your diners already expect a digital loyalty programme. Without one, an independent looks behind the times.
Paper vouchers get shared and abused
Printed vouchers and discount codes end up on social media and voucher sites. People who have never visited your restaurant use them. You have no control over who redeems.
How TapStamp works for restaurants
Three steps. No complicated setup. Go live the same day.
Customer taps the NFC pod
After they dine in or order takeaway, the customer holds their phone to the NFC pod. One tap, done.
Stamp collected instantly
A digital stamp is added to their card in the TapStamp app. They can see their progress towards the reward at any time.
Reward unlocked
Free starter at stamp 2, free dessert at stamp 5, free main at stamp 9. The customer redeems their reward in-app and keeps collecting towards the next one.
Why restaurants choose TapStamp
Built for real businesses on real high streets. Here is what you get.
- Multi-reward card with early wins so once-a-month diners always have something in reach
- Capture December party bookings and bring them back in January
- Lapsed-customer push notifications to fill quiet Tuesday-to-Thursday tables
- Birthday rewards that drive a booking you would not have had
- Prompt happy diners to leave a Google Review
- NFC stamps that cannot be shared or faked like paper vouchers
Loyalty programme economics for restaurants
Spend per head at a UK casual dining restaurant typically sits between £18 and £30, with a full bill including drinks landing in the £20 to £35 range per head. Most diners are paying for two to four covers on one card, so the actual transaction at the till is often £40 to £120. Fine dining and central London push higher, frequently £40 to £80 per head and above.
Visit frequency is the harder number. Lumina Intelligence tracks the average UK adult eating out two to four times a month, but that's spread across multiple brands. A genuine regular at any single restaurant is more typically once or twice a month, and a meaningful chunk of your database will be once-a-quarter diners or one-visit-and-gone bookings.
That trial tail is the problem a single end-state reward fails to solve. Telling a once-a-month customer to come back nine more times for a free main is asking for nearly a year of loyalty before they see anything back. They won't wait. The fix most casual dining chains have landed on is a tiered or multi-reward structure that gives something back early.
Run the maths against your own covers. A 60-cover restaurant doing 80 covers a day at a £25 spend per head turns over roughly £730,000 a year. Every 1 per cent of additional repeat visit revenue is worth £7,300. A 5 per cent lift from regulars who would otherwise have drifted is worth £36,500.
Common reward structures for UK restaurants
Multi-reward card with early wins (we recommend this for most independents)
Set a small reward at stamp 2 (free dough balls, side, or starter to share), a mid-tier at stamp 5 (free dessert per cover or a percentage off the bill), and the headline at stamp 9 or 10 (free main course or two courses on the house). The card carries on after each early redemption rather than resetting, so the customer is always close to the next thing. This is the same logic chains like PizzaExpress Club (Bronze, Silver, Gold) and Nando's Chillies (Green, Orange, Red) use to hit millions of members. The multi-reward card delivers that mechanic without needing chain-scale infrastructure to run it.
Spend-triggered single stamp per visit
One stamp per visit at a minimum spend of £10 to £15 per head (in line with PizzaExpress Club's £10 minimum). Ensures stamps reflect proper sit-down meals rather than a quick coffee or a side order, and keeps the economics of the reward sustainable.
Birthday reward bolted on top
A free dessert, glass of fizz, or starter on the customer's birthday, sent automatically. Cheap to give, high emotional weight, and a reliable driver of a booking that would otherwise have gone elsewhere.
Capture in December, redeem in January
Christmas party season (mid-November to mid-December) is the single biggest revenue month for most casual dining restaurants, and January is the quietest month. Use the busy month to onboard every party booking onto the loyalty card, then send a broadcast push notification in early January to the customers who tapped in during December but haven't been back. A targeted lapsed-customer message turns the slowest weeks of the year into a recovery window.
Everything you need to run a loyalty programme
NFC stamps, analytics, push notifications, and more. All included.
NFC Tap to Stamp
Customers tap their phone on your NFC pod. One tap, one stamp. No fuss.
Digital Stamp Cards
Multi-reward loyalty cards with your branding. Set rewards at multiple stamp positions so customers always have something within reach.
QR Code Fallback
A backup option when NFC is not available.
Business Analytics
See stamp activity, customer visits, redemption rates, and more at a glance.
Push Notifications
Send targeted messages directly to your customers' phones.
Birthday Rewards
Automatically send rewards on your customers' birthdays.
Why NFC beats paper cards and QR codes
TapStamp uses NFC tap-to-stamp technology. Here is how it compares.
NFC Tap
- Sub-second stamp
- No camera or scanning needed
- Tamper-proof and encrypted
- Works offline
- Feels premium
Paper Cards
- Lost, damaged, forgotten
- Easy to fake stamps
- No customer data
- Printing costs add up
- Looks outdated
QR Codes
- Requires camera and scanning
- Slower than NFC
- Can be screenshotted and shared
- Needs good lighting
- Feels transactional
Frequently asked questions
Common questions about loyalty cards for restaurants.
The most natural moment is when the bill folder comes out and the card machine is already in the customer's hand. The server brings the pod to the table alongside the card terminal, takes the payment, and offers the tap. The pod stays under staff control the whole time, so you decide who gets stamped and when. This avoids the awkwardness of asking guests to find a pod by the door on their way out.
Yes, by default the cardholder paying the bill gets the stamp. Most restaurants live with this because the cardholder is usually the host who books the table and is the one you most want to retain anyway. If you want to recognise everyone at the table, your server can manually award additional stamps to other guests at the till before they leave. It's a judgement call between attribution accuracy and speed of service.
You set the rewards once in the dashboard. Choose what sits at stamp 2, stamp 5, and stamp 9, and that structure applies to every customer's card automatically. When a customer hits stamp 2 and redeems the dessert, their card carries on accruing towards the stamp 5 reward without resetting. The card only resets when the final headline reward is redeemed. This is what makes it work for once-a-month diners: they're always close to something.
In England and Wales it's allowed under your premises licence, with Challenge 25 applied as normal. In Scotland the Licensing (Scotland) Act 2005 prohibits offering alcohol as a reward or prize unless it's in a sealed container and consumed off the premises, so a free bottle to take home is permitted but a complimentary glass of wine at the table is not. If you operate in Scotland or across both jurisdictions, take licensing advice and consider a non-alcoholic equivalent (a free dessert, a coffee round) as the on-premises reward.
The lapsed-customer push notification is the lever. Set a threshold in the dashboard (for example 21 or 30 days) and send a broadcast that only goes to customers who haven't tapped in for that long. Pair it with a Tuesday-to-Thursday incentive (a free starter on midweek bookings, a bonus stamp on Wednesdays) and you're targeting the people most worth winning back without spamming the regulars who are already coming on Saturdays.
Starter is £20/month, Growth is £35/month, and Scale is £50/month. All plans include a 30-day free trial and the setup fee includes your NFC pod.
Yes, customers use the free TapStamp app on iOS or Android. Signing up takes under 30 seconds with Google, Apple, or a phone number.
Ready to launch loyalty for your restaurants?
Start your 30-day free trial today. Set up takes minutes, not days.
