Craving better tools? The top alternatives to Owner.com

With nearly 76% of customers enjoying the experience of eating at home and 75% prioritizing convenience, it's clear that digital ordering is not just a trend—it's becoming the norm. The online food delivery industry is projected to reach over 2.6 billion users by 2026, driven by factors like the ability to watch TV or movies while eating (50%) and not having to cook (49%).

As digital ordering becomes increasingly vital, platforms like Owner.com have become a go-to for many restaurant owners. With a solid suite of automated marketing tools and features designed to simplify operations, it's easy to see why it's gained so much popularity.

That said, market-leading review sites indicate that many restaurant owners have found that Owner.com doesn't always meet their expectations regarding integration, customization, and fees. 

For example, one review shared, "Integration was a bit hectic, and we did some of the work ourselves." At the same time, another mentioned the need for more customization, especially with the loyalty program. Additionally, with a $500 per month subscription cost, a 5% per order fee, and a $1,000 implementation cost, the platform’s pricing often fails to justify the value it delivers—especially when alternatives like Restolabs provide a robust, high-quality solution at a far more competitive price while genuinely prioritizing the interests of restaurant owners.

Because of these challenges, many restaurants are now seeking alternatives that offer better flexibility, easier integrations, and lower fees, all without sacrificing the core tools needed to grow and scale. If any of this sounds familiar, you're not alone. 

Let's look at some of the top Owner.com alternatives, helping restaurants like yours overcome these obstacles and find a better fit. 

But before diving into the alternatives, it's essential to understand the key features your new system should offer to ensure it truly supports your restaurant's growth and success.

Must-Have Online Ordering and Marketing System Features

Online food ordering has become a game-changer for both customers and restaurant owners. It's all about convenience—customers no longer need to search for a place to eat, stand in long lines, or struggle with phone orders. Instead, they can browse menus, choose what they want, and have a delicious meal delivered to their doorstep.

But it's not just about making the process easy. An excellent online ordering system goes beyond convenience to create a smooth, efficient experience for everyone involved. For customers, it's about quickly selecting items, entering payment details, and placing orders. For restaurant owners, it means managing orders, tracking inventory, and keeping everything organized in one place.

Now, let's take a closer look at the must-have features of an online ordering and marketing system that can make all the difference for your business. Below are the key features you should look for to ensure your system meets your needs and your customers' expectations.

You need a unified system that does ordering and marketing to ensure seamless operations and results from your marketing campaigns. 

Top 5 Owner.com Alternatives for Restaurants

Owner.com alternatives like Restolabs are becoming preferred for ambitious restaurant groups and premium establishments. Combining sophisticated ordering capabilities with powerful marketing tools helps restaurants create a seamless experience that keeps customers returning. 

1. Restolabs

‍Restolabs is an online ordering platform that transforms how restaurants manage digital operations. With a setup time under a week, you can quickly launch your online ordering system and start accepting orders. Serving over 2,000 restaurants in 10+ countries, Restolabs provides efficient delivery management and cutting-edge customer engagement tools to help businesses grow faster and wiser.

What makes Restolabs stand out is its versatility, catering to single-location restaurants, multi-unit chains, and ghost kitchen operations. The platform simplifies workflows with features like intelligent order throttling and inventory management, ensuring smooth operations during peak times. It speeds up the checkout process with a no-sign-up option, reducing order time by 50%, and automates tasks such as order-taking, kitchen communication, and payment processing.

This reduces staff dependency and boosts operational efficiency. Restolabs also allows for easy scaling with multi-location management tools, and it offers an omnichannel ordering experience, enabling customers to place orders from your website, mobile app, social media, or QR codes.

This increases sales and helps drive up the average order value. Furthermore, the platform maintains your restaurant's branding with custom-branded URLs across all digital touchpoints.

‍Pros: 

• Gain complete oversight and optimization of delivery processes for improved efficiency.
• Enjoy a risk-free 30-day trial to explore the platform's features and benefits.
• Uses a wide range of tools to foster stronger customer relationships and loyalty.
• Offers a variety of secure payment methods to meet customer preferences and streamline transactions.
• Enable convenient ordering via social media and QR codes, making it easier for customers to order on the go.
• Allows customers to schedule orders in advance, helping to manage peak times and improve service efficiency.
• Seamlessly manage catering orders up to three months ahead, boosting revenue and supporting long-term profitability.
• Uses sophisticated business throttling tools to manage high-traffic periods, ensuring smooth and efficient order processing.

Cons

• The marketing and loyalty program features are evolving, with more enhancements expected soon

‍Pricing: A 30-day free trial is available

2. ChowNow

ChowNow is an online food ordering marketplace platform that allows customers to place orders directly with restaurants and food trucks through their website or mobile app. Customers can choose to order ahead or place real-time pickup and delivery orders.

The platform also offers a white-label system, enabling restaurants to personalize the ordering experience with their branding and logo. Additionally, ChowNow's loyalty program is still in its early stages to reward repeat customers and features an "Order Ahead" option, allowing orders to be placed up to 24 hours in advance.

Customers can quickly pay online and track their orders, while restaurants receive instant notifications and manage orders in real-time. ChowNow also provides restaurants with tools to optimize their takeout and delivery operations, including analytics, reporting, and marketing features.

‍Pros: ‍

• Enables customers to place orders directly from social media platforms other than Facebook and Instagram, enhancing convenience.
• Includes marketing features to help retain regular customers and attract new ones.
• Offers various delivery solutions, allowing you to choose what works best for your restaurant.

Cons: 

• It can be an expensive choice for small and medium sized restaurants, especially considering its limited features compared to competitors.
• The 8-mile delivery limit restricts restaurant reach, with anything beyond that falling on the restaurant to handle.
• Automated email marketing only sends 3 emails per month, and using a coupon from the first one halts the rest, limiting engagement.
• No direct integration with key POS systems, requiring third-party platforms and complicating data sync.
• Lacks Facebook and Instagram ordering integrations, missing out on social commerce opportunities.
• Subscription cancellations aren’t straightforward; users must contact support via email.

‍Pricing‍

3. Toast

Toast is an all-in-one solution to streamline online ordering and in-house operations. It integrates your POS system with online ordering, managing dine-in, takeout, and delivery orders from a single platform, minimizing errors and improving efficiency.

Toast offers tools for promotions, discounts, and loyalty programs to boost customer engagement. The easy-to-use interface allows customers to place orders while staff can manage and track them in real time.

Detailed reporting tools provide valuable insights into sales, menu performance, and customer preferences, helping drive growth.

‍Pros: 

• Combines in-house and online ordering, simplifying back-end operations and reducing the complexity of managing multiple systems.
• The platform includes integrated payment processing, ensuring smooth transactions and reducing the hassle of managing multiple payment providers.
• Users can easily customize menus and update items in real-time, allowing quick adjustments based on inventory or seasonal offerings.
• Beyond ordering, Toast provides tools for employee scheduling, payroll, and employee management, helping you run all aspects of your restaurant from one platform.
• Toast is an excellent option for small to large multi-location businesses seeking an all-in-one restaurant management solution. However, its POS hardware costs and monthly fees can make it pricey

Cons:

• Since Toast is a pure POS platform, online ordering is not their primary focus as it is offered as merely a complementary product and its online ecosystem is not built around online ordering softwares.
• Customers have reported experiencing frequent glitches during online orders. This has not only impacted a restaurant's business, but also customer experience.
• Orders placed by customers sometimes do not get reflected into the restaurant's system, leading to poor customer service and repeat order loss.
• Poor customer service is a constant grievance shared by users, especially around Toast's convoluted billing practices and not issuing timely refunds.
• Due to improper billing, some customers have been overcharged, with no active support from the platform to resolve the issue. 

While Toast is an ideal choice for a POS platform, however, its online ordering features have fallen short of customer expectations, for which there are better alternatives that focus purely on delivering good online ordering services.

‍Pricing: Toast offers several pricing tiers tailored to different business needs. Businesses may also face additional fees for payment processing, add-ons, and hardware. A direct consultation is often necessary to determine the final cost based on specific needs.

The starting price for Toast’s digital ordering platform is priced at $75 per month. The online ordering solution and pricing does not include loyalty, gift cards, email marketing, catering & events and exclusive website. These are available as add ons and when included, restaurants may add another $300 to the monthly bill. 

4. PopMenu

Popmenu is a cloud-based restaurant management platform designed to streamline operations and boost efficiency. It offers a powerful menu management system, enabling restaurants to create, update, and organize menus easily. Popmenu enhances customer engagement with interactive menus, including online ordering and real-time diner reviews, helping increase sales and visibility.

The platform's marketing tools enable targeted campaigns, including text messaging, to drive repeat business. Additionally, Popmenu optimizes front-of-house operations with features like waitlisting and support for delivery and curbside pickup.

Pros: 

• Features menus with photos and reviews to engage customers and drive conversions.
• Their text marketing helps engage customers and personalize services
• Brands can customize website to fit their branding needs

Cons: 

• Popmenu's ordering process is clunky, requiring multiple clicks and this can hurt Google's rankings.
• Offers cookie-cutter template and dated UI/UX
• Pushes restaurants into long contracts with costly buyout options if the restaurant  feels the platform isn't a good fit.
• Lacks a built-in loyalty program, missing the chance to drive repeat business and increase customer retention.

‍Pricing: Popmenu doesn't offer a free trial.

5. Doordash Storefront

DoorDash Storefront is an online ordering tool designed for restaurants. It enables them to accept orders directly through their website. It provides an easy-to-use page builder and order processing system, allowing restaurants to manage orders without incurring commission fees or monthly charges.

For restaurants already using DoorDash's marketplace, Storefront offers an additional way to capture orders. However, it does not allow businesses to differentiate their direct-order and marketplace menus.

DoorDash Storefront allows restaurants to access and download their customer data, enabling them to use third-party email platforms for customer marketing outreach.While DoorDash Storefront offers essential features like customer analytics, multiple payment options, and Google integration, it lacks marketing and loyalty features that would enable businesses to manage customer engagement and repeat business directly.

Doordash Storefront is ideal for fast-casual restaurants, neighborhood spots, and ghost kitchens that want to streamline online orders without a complex setup.

‍Pros: 

• The registration process on DoorDash is simple and quick. Restaurants can set up their profiles and begin receiving orders quickly.
• Features like sponsored listings, promotional discounts, and featured spots in the app can increase visibility and attract more customers.

DoorDash's strong brand recognition can enhance credibility, especially for smaller or newer restaurants.

‍Cons: 

• Restaurants can’t use the storefront independently and are tied to DoorDash’s 15-30% commission fees indirectly. On top of that, they face a 2.9% credit card fee, 30 cents per order
• While Storefront itself is commission-free, DoorDash actively promotes its Marketplace to customers. Since restaurants are also required to list on the Marketplace, customers may opt for commission-based orders instead of ordering directly through Storefront, as both options appear to be part of the same platform for
• Lack of delivery partner flexibility, as restaurants are locked into DoorDash’s drivers and pricing.

‍Pricing: Commission-based pricing.

Why Restolabs is a Game-Changer for Your Restaurant?Restolabs provides a branded online ordering platform that streamlines operations and strengthens your restaurant's brand, whether you have 3 or 10 locations. 

With seamless integration capabilities with all major POS systems and loyalty programs, Restolabs ensures that your loyalty program works seamlessly with your online ordering platform.Used by over 2,000 restaurants in more than ten countries, Restolabs is trusted for its commission-free model, enabling restaurants to increase more profits and revenue.

Try our 30-day free trial to experience how Restolabs can optimize your operations and boost profitability. Sign up for a demo and transform your restaurant's online ordering experience.