How to set up recurring meal plans

A meal plan is a subscription. The customer signs up once, and the site creates and charges an order for them every week or every month. Fewer decisions for the customer, predictable volume for the kitchen.

Turning it on

Meal Plans is listed under Active Features or Disabled Features on the Features page, and we turn it on per site. The renewal day, the time of day and the other site-wide plan rules are set up for your site with you.

The three plan types

  • Credits plan. The customer prepays for a number of credits each renewal and spends them on whatever they like from the menu. Best when your menu changes every week and customers want choice.
  • Products plan. The site fills the order for the customer from the menu, guided by their meal preferences, and the customer can adjust it before it finalizes. Best for "just send me five lunches" customers. On a plan that fills orders for the customer, the plan page shows how many meals on the current menu match the selected meal preferences, so you can check there is enough to choose from.
  • Package plan. A fixed bundle at a set price, such as a 10-meal starter pack, delivered each renewal.

Repeat orders and order subscriptions

Not every regular wants a plan. Some customers find the meals that work for them and simply want them again. Two tools make that easy, and they work on their own or together:

  • Repeat this order: on any past order, one click puts the same meals back in the cart for the current menu. The customer can tweak it and check out.
  • Subscribe to this order: the customer picks a delivery day and clicks Start subscription, and the same order comes every week without another click.

They shine when you have a base set of meals on every menu (see Always On Menu in How to create new meals). Fitness-focused kitchens use them a lot: an athlete builds a custom meal with the exact macros they want, and then gets it on repeat, with a click or as a weekly subscription. See Repeat orders.

Repeat orders come with the Repeat Order toggle on the Features page. Subscribe To Orders is listed under Active Features or Disabled Features there, and we turn it on per site.

Interval

The Interval Type is weekly or monthly, and the length is how many of those between renewals. Every week, every two weeks, every month.

Creating a plan

  1. Go to Plans & Packages > Meal Plans and create a new plan with a name. Click Add & Edit.
  2. Set the Plan Type and the Interval.
  3. Set the price: the Plan Price for a products or package plan, or the number of credits and the price per credit for a credits plan.
  4. Under Plan Items, set what a renewal includes: the Meal Quantity, the Meal Categories it draws from, Meal Options, and whether Deliveries are included.
  5. Tick Pay On Order if the customer should pay when each order finalizes rather than at renewal. Link a Discount or Fees if the plan carries them.
  6. Tick Visible and Active, and click Update.

The plan appears on your plans signup page. Plan Subscribers on the plan page lists everyone on it.

Managing a customer's plan

Pause, skip, renew early, cancel, or make it complimentary from the customer's Edit Plan page. See How to cancel a customer meal plan subscription.

Keywords: auto renew, membership, prepaid plan, meal subscription

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