If your takeaway is already on Just Eat, Deliveroo and Uber Eats, you might reasonably ask why you'd bother with a website. You're already online, the orders are coming in, the platforms handle delivery, the payment is sorted. Why pay £199 for a site nobody is going to read?

Here's the honest answer: because the aggregators take 30% of every order — and your own website takes 0%. And because customers who Google your name first (which most do, even when they end up ordering on Just Eat) form a judgement about your shop in three seconds based on what comes up. Right now, for most takeaways, what comes up is either nothing or a half-finished Wix page from 2019. That's the bit your site fixes.

The 30% problem.

On a £20 order, the aggregator keeps £6 before you've even paid for chicken. Over a year of 4,000 orders, that's £24,000 of margin gone — for a service that, fundamentally, is putting you in a search results page and letting people tap an order button.

Your own website can do the same job for the customers who already know you exist, with one important difference: the £24,000 stays in your till. You still take payment (via Stripe, Square or even old-fashioned card-on-collection), you still take orders (via WhatsApp, a simple form, or an embedded order system like ChowNow). The website is the cheapest staff member you'll ever hire.

The second-click problem.

Most takeaway customers don't go straight to the app. They Google "[your name] [your area]" first — to check menu, prices, hours, sometimes just to see if you're the place their cousin mentioned.

That first click is your Google Business Profile (the map panel on the right of the search results). The second click is your website.

If the website is missing — or worse, it's a single-page Wix site with broken images and last month's hours — that's where the customer decides whether you look like a trustworthy place to spend £20 of their Friday night.

What a good takeaway website actually does.

It isn't a brochure. It's six things, on the phone, in under three seconds each:

  • The menu. With prices. Not a PDF. Not a photo of a laminated menu. Actual text on a page, so Google can read it and customers can search it.
  • The hours. Today's hours, prominently. With logic that handles bank holidays, Eid and Ramadan.
  • The address. One tap opens Google Maps with directions to your door.
  • The phone number. One tap rings you.
  • The order link. Whether that's WhatsApp, Just Eat, a form, or your own click-and-collect.
  • Reviews. Pulled live from Google, so they're verifiable.

That's it. There's no "About Us" hero video. No mood-board carousel of food photography. Just the six things a hungry person needs in three seconds.

"Most takeaway websites we replace had everything except the menu on the homepage. That's the single most expensive mistake in this sector."

The Google Maps connection.

The other reason a takeaway needs a website: your Google Business Profile asks for one. Google's ranking algorithm gives weight to profiles that have a working, fast, mobile-friendly site attached. No site, or a slow Wix site, drags your "near me" ranking down measurably.

This is why the Launch Bundle (website + Google Business Profile + social pack for £299) tends to be the right move for a takeaway. The three pieces multiply each other.

"But Just Eat already has my menu."

Yes — locked inside Just Eat's app, invisible to Google search, and presented in their format with their branding around it. The same menu on your own site can rank in Google for "[your dish] near me", win the search before Just Eat does, and route the customer to your own till.

So, do you need one?

If you're doing fewer than 20 orders a week, probably not yet — focus on the Google Business Profile first. If you're doing 100+ a week, the £24,000-per-year question above answers itself. The £199 spend pays for itself in the first month of saved aggregator fees on the orders you redirect to your own ordering.

If you'd like that website, we build them for London takeaways in a week. Send us a sentence and we'll come back the same day.