Built by operators,
for operators.
Every quiet shift costs you more than you think. Halfseat fills those covers last-minute, quietly, on your terms.
You list tonight’s last seats to diners who actually want to be in your room. The deal is always half off the food bill, and you set the conditions: which menu it applies to, a two-drink minimum, which nights, which party sizes. You keep 100% of drinks margin and earn £3 to £8 cash on every booking fee, on top of what they spend at your table.
Brighton and Hove opens in January. We are signing 30 founding venues first. Founding venues keep 100% of the booking fee for their first 90 days, not just our share of it, and are first on the app when the area switches on. Lewes and the rest of Sussex follow, then Bristol and Bath.
An empty seat charges you twice.
You bought the food and rostered the staff before anyone walked in. A table that stays empty doesn't just earn nothing, it burns money you have already spent.
Of food binned per venue, every year. Over-prepping for covers that never show is the single biggest cause.
Of revenue goes on labour, and it is fixed before service. A half-empty Tuesday carries a full Saturday's wage bill.
Loss on every empty cover. The food and the staff are already paid for. An unsold seat recovers none of it.
The slowest nights, every week. Off-peak, up to half the room sits empty while weekends are full.
Sources: WRAP (UK food-waste authority), PwC UK Hospitality 2024, industry trading-day data. Sector benchmarks, not venue-specific.
How it works
You release tables
You set the terms. Half off the food bill is the deal, every time. What you control is everything around it: which sessions go on Halfseat, how many covers, which sittings, which party sizes, and a house rule shown to the diner word for word before they book, like a two-drink minimum or which menu it applies to. Nothing goes live you haven't approved.
Diners claim them
Diners pay a booking fee of £5 to £14, by party size. They give their name at your door, no voucher, no app. You seat them as any other guest and honour whichever deal you set.
You get paid
Diner pays full price on drinks and half the food bill at the table, on your terms. On top of that you get £3 to £8 cash on every booking fee, by party size, paid straight to your bank.
The maths
| Party | Diner pays | You keep | Halfseat |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 to 2 | £5 | £3 | £2 |
| 3 to 4 | £8 | £4 | £4 |
| 5 to 6 (you opt in) | £14 | £8 | £6 |
One fee per table, never per head, and the same whether you pay us anything or not. If the diner doesn’t turn up, you keep your share anyway, which is more than a no-show pays you today.
Contribution after food cost, on a seat that was going to stay empty. Two tickets, because a £60 cover and a £24 cover are different businesses. Both assume a 30% food cost and the common half-off-the-food deal.
| One table of two | £60 cover £40 food, £20 drinks | £24 cover £14 food, £10 drinks |
|---|---|---|
| Food, after a half-off deal | £20.00 | £7.00 |
| Drinks, full price | £20.00 | £10.00 |
| Your cut of the booking fee (per table, not per head) | £3.00 | £3.00 |
| Food cost you still carry (30% of the full plate) | −£12.00 | −£4.20 |
| Contribution | £31.00 | £15.80 |
| If the seat stays empty | £0.00 | £0.00 |
The comparison that matters is the empty seat, not another platform. For the record: FirstTable, EatClub and TheFork route £0 of the booking fee to you. Change the deal and these numbers change with it, which is the point of setting your own. And a note worth having before your floor team hears it: after the booking fee, a diner on a £24 cover saves nearer a quarter than a half, so the lower your ticket, the less this reads as a discount to them.
From the venues
Our founding venues, from the operator group behind Halfseat (Coal & Co). We ran it in our own rooms before opening it up. Independent venues next.
"These aren't discount diners. They're curious ones. They pay to hold the table before they've even walked in."
Dan · Ash & Honey
"It fills the room on slow nights without touching what makes the room worth coming to."
Natalie · Need Coffee Bar & Kitchen
"Genuinely the easiest decision we made this year. The seats were going empty regardless."
Ruby · The Bull on the Green
"The hotel dining room on a Wednesday used to be our quietest cost. Now it covers itself."
Charlie · The Castle Inn Hotel
Common questions
Won't this attract bargain-hunters and cheapen the experience?+
The model is designed to prevent that. Halfseat is curated, we don't list every venue, and we never run discount-led advertising, because that is exactly what brings bargain-hunters. The booking fee, £5 to £14 by party size, is non-refundable, so a diner has paid to hold your table before they arrive. The seat was going empty anyway. This fills it with someone who chose your room.
Do I have to offer it every night?+
No. You release tables when it suits you, quiet Tuesdays, slow Januaries, a private cancellation that came in at 2pm. If you're full, don't list. There's no contract, no minimum, no penalty for nights you don't participate.
How does the diner deal work at the table?+
The diner gets 50% off the food bill and pays full price on drinks: you halve the food total at the end. The discount itself is fixed, but the conditions are yours. Set a house rule and we show it to the diner word for word before they book, so “two drinks per head minimum” or “a la carte only, not the tasting menu” is agreed before they arrive. You also choose the nights, the sittings and the party sizes. The booking code in your portal links their name to the booking: no app, no voucher, no friction for your floor team.
When do I get paid?+
£3 to £8 per booking by party size, and Halfseat Pro never buys a better rate. Paid to your bank automatically through Stripe Connect once your account is verified. Not set up on Stripe? We BACS you monthly.
We curate the rooms,
not chase the discount-hunters.
Halfseat isn’t open to every venue. We list rooms people actually want to be in, whatever the format: the natural-wine bistro and the tasting-menu destination, but equally the ocakbaşı everyone queues for, the taqueria, the pub doing a serious Sunday roast, the pizza place with the good dough, the hotel dining room nobody thinks to book. We care whether the food is worth eating, not what the cuisine is called. That means your seat is filled by someone who’d be proud to tell their friends where they ate, not by a coupon-clipper.