Venue type · Wine bars

Wine bar and small-plates restaurant bookings that leave the counter to the door

A glass and three plates takes an hour and a quarter, not two. Half the room arrives straight from work without a booking, the best seats are the stools at the counter, and the last table leaves long after the kitchen has wiped down.

Tell me when it opens

Tastings can be booked through Slotora, free or paid for when booking, once your Stripe account is connected.

The shape of a wine bar evening

Between half past five and seven the room fills with twos and threes who decided on the way out of the office. From about eight the booked tables arrive — still mostly twos and fours, rarely more than six, and here for small plates rather than three courses. Visits are shorter than in a restaurant and more of them fit into a night, which makes a table held empty for a late booking an expensive gap.

Many wine bars keep the counter and a few high tables unbookable on purpose. Those seats are what make somebody walk in on a whim, and a room that is fully booked online is a room that turns that person away.

Setting the room up for it

Draw the counter as the counter
The bar with its stools is drawn on the floor plan to scale, as part of the room. It is décor to the booking page, so no booking is ever placed on it — the stools stay for whoever walks in.
Give twos and fours their real length
Turn times are set by party size: an hour and a quarter for two, an hour and three quarters for four. The booking page offers the table again when it will genuinely be free.
Keep the evening open late
A service can run past midnight, and seat walk-ins right up to closing, while its last online booking stays at the time you choose.
Hold tables for the after-work rush
Keep a few tables back from online booking until the time you set — then they return to the booking page if the rush did not come.

At the door, and the morning after

One tap for the walk-in

Two people at quarter to seven: tap two, and they are on the best free table that the half-past-eight booking does not need.

A wait you can say out loud

Full? The waiting list quotes a wait from the tables actually finishing — and at six, when the door is three deep, people scan the QR by the entrance and add themselves. They wait with a glass; one tap seats them when a table comes free.

What the night really was

The reports show how much of the night walked in, how often tables turned, and how many parties you had to send away, with the reason recorded for each.

Tastings and producer dinners

A Thursday tasting or a winemaker dinner can go on your booking page as an event: its date and time, how many places, how long it lasts, and the questions you want answered when someone books — dietary needs, who is driving. Each guest gets a ticket with a code, and the door list is at the host stand. A free event costs the guest nothing; a paid one takes the money when the guest books, through your own Stripe account once it is connected. The event does not take the room off the booking page on its own: close the room for that evening as well, so nobody books a table for two into the middle of twenty people tasting.

Wine bar questions

Can the counter seats be booked if we want them to be?

The counter is drawn as part of the room and is not a bookable table. If you want a few of those places bookable, draw them as small tables beside the counter, with their seat count.

Can bookings stop at nine while we stay open?

Yes. The last time offered online is set per service, and walk-ins can be seated until the time you set, up to closing.

Can Slotora take the orders and the bill?

Yes. Waiters send each round from the table, and the bill is split by dish, by seat or into equal shares.

For the next after-work rush

We e-mail you once, when Slotora for restaurants opens in the UK or Ireland.