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Subscription Food and Beverage Websites on Shopify: The Essential Elements

For many food and beverage businesses, subscription services are a great way to improve their bottom line. In fact, some would say that the rise of food and beverage subscriptions is one of the most important trends in the food industry.

If you're thinking about starting an F&B subscription business, you'll need a Shopify website that's more than just functional—you'll need a site that will be the cornerstone of your marketing efforts.

Food and beverages are easy to sell as all you need is a good supply, effective marketing strategies, a nice catchy product description, and great images so that customers can get a feel of the physical appearance of the product. All of this should be housed in a fantastic Shopify website.

In this post, we’ll share the 6 essential elements for any food and beverage subscription website.

The Food and Beverage Subscription Market is on Fire

You see, the food and beverage subscription market is on fire right now. It's projected to grow by more than 30% in the next 5 years. There are a lot of people jumping on this trend, with over 1,500 subscription websites for food alone. If you add beverages and other items into the mix, that number jumps up to 4,000.

On top of that, it's an incredibly crowded space with many different types of subscriptions available:

  • Standard: The most common type of box where you get a curated selection based on your preferences or dietary needs (e.g., vegan)
  • Customized: A unique box created with yours/customers’ specific tastes in mind from start to finish (e.g., one-of-a-kind recipes)
  • Personalized: A bespoke experience where customers have complete control over what goes into their box every month (e.g., build your own meal kit)

Why Food and Beverage Subscriptions?

Food and beverage subscriptions are a growing industry. And, they’re here to stay. Food and beverage subscription boxes allow you to get your customers interested in trying new products without having to invest money into marketing or advertising, which can be a huge expense.

Why do people like food and beverage subscriptions? Because they give them the opportunity to try something new (or several things at once). It’s like going out for dinner with friends or family on a regular basis with no prep work required! The subscription box will come directly to their doorstep so there's nothing else that needs doing except opening up an email and seeing what's inside each month...and maybe sharing some of it with friends and family too.

The Importance of a Great Shopify Website for F&B Subscriptions

When looking for a place to order from, things like a restaurant's website can play a big part in deciding if you want to order from them or not. If the website is slow or hard to navigate, you may decide that it's just not worth the hassle.

You also want your customers to feel confident about ordering from your site. They should be able to use Google to find you and then easily be able to see the menu, ingredients, and even reviews of other customers. 

Of course, since everyone is on their phones now, your site needs to work on mobile devices as well as desktop computers. A great Shopify website can make all the difference in whether someone is willing to order from you or decide to go with someone else instead.

Why You Should Build Your F&B Subscription Website on Shopify

Grocery stores used to be the only place where you could buy food and beverages, but as e-commerce has become more popular, people want to do their shopping online. It's much easier for them to order online than it is to get in their cars and drive to a store.

The good news for business owners is that there are many ways to set up an online store with Shopify. It's a flexible platform that can adapt to your business needs.

In fact, if you have a subscription food and beverage business, you'll need a platform that lets you easily serve customers and manage inventory—Shopify is one of the best platforms in the world for that.

And if you have a fast-growing business, Shopify will help you adapt quickly. You'll need something that's secure and fast since customer demand will grow with your business.

With Shopify's robust platform, you can also customize your website with ease. From building landing pages that sell your product or service to creating a mobile-responsive layout for your site, Shopify makes it possible for you to focus on serving your customers instead of on technical details.

Plus, with Shopify Payments integrated into your checkout (and available in over 150 countries), you're also able to accept payments from almost every country in the world.

What Makes a Great F&B Website?

Here are the essential elements of a successful F&B subscription website:

  1. Good navigation. A user-friendly experience starts with clear, intuitive navigation that helps users find what they need quickly. Make sure to include search functionality and filters to let customers search by price, distance from their location, and other criteria that matter to them.
  2. Easy-to-understand pricing. If you’re going to charge for something, it needs to be easy for your customers to understand how much they will be paying in total based on the combination of products delivered over time—and when those payments will be due (monthly or annually).

If there are additional fees involved in using your site—other than delivery charges—make sure those are clearly outlined as well (e.g., membership fees).

  1. Customer reviews. New customers don’t know what your food tastes like and they may not trust you just yet. A few reviews from people you know or perhaps previous customers from your brick-and-mortar store could really help sell the food subscription.
  2. High-quality photos. Do you know how people say that a picture is worth 1k words? Well…it really is true when it comes down to deciding what meals/drinks look like so make sure you have plenty of photos available so customers can see exactly what they're getting before placing an order!

In addition, make sure these pics are high quality because low-resolution pics don't do anyone any favors — especially when customers are looking to try new things out!

  1. Customer service. While many people take advantage of online shopping because its convenient, there will always be questions about products that need clarification before making purchases.

Make sure customer service representatives are easily accessible via phone call or email. Include live chat support options as well and if you can, make them available 24 hours per day 7 days per week during business hours.

  1. Easily cancel and restart subscriptions. Don’t make it hard for your customers to end their subscriptions because there’s a good chance that they will come back at a later time if they really like your food. By making this process hard for them, you only ensure that you lose more customers in the future.

Final Thoughts on Food and Beverage Shopify Websites

These are the keys to success in this industry:

  • A great website.
  • This is the first thing customers will see. It needs to be clean, easy to navigate, and reflect your brand. The best websites have an intuitive design that makes it easy for users to find what they’re looking for and take action immediately. As soon as someone lands on your site, you want them to know exactly what you offer and how much it costs without having to do any heavy lifting themselves.

    If customers are going through too many hoops or feel frustrated while interacting with your company (especially during checkout), they're not going to come back again!

    That's why creating user-friendly interfaces that allow customers' purchases seamlessly through while also making them feel valued throughout their entire interaction (from the beginning until the end) is critical.

  • A great product.
  • Successful food and beverage subscription businesses need two key things: good food and a good website. Your food is the product, so if it's not good, no one will come back for more.

    As long as your recipes are tried-and-true, your ingredients high quality, and your cooking skills on point, you've got most of what you need. If the meal is bad or doesn't live up to expectations, there's nowhere else to place the blame; it all comes right back to you.

    Another unexpected benefit of having good food as your product is that it makes logical sense. If someone has a bad experience with your service, they can tell their friends about it without much effort (it's easy to write something on Facebook), but if they have a great experience with your service, they're likely to recommend it anyway (that's why people go out to eat in the first place).

    Conclusion

    In summary, Food and Beverage subscriptions are a growing industry that has the potential to go mainstream. For those of you who want to get into the game, it's vital to have a website that reflects your brand and helps customers easily navigate the subscription process if they decide to buy from you.

    Are you ready to start your own website? Want to give your Shopify store a facelift? We'd be happy to work with you! Please contact us at 713-805-5888, email us at [email protected], or leave us a message here.

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