Skip to content
Sidedoor

Getting started

This guide takes you end to end: from signing in to a published, bookable venue that’s live in the Sidedoor app. If you’re brand new, work through it in order - each step builds on the last. You can always come back and refine your settings later.

Before you begin

Section titled “Before you begin”

You’ll get the most out of this if you have to hand:

  • Your venue’s address, contact details and (if relevant) company registration and VAT numbers.
  • A logo and any brand colours you’d like the widgets and emails to use.
  • Access to your Stripe details, so you can connect an account for payouts.

Set up your venue

Section titled “Set up your venue”

  1. Sign in.

    Sidedoor is passwordless by default. Go to the login page and request a magic link - you’ll get a one-tap sign-in email. Once you’re in, you land on the operator-wide Dashboard in the client portal ↗. If your account has a password set, you can use that instead.

  2. Create your venue.

    Open Venues from the main menu and choose + Add Venue. Fill in the name, type and address, plus any optional details. When you submit, the venue is created as a draft so you can finish setting it up before anyone can book it. (Publishing it live, and the Sidedoor app listing, come later in step 8.) See Managing your venues for every field.

  3. Configure availability.

    Open the venue, then go to Settings → Availability. Set your booking windows (how far ahead guests can book and the cut-off before a slot), define your time periods and add any blackout dates. Then build your shifts (recurring service windows) and access rules (the per-slot table-reservation and guest-list rules guests actually book against).

  4. Set your tables and floorplan.

    Under Settings → Tables, enable table bookings, set your default duration and party sizes, create your seating areas, then lay out your room in the Floorplan editor. This is what powers the live reservations grid.

  5. Set policies and deposits.

    Under Settings → Policies, write your default booking policies and create your payment policies. Each payment policy takes a payment one of two ways: Hold (place a hold on the guest’s card for the minimum spend, released or captured at the door) or Capture (charge the guest’s card for the minimum spend at checkout). It also carries your refund and cancellation rules. To run a rule with no deposit, simply don’t attach a payment policy to it. If you want to take deposits per cover, set up price lists under Tables and link them to your access rules. See Deposits & card holds for the full model.

  6. Add your branding.

    Under Settings → Marketing → Branding, upload your logo and pick a colour preset (or set a custom accent, background and text colour) and a font. This branding is inherited by your embeddable widgets and your branded voucher and confirmation emails.

  7. Connect Stripe for payouts.

    Payouts are set up at the operator level. From the main menu, open Settings → Payments and start Stripe Connect onboarding. You’ll be taken to Stripe’s hosted flow to provide your business and bank details. Until this is connected and enabled, you can’t take live payments or capture deposits. See Operator settings.

  8. Publish and go live.

    When you’re ready, set the venue’s status to live (Settings → Venue Details → Publishing). Going live automatically submits your venue for a Sidedoor app listing - there’s no separate “Request” step. Sidedoor reviews the listing; while it’s pending you can still take bookings through your own site widgets. If a listing was previously withdrawn or turned down, you can re-request it from the same Venue Details → Publishing panel. See the publishing flow.

What to do next

Section titled “What to do next”

Once you’re live, spend some time with: