Frequently asked questions

Answers on the KitchenWebStudio offer: what is included, revisions, articles, the AI Engine, hosting, domains, moving your current site and billing.

The offer

What does KitchenWebStudio actually build for a kitchen operation?

A fully managed, custom-coded website built for how a ghost kitchen, commissary, catering operation or multi-brand group actually runs: fast pages, brand and location pages structured for how you operate, a delivery-platform links hub, and inquiry forms built around stations, dates and covers rather than dining-room ambience. We are not a food safety consultant, a health inspector or a licensing authority. We build and manage the website, nothing more.

How long until my site is live?

7 days on The Line, 10 days on The Pass while the AI Engine is trained on your brands and menus, and 15 days on Head Chef once the Content Engine's first articles are queued. The clock starts at your onboarding call, not at purchase, so the sooner the onboarding form is in, the sooner the site is live.

Getting started

What happens right after I buy?

You fill in the onboarding form, which asks for your brands, your menus, your delivery platform links, your facility details and where inquiries should land. It takes about 15 minutes. If something is missing, submit anyway: you can send the rest by email or raise it in your client portal, and it will not hold up the build. We then run one onboarding call to fill any gaps and agree the launch date.

What is the client portal, and when do I get access?

It is your account with us, and you get it the day your site goes live. From the portal you request revisions, raise a support ticket for anything that needs attention, send us files you still owe us like updated menus or photos, and message our team directly. Everything to do with your site runs through it, so nothing gets lost between shifts. You never log in to the website itself; we handle that side.

Revisions and the client portal

What counts as a revision, and what happens after five?

A revision is any change request you send, and there is no limit on how much goes into one. A new brand page, an updated menu, a changed delivery link, a different photo: each is one revision. So is something much larger. "Build pages for our two new virtual brands, here is the menu copy and photos for both" is one revision, not four. 5 are included every month. After the fifth, each additional revision is a flat $20, with no cap on how many you can buy and no hourly billing anywhere. Every revision is completed within 2 to 5 working days of you sending it, whatever the size.

How do I actually request a change?

Raise it in your client portal. You describe the change, attach anything we need like an updated menu or a new delivery link, and it lands with the team as a tracked request so you can see where it stands. You can also email us or reply to any thread with our team, and we log it for you. Unused revisions do not roll over to the next month.

Can we update delivery platform links ourselves without waiting on a revision?

No, and that is deliberate: every delivery link change goes through the portal so we can confirm it points at the right brand and the right platform before it goes live, rather than risking a broken link during service. Because it is a standard revision, it is still turned around inside your plan's normal window, not treated as a special request.

Articles

How many articles get published, and how long are they?

2 researched articles a week on The Line and The Pass, and 3 a week on Head Chef, each one 2,500 to 3,200 words. They are written for people actually searching around your kind of operation, virtual brand models, commissary tenancy, catering logistics, not filler generated to hit a word count.

Do the researched articles need review before they publish?

No, they publish on the standing weekly schedule without you drafting or approving each one first, since most kitchen operators do not have spare time between prep and service for a review cycle. If an article needs a change after it is live, whether that is a correction or a different angle, that is a standard revision through your portal.

Will an article ever give food safety or allergen advice?

No. Articles are researched and written around topics like operations, delivery logistics and the business side of running a kitchen, never food safety, allergen or licensing guidance. We are not a food safety consultant or a licensing authority, and every claim in an article either has a real cited source or does not appear at all.

The AI Engine

What does the AI Engine actually do for a kitchen?

On The Pass and Head Chef, the AI Engine picks up incoming inquiries the moment they arrive, whether that is a catering request, a commissary tour request, or a general question about one of your brands, and responds immediately. It can answer questions about menus, delivery areas and availability, hold a conversation with a prospect, and book a facility tour directly onto your calendar, all without someone on your team stopping mid-shift to reply.

Can the AI Engine tell a customer about allergens?

No. It never gives food safety, allergen or nutrition advice under any circumstance. The moment a conversation touches any of that, it hands the customer to a person on your team rather than guessing at an answer. We build and manage the website and its automation; we are not a food safety consultant, and the AI Engine is built to respect that boundary every time.

Does the AI Engine work across all our brands at once?

Yes. It is trained on every brand, menu and facility detail you provide at onboarding, so it can answer a question about any of your virtual brands or units without you configuring a separate assistant for each one. When you add a new brand, its menu and details are added to what the AI Engine already knows as part of that revision.

Hosting and management

Is hosting an extra cost?

No. Hosting is included in the monthly fee and never billed separately. Your site runs on Cloudflare's global network with SSL, CDN, DDoS protection and unmetered bandwidth included. There is no hosting invoice, no SSL renewal, no bandwidth overage and no surprise line item in month four.

What happens if the site goes down during a rush?

Hosting and security monitoring are handled as part of your plan, so if something needs attention, it is caught and worked on by the team that built the site, not a ticket queue at a separate hosting company. You raise it in your client portal or by email and it is treated as a priority, since we know downtime during service hours costs you real orders.

Domains

Do I have to pay for a domain?

No. One domain is included free for as long as your plan is active, registered in your name through Cloudflare Registrar or Spaceship, so you own it outright. If you already have a domain we point it at the new site instead and nothing changes for people who know your current address. If you ever leave, tell us where to send the domain and we transfer it at no charge.

Can each brand have its own domain, or do they share one?

Every brand lives on its own page under your one included domain by default, which keeps things simple and lets each brand still get indexed on its own merit. If a specific brand needs its own separate domain for a reason particular to your operation, that is something we can scope during onboarding rather than something included automatically.

Moving from your current site

We are moving off a marketplace-only page, what happens to our current links?

We rebuild your presence on a site you actually own, then point your existing delivery platform links and any social bio links at the correct new pages for each brand, so a customer who already has your Instagram or a saved delivery link does not hit a dead end. Old marketplace-only listings do not need to be torn down; the new site simply becomes the hub everything else points back to.

Can you migrate our existing menu and brand pages?

Yes. Send us what exists today, whether that is menu PDFs, photos, or pages on a current site or page builder, and we rebuild it into the new structure during onboarding rather than starting from a blank page. Anything outdated, like a discontinued item or an old price, gets flagged to you rather than carried forward automatically.

Billing and cancellation

What do I actually pay, and when?

You pay the monthly fee for the tier you choose up front: $117, $247 plus AI usage, or $597 a month. The $647 one-time build fee is invoiced only after your site is live and you are satisfied with it. Domain and hosting are inside the monthly figure.

How do I cancel, and how much notice do you need?

Email us and say you want to cancel. Your message must reach us at least 2 business days before your next invoice date, during business hours, which are 9:00 to 17:00 Central Time, Monday to Friday. A message sent outside those hours counts from the start of the next business day, so a weekend email does not give 2 business days of notice for an invoice due Monday or Tuesday. With valid notice, no further invoice is raised and your site runs to the end of the month you have paid for. With late notice, the next invoice is charged as normal and the cancellation takes effect at the end of that month.

Do you offer refunds?

No. All sales are final, and that includes monthly fees, the build fee, extra revisions and any cost we pass through at what our providers charge us. We do not refund for a change of mind or for a month you did not use. The one exception is a duplicate or incorrect charge made by our billing: tell us within 30 days and we correct it within 10 working days. The build fee is charged only after you have approved your site, which is exactly why it is not refundable afterwards.