HOW ONLINE SHOPPING WORKS
Shop. Order. Book. All in one marketplace.
Online Shopping connects customers with independent businesses that can serve them — whether that means ordering products, getting food delivered, collecting locally, receiving an order by post or booking an appointment.
FOR CUSTOMERS
Find what you need and order online
Set your location, discover businesses and products available to you, choose how you want to receive your order where options are available, and complete your purchase through the marketplace.
Set your location
Your location helps the marketplace show businesses and products that can serve your area.
Discover & browse
Browse independent businesses, categories, products, food and services without needing to already know the business name.
Shop, order or book
Buy products, place food orders or use a configured booking system for appointment-based services.
Choose fulfilment
Depending on the business, choose local collection, local delivery or postage.
Pay online
Complete marketplace orders through the online checkout, with card payments processed using Stripe.
Follow your order
Order status and fulfilment are managed through the platform and the individual business.
FOR SELLERS
Your business. Your products. Your customers.
Businesses selling physical products must offer customers at least one fulfilment method: local collection, local delivery or postage. You can offer one method or a combination that suits the way your business operates.
What happens when somebody buys from you?
When a purchase is made, the seller receives an instant text message and email notification. You then log into your merchant dashboard, accept the order — or use auto-accept where configured — and process it ready for collection, delivery or dispatch.
SIMPLE PRICING
No sale. No fee.
We believe pricing should be simple and straightforward.
No sign-up fee. No monthly fee. No transaction fees or other nasty surprises.
We charge just 8% per sale, which includes everything we provide through Online Shopping. If you don't make a sale, you don't pay us anything.
Simple payments. Weekly payouts.
When a customer places an order, the payment is processed through Stripe and split automatically, so our 8% commission is handled without you having to calculate or pay us separately. Your seller balance is then paid out every Friday.
RESTAURANTS & TAKEAWAYS
Online ordering for food businesses too
Restaurants and takeaways with their own drivers can use Online Shopping to receive customer orders while continuing to handle their own deliveries. Food businesses can use the restaurant ordering system and tablet to receive incoming orders, accept them or use auto-accept where configured, process the order and prepare it for collection or delivery.
APPOINTMENTS & BOOKINGS
Not every transaction needs a shopping basket
Online Shopping can also be configured with booking systems for appointment-based businesses. This can be ideal for hairdressers, barbers, nail technicians, beauty businesses and other services where customers need to choose a service and book a time.
GETTING DISCOVERED
Customers don't always search for your business by name
Someone may not know the name of a particular butcher, florist or gift shop. They may search for things such as butchers near me, flower delivery, gifts from independent businesses or a product in their local area. That is why we're building discovery around locations, postcode areas, shopping categories and search intent as well as individual stores.
More routes into your business
Alongside the marketplace, we're developing location and category search pages and product discovery infrastructure. Eligible products can also have another route into Google's shopping ecosystem through Google Merchant, helping create more opportunities for customers to discover what independent businesses sell.
DON'T SELL OR TAKE BOOKINGS?
We can still help through City Local
Not every business needs an online shop. If you're a plumber, builder, electrician, cleaner, professional service or another business where customers mainly need to find and contact you, our sister platform City Local may be a better fit.
Online Shopping: Shop. Order. Book. City Local: Find. Discover. Contact.
READY TO GET STARTED?
Sign up free
No sign-up fee. No monthly fee. No transaction fees or other nasty surprises. We charge 8% per sale, which includes everything. No sale, no fee. Seller payouts are made every Friday.
Got a question first? Contact Us →