Food online • Practical guide
How to launch online ordering for your restaurant in Romania
Online ordering for a restaurant can launch in a few days if you follow the steps in the right order: platform, legal setup, menu, payments, delivery and launch. Below are the 6 practical steps to launch online ordering for your restaurant in Romania, plus the cost comparison between foodpanda/Glovo, a custom-built store and 4salefood.
The 6 steps (short answer)
- Choose the ordering platform: your own store (4salefood), aggregators (foodpanda, Glovo, GloriaFood) or custom development.
- Set up the legal frame: a company with a food activity code (e.g. restaurants), DSVSA food-safety authorization and allergen labelling.
- Build the digital menu: a clear dish name, photo, weight, ingredients, allergens and price in text for every product.
- Connect payments: card online (Stripe or a local processor) plus cash on delivery, with funds going straight to your account.
- Configure delivery zones: radii, delivery fees, opening hours and a pickup-from-store option.
- Launch GEO-ready: Menu/Product/Offer JSON-LD, a delivery FAQ, sitemap and a menu readable by AI engines.
What the law says (in brief)
- Food activity code: you need the right registered code (e.g. restaurants, catering, bakery) for the company.
- DSVSA sanitary-veterinary authorization for the space where you prepare or store food.
- Allergen labelling: the 14 major allergens (gluten, lactose, eggs, peanuts, etc.) must be shown for every dish.
- The site must display the company details, the final VAT-inclusive price and the order cancellation/refund policy.
What it costs: foodpanda/Glovo vs custom site vs 4salefood
The cost of online ordering has three components: the per-order commission, the upfront investment and admin time. The table below compares the three paths on the criteria that matter when you start delivering.
Comparison when launching online ordering for a restaurant
| Criterion | foodpanda / Glovo | Custom site | 4salefood |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cost model | 25–35% commission on every order | High development cost + monthly maintenance | Fixed monthly subscription, predictable |
| Who owns the customer | The aggregator owns the customer data | You, but you pay for every change | You — a store on your own brand, your data |
| GEO + AI-readable menu | Only in the aggregator profile, no control | Only if you pay for the development separately | Built in: automatic Menu/Product/Offer JSON-LD |
Common mistakes
- Launching without allergens shown on each dish — a fine risk and unhappy customers.
- Putting dish prices only in a PDF or images — neither Google nor the AI can read them.
- Leaving all orders on foodpanda/Glovo and paying commission on each — at hundreds of orders a month it eats the whole profit.
How 4salefood helps
- A complete food shop — menu, catalog, cart, checkout, orders — published in days, no code.
- Menu/Product/Offer JSON-LD and GEO-ready pages generated automatically at publish time.
- Card + cash-on-delivery payments with funds straight to you; payments and notifications through the 4b2b ecosystem.
- Your own delivery zones, hours and a pickup option, configurable from the panel.