As someone who’s set up countless WordPress sites for local businesses, I’ve seen firsthand how managing restaurant reservations can be a real headache. Clunky booking systems are more common than a well-done steak.
However, Five Star Restaurant Reservations promises to streamline WordPress-powered restaurants’ reservation process.
So, I decided to roll up my sleeves and determine if it delivers. I’ll share my hands-on experience, break down its features, and give you the scoop on whether it’s worth your time and money. Ready to see if this plugin can take the stress out of managing bookings? Let’s dig in!
Meet Five Star Restaurant Reservations
As the name suggests, the Five Star Restaurant Reservations plugin promises to simplify restaurant online bookings. This plugin is designed with versatility in mind, catering to the needs of both intimate cafes and sprawling multi-location establishments.
At its core, Five Star Restaurant Reservations is about giving you more control over your booking process. For restaurants looking to upgrade their reservation system, this plugin presents an intriguing option that’s worth exploring.
The developers also claim to focus on creating a user-friendly interface, aiming for an accessible experience for restaurant staff and customers. Let’s break down some of the features that caught my eye:
- Customized Reservation Form: Create a booking form that aligns with your restaurant’s branding.
- Gutenberg Integration: Easily add the reservation form to any page using Gutenberg blocks or shortcodes.
- Specific Restaurant Schedule: Set your own available times and dates for reservations.
- Email & SMS Notifications: Keep everyone in the loop with automatic notifications about reservation statuses.
- Abusive Customer Ban Feature: A smart feature to help manage no-shows and problematic customers.
- Minimum/Maximum Party Sizes: Take control of your restaurant’s capacity with party size limits.
- Multi-Location Support: For those running multiple venues, it integrates seamlessly with the Five Star Business Profile plugin.
- Booking Deposits: Available in the Ultimate license, this feature helps reduce no-shows by requiring deposits.
- Five Star Restaurant Manager Mobile App: Another Ultimate license perk, this app syncs with the plugin for on-the-go booking management.
While these aren’t all the features, they represent the most unique aspects of this plugin, in my opinion.
Five Star Restaurant Reservations: In Action
Upon installing Five Star Restaurant Reservations, you’ll encounter a setup tour. This guides you through creating your reservations page, setting booking times, and configuring essential options. You can skip the tour if you prefer to explore on your own.
Let’s examine the plugin’s interface. The dashboard features a Get Support section with links to YouTube tutorials, FAQs, Documentation, and Support. Below, you’ll find a summary of all bookings made on your website.
For free users, the dashboard contains several upsells that occupy significant space, which some may find distracting.
The Bookings tab allows you to manage all reservations. You can filter bookings by time, date, and status (Closed, Confirmed, Pending, and Trashed). You can also add new bookings manually from this section.
In the Settings tab, you can adjust booking schedules and notifications in the free version. Paid licenses unlock additional options for payments, styling, and label customization.
Now, let’s take a look at how to set up some important features of this plugin.
Configuring Reservation Notifications
Five Star Restaurant Reservations offers comprehensive notification settings to inform you about booking activities. To configure these options, navigate to Bookings > Settings > Notifications.
In the free version, you can set the reply-to name and email address for customer communications, specify the admin email address, and choose which events trigger admin notifications. These include new booking requests, confirmed bookings, and cancellations.
The premium version enhances this functionality with a streamlined notifications table. While you’ll still set basic information like reply-to details and admin email, the table allows for more granular control over notification triggers and content.
Premium users also benefit from the ability to customize the subject line and design for emails sent to customers from the Bookings panel, offering an additional layer of personalization.
Customizing Booking Form Appearance (Premium Feature)
Five Star Restaurant Reservations provides a range of customization options for your booking form’s appearance. From Bookings > Settings > Styling, you can select three layout styles: a standard design available to all users, a modern minimalist approach, or a two-column layout separating booking information.
The plugin allows you to fine-tune various visual elements. For example, you can adjust the font family and color of section headings, modify the form’s border and background, and tweak the typography of form labels for improved legibility and visual appeal.
Button customization is also available. You can set colors for both normal and hover states across various action buttons.
These styling features allow you to create a booking experience that feels cohesive with your website’s aesthetic while maintaining functionality.
Integrating Reservation Forms Into Your Website
The plugin offers multiple methods for integrating booking forms into your website. Upon installation, you can create a dedicated reservations page for centralized booking management.
For custom page integration, the plugin provides flexible options. Using the Gutenberg editor, you can easily insert the Booking Form block where needed.
For those using alternative page builders or editors, the [booking-form] shortcode allows you to display the reservation form on any page or post. A dedicated module for popular page builders like Elementor would have been great, as shortcodes seem a little outdated these days.
Premium license holders can access additional functionality with the [view-bookings-form] shortcode. This feature displays a comprehensive view of current and upcoming bookings, allowing guest check-ins.
It’s particularly useful for creating staff-accessible booking management areas without granting full backend access to your website.
Five Star Restaurant Reservations: Pricing Plans
Five Star Restaurant Reservations offers three pricing tiers:
- Free: The free version of Five Star Restaurant Reservations provides essential online booking features. It includes a customizable reservation form that can be added to any page via Gutenberg block or shortcode. You can set specific booking times and dates and receive email notifications for new requests with options to confirm or reject. While basic, this version offers a cost-free starting point for restaurants implementing online reservations. You may download the plugin from the WordPress plugin repo.
- Premium: The premium version, starting at $67 per site (lifetime), offers advanced features along with free features, including admin panel booking management, holiday exceptions, customizable notifications, automatic confirmations for small parties, and the ability to ban customers. It also allows customization of date and time formats.
- Ultimate: The ultimate version, priced at $297 per site, includes all previous features plus table-specific booking, deposit support via Stripe and PayPal, SMS notifications, late-arrival alerts, and a mobile app for on-the-go reservation management. It aims to enhance customer experience and reduce no-shows for more demanding restaurant operations.
While not the cheapest, these prices are still very affordable, especially when you compare them to non-WordPress booking and reservation solutions such as OpenTable API, which starts at $149/mo.
Five Star Restaurant Reservations: Support & Documentation
Five Star Restaurant Reservations offers a comprehensive documentation page that covers plugin setup and feature usage. The user interface is clean, with concise and easy-to-follow text. .
While most articles are text-based, only some include helpful images. This might be a slight drawback if you’re a visual learner, but it doesn’t significantly impact the overall quality of the documentation.
One notable omission is a search function within the documentation, which could make finding specific information more challenging. However, the plugin’s YouTube channel offers a wealth of video tutorials demonstrating feature setups, which you might find more accessible and practical.
The plugin provides an open web form through its support center for support. While this system works, the absence of a live chat or ticketing system might make it slightly less convenient for you to track your support requests.
Despite this, the available support options should still adequately address most of your needs.
Users’ Perspective About Five Star Restaurant Reservations
Reviews for Five Star Restaurant Reservations are sitting at a solid 4.7 out of 5 stars from 195 reviews on the WordPress plugin repository.
Many reviewers highlight the quality of customer support, noting the team’s responsiveness and helpfulness. Ease of use is another frequently mentioned positive aspect, with users appreciating the straightforward setup and operation. That’s always a good sign.
There are a few 1-star reviews in the mix, with some people running into issues. But overall, most users seem to think it does the job well for managing restaurant reservations.
As with any plugin, individual experiences may vary, and it’s advisable to test the plugin to determine if it meets your specific requirements. Luckily, you can try out its free version.
Reservations Made Easy, With Five Star Restaurant Reservations
Five Star Restaurant Reservations packs a punch for WordPress restaurants looking to streamline bookings. It’s versatile enough to handle small cafes and multi-location establishments alike. While the free version covers the basics, premium tiers unlock more robust features.
User feedback is generally positive, especially regarding support and ease of use. That said, the plugin could use clearer labeling for free vs. premium features and fewer upsells. Native integrations with popular page builders would be a nice touch.
If you’re tired of reservation headaches, try the free version. It might just be the solution you’ve been looking for to simplify your booking process.
