--- slug: 'way.food' client: 'way.food' category: ['Product', 'Development'] date: '2024 — Present' website: https://way.food services: ['Development', 'System Architecture', 'DevOps', 'Stripe Integration', 'Technical Consulting'] technologies: - Laravel - Livewire - Alpine.js - Tailwind CSS - MySQL - Filament - Mapbox GL JS - Laravel Cashier - Stripe - OpenAI API - Sentry title: 'Foodtruck & Catering Booking Platform' story_preview: "We built way.food from the ground up: started as a comparison portal for foodtrucks, caterers and party services, today a full booking platform with real payments on Stripe Connect. Brand, product strategy, marketing and the entire technical architecture, scaled to 1,000+ users, 300+ providers and 7-figure traffic." fineprint: "From zero to market leader. We turned a complex, multi-party marketplace into a real payments platform, complete with Stripe Connect, tax-correct invoicing and a booking engine that carries a transaction from first message to settled payout. From strategy and product roadmap to creative direction and full-stack development, we own every layer of this platform." --- > **Case study source:** https://unlimited.studio/en/case-study/way.food # Building a Foodtruck & Catering Booking Platform way.food started as a comparison portal for foodtrucks, caterers, and party services. It has since grown into a full transactional booking platform, currently focused on the DACH region with plans to expand worldwide. We have been with the startup from day one: brand identity, product strategy, investor pitches, marketing and social media, and the entire technical side. We own the technical architecture, from strategy, system design and DevOps to payment infrastructure and full-stack development. ## Infrastructure at Scale We architected a **production-grade server infrastructure** designed for growth: - **Multi-environment setup:** Separate servers for development, staging, and production - **CI/CD pipeline:** Automated deployments with zero-downtime releases - **Load balancing:** Distributed traffic handling for high-demand periods - **Database architecture:** Dedicated database servers with automated backups - **S3 integration:** Static media handling and scheduled backups to AWS S3 - **Two payment rails in parallel:** Stripe Connect handles the booking money flow, Laravel Cashier handles provider subscriptions — migrated live, without downtime ## From Discovery to Direct Booking The core of way.food is no longer just browsing — it's booking. Providers build structured packages and extras with calendar-based capacity, and customers move through a **Discover search wizard** that factors in guest count, date, and budget. - **In-booking chat:** Customers and providers negotiate directly inside the platform, with binding offers rendered as cards right in the conversation - **Deposit checkout:** A Stripe deposit secures the booking, with the remainder collected before the event - **Five ways a booking can start:** an instant direct booking, a change request negotiated in chat, a custom price-on-request offer, a concierge offer built by our support team, or a landing-page lead converted later ## Payments, Tax, and Paper Trail Every booking runs through a **Stripe Connect** setup with destination charges — the platform commission is taken as an application fee on the provider's side, payouts are automated, and disputes trigger holds automatically. Behind it sits a **tax-correct pricing engine**: catalog prices are net, the platform applies its markup, and VAT is calculated per line item — 7% on food, 19% on drinks and service — with a dedicated path for small-business providers. Every booking produces a clean, itemized breakdown instead of a single lump sum. The whole lifecycle is backed by **automated, branded documents**: customer invoices, provider commission statements, cancellation invoices, and offer PDFs are generated and mailed at the right moment, without anyone touching them by hand. ## Fair by Design Cancellations are handled by a dedicated **cancellation engine**: fees are tiered by how close the cancellation is to the event date, terms are frozen to the booking at the moment it's made, and there's a free-cancellation window before fees apply. No-shows settle through a separate path, and our support team can adjust fees with a full history of the change. Checkout copy and terms were reviewed for legal compliance, with versioned terms stamped to each booking. Search results are ranked by a **transparent, weighted score** — subscription tier, behavior, review average, and deposit rate — with the exact formula published on a public ranking page. There's no paid placement and no hidden boosts. Free-tier providers are fully listed and bookable, just ranked last. ## Provider Experience Providers manage their business from a dedicated cockpit: - **Bookings & analytics:** A bookings table plus a dashboard for revenue, requests, and response times - **Packages & extras builder:** Providers structure their own offering and pricing - **Availability calendar:** Capacity and blocked dates, tied directly into the booking flow - **Verified reviews:** Only customers with a completed, verified booking can leave one - **Four subscription tiers:** Free, Basic, Premium, and Premium+, each unlocking more visibility and tooling ## Admin & Operations Behind the scenes, an internal platform built on **Filament** runs the operational side: KPI dashboards for cancellation rate, payout alarms, and response times; work queues for provider onboarding, catalog review, leads, and open tenders; a builder for concierge offers; and a marketing dashboard with channel heatmaps. ## Marketing, Reach & Content We built a self-hosted **marketing attribution** system — click-ID and UTM capture without third-party tag managers or pixels, gated behind consent, feeding conversion data back into Google Ads including retractions when a booking is cancelled. The platform itself runs on an interactive **Mapbox GL JS** map with taxonomy filters, is fully multi-language (German, English, Dutch) with hreflang sitemaps, supports open tenders where customers post events and providers apply, and includes a blog with AI-assisted content tooling. ## Tech Stack & Monitoring Built on **Laravel 12** with **Livewire** for reactive components and **Alpine.js** for lightweight interactivity. **Tailwind CSS** ensures a consistent, responsive design, and **MySQL** handles the data layer. The admin and ops platform runs on **Filament**, payments run on **Stripe Connect** and **Laravel Cashier**, and AI features are powered by the **OpenAI API**. For reliability, we integrated **Sentry** for real-time error tracking and performance monitoring. ## The Results way.food has scaled to: - **1,000+ registered users** - **300+ verified providers** - **Thousands of booking requests** - **7-figure annual traffic** A platform built for scale, proving that startup speed and enterprise-grade architecture aren't mutually exclusive.