How do I run specials, sold-out dishes and stock counts?

Set a category's serving times, feature today's specials, mark a dish sold out or hide it, and let stock counts sell it out by itself.

Part of How do I build my menu and share it with guests?. This part covers what is on today: serving times on a category, today's specials, sold-out and hidden dishes, and dish stock counts.

Serving times on a category

A category can carry serving times — a lunch section served weekdays 12–3, a breakfast page that ends at 11. Set them in the category's own edit form: its Serving times block takes day pills plus a start and end time per window, with several windows allowed (up to 21; an end at or before the start runs overnight, so 21:00 to 02:00 covers a late bar). The category list marks timed sections with their hours, and — on venues with Order & Pay — the same windows are also editable on Settings → Menu and stock → Serving times, where the per-category ordering switches live (see How do I set up ordering at the table?).

Out of hours the category is never hidden: it stays on your guest menus with its serving times shown against its name — "Served Mon–Fri 12:00pm–3:00pm" — so guests can still read tonight's dinner menu at breakfast. Guests see those times on the same clock as the rest of your public pages: 12-hour unless you've picked 24 hour under Time format for public pages (see branding), when it reads "Served Mon–Fri 12:00–15:00". Your wall screens show them on the same clock as the time in their own header. It just can't be ordered: at-table ordering won't take its dishes outside the window, and a pre-ordering party can't pick its dishes for a booking that falls outside the window either — both say why in plain words rather than failing silently. A category with no serving times is simply available whenever ordering is, exactly as before.

Today's specials

Got something on today that isn't on the printed menu — or a dish you want to push? Open the dish, and switch on Today's special. That's the whole job: no dates to fill in, nothing to remember to undo. The special ends at the end of today by itself, so yesterday's special can never sit on a wall screen advertising food nobody is cooking.

The dish does not move. It stays exactly where it lives — Starters, Mains, wherever — and also appears in a Today's specials section pinned at the top of your menu. So stock counts, station routing, VAT and Order & Pay all carry on working untouched, and there's nothing to tidy up when the special finishes.

Two optional extras sit under the switch:

Want it to run longer than today, or only at certain hours? Open Schedule underneath. Set Starts and Ends after dates to run it over a period, and add time windows for something like a lunch-only special or "every Tuesday". The summary line above the fold always tells you what's currently set — "today only · all day" until you change it.

A special shows in four places, and they always agree with each other because they all read the same thing: the Today's specials section at the top of your guest menu, your menu board screen (marked in place, with the old price struck through), the dedicated Today's specials display screen, and Order & Pay, where it's ordered at the special price. On your own Menu page a dish on special carries a small amber Special badge, so you can see at a glance what's on without opening dishes one at a time.

The specials display screen clears itself. When the last special of the day ends, the screen simply shows "No specials on today" — nobody has to go and switch anything off.

Mark a dish sold out

Flip the Available switch on the dish's row (or inside its edit form). When it's off, the public menu greys the dish out and marks it "Sold out today" (the price stays visible) — handy mid-service when something runs out. Flip it back on when it returns.

Rather guests didn't see it at all? Switch on Hide sold-out dishes (Settings → Menu and stock → How your menu looks — see "How your menu looks" in How do I share my menu and choose how it looks?): a sold-out dish then drops off your menu — its section, the section buttons, today's specials, the menu search and the dietary filters all agree — and comes back by itself when it's available again. It's off to start with.

You can also type it into the search: "86 the salmon" or "only 5 sea bass left" opens your menu with one check for that dish — see What can I type into the search?.

Hide a single dish from your menu

Sold out and hidden are two different things, and the difference matters. Available switched off still shows the dish, greyed out with a "Sold out" badge — you're telling guests "not tonight". Hide from menu takes the dish off your guest menus completely — you're telling them nothing at all.

Open the dish's … menu on the Menu page and choose Hide from menu. It then disappears from your public menu page, your menu board and TV screens, and at-table ordering, while staying set up in your dashboard with everything about it intact — its price, photo, allergens and choices are all still there for whenever you want it back. Your own Menu page shows it with a grey Hidden badge so you always know why it isn't appearing.

Use it for a dish you're resting for the season, one you only do for private bookings, or a staff dish that was never meant to be on the menu. A hidden dish still appears where something deliberately offers it — an event menu or a shareable menu whose categories include it, or a set menu or deal that picks it — the same rule a hidden category follows. One difference: hiding a dish doesn't take it off the pre-order list — switch off its Available to pre-order too if it shouldn't be pre-ordered (the dish's last step tells you when it still can be).

This is a display setting, not a security lock: dish records are readable by anything that asks, so don't use it to keep something genuinely secret.

Dish stock counts — sold out by itself when the portions run out

If you'd rather not watch the fridge yourself, ResoFlow can count portions down for you. The master switch lives in Settings — the Dish stock counts card on Settings → Menu and stock (the gear at the top right of the Menu page opens it). It starts switched off — turn on Track dish stock there and each dish row on the Menu page gains a small stock line: press Count it daily and set its Usual number per day ("we do twelve of these a night") — the line then reads "Usually 12 a day". As the dish sells, the number counts down, and at zero it shows as sold out on your guest menus — the public menu, TV screens, event and shareable menus, and at-table ordering — and can't be added to new pre-orders, until the next service day. Dishes without a number are simply not tracked and behave exactly as before.

The count is one honest number however the dish sells: an Order & Pay table order, a pre-order from a booked party and a dish inside a set menu all draw from the same day's count — and a pre-ordering party's portions are held for them, so a busy walk-in night can never sell food already promised to a booking. If a booking with a pre-order cancels or moves to another date, its portions go back on sale (or move with it) automatically. The same goes for a table order your team rejects — the food was never made, so its portions go straight back on tonight's count. Refunding a guest for food that was already delivered doesn't put anything back, because that food is gone.

On each row you can also correct Left today to whatever is actually in the kitchen, or tap None left today to mark the dish sold out for the rest of the day in one go. Changing counts is a floor job: anyone who can edit the menu can do it, and there's a separate Set and change dish stock counts permission so you can hand it to front-of-house staff without giving them price editing (Hosts have it by default).

Counts reset to each dish's usual number automatically at the start of each service day. Prefer to set them by hand? Switch off Reset automatically each day on the same settings card — then a day only has counts once you set them. Either way, the card's Reset today's counts button starts the day again on demand (portions already promised to pre-ordering parties are kept). Each dish's count chip on the Menu page also turns amber as it runs low — at 3 or fewer left unless you tune the point with the card's Warn when control (1–50). The Stock counts figure at the top of the Menu page says where things stand — how many dishes are counted and whether counts reset nightly or are set by hand (Off while stock is off), with None left today beside it once something runs out — and, for anyone who can change the setting, clicking it opens the card in Settings. Stock tracking comes with menu management (Pro plan and above, or the Order & Pay or Your website product), and while the switch is off nothing else stock-related appears anywhere. On a plan without it the card's controls sit under More options, with a padlock — unless stock counting is still switched on from before, when they stay in view so you can switch it off.

Related: How do I build my menu and share it with guests? · How do I add dishes and choices to my menu? · How do I share my menu and choose how it looks? · How do I set up ordering at the table?