Simplifying Custom Pasta Kit Preorders in Square

[MarkSpiegelman]

Hi everyone,

I'm offering a product I call a custom pasta kit. When a customer selects this item, they customize it by choosing their preferred pasta, sauce, and toppings. Each kit is then assembled to order and packaged for either pickup or delivery.

Since these kits aren't prepared on demand, we require customers to select a fulfillment date—whether that's the next day or a future date (up to a week out).

My goal is to streamline the online ordering process to just three simple steps:

1. Choose your kit components

2. Pick a fulfillment date

3. Select pickup or delivery

I'm wondering if this can be done within Square's system.

The "Edit Preorder Screen" for items doesn’t seem to offer the functionality I’m looking for, so I’m reaching out to see if anyone has a workaround or solution.

Thanks in advance for any insight!

Cheers,
Mark

[Subport]

Hello @MarkSpiegelman How are customers currently ordering these? Do your pastas come fixed or can customers choose what goes in it?

[MarkSpiegelman]

Hi Zech,

That is seriously impressive on many levels—way to go!

I’d love to dive deeper into CafeKit. One feature that would be incredibly useful is the ability to see a breakdown of ingredients required for kits over a selected date range.

Since these kits are customizable, it would be a huge help to know how much of each component is needed based on scheduled orders for a given date or range. That kind of insight would really help with portion prep, ordering, and waste management.

Let’s keep the conversation going, and thanks again for all your great work!

Best,
Mark

[zechcamp]

Hey @MarkSpiegelman , created a video that walks you through how to set this up. Let me know if that solves the problem for you. Also tried to write up the step by step instructions below, but I think the video might be more clear. 

Tutorial Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTYl5jfnDos

Step-by-Step Guide to Configure Custom Pasta Kit Pre-Orders

1. Open Square Dashboard
   Log in and click the gear icon (Settings) in the lower-left corner.

2. Navigate to Fulfillment Settings

   • Select Account & Settings.

   • In the sidebar, choose Fulfillment.

   • Under Online Pickup & Delivery, click Edit.

3. Enable Recurring Pre-Order Window

   • Find the pickup settings section.

   • Toggle Allow same-day pickup on or off depending on whether you want customers to pick up today.

   • Under How many days in advance can orders be placed?, set this to 7 days so customers can choose any day in the upcoming week.

4. Set Pickup Time Options

   • Scroll to the time window settings.

   • Choose Customer sees a window if you want them to pick a block (e.g., “9 AM–5 PM”).

   • Or leave it off to let them select exact times in 30-minute increments.

5. Save Your Changes
   Click Save at the bottom. Your custom pasta kit will now appear as a regular item, and customers can always pick a pickup or delivery day within the next seven days.

6. Verify on Your Site

   • Go to your online store.

   • Add the pasta kit to cart, choose toppings, then select Pickup or Delivery.

   • In the cart, click Edit next to the fulfillment option to confirm the seven-day date range and time-selection behavior.

With these settings, your pasta kit behaves like an ever-available item rather than a one-time pre-order. Customers can mix and match toppings and lock in a convenient pickup or delivery slot up to seven days out—without having to manually reopen a pre-order each week.

I've found the biggest drawback is when it comes time to actually fulfill these customer orders. In order to know how many of each custom kit you need to prepare for next week, you have to click on each order, find the pickup date and manually count the items in each order. Not bad for a few items, but when you start getting a lot of orders manually clicking into each order and tallying sauce and topping counts can get tedious.

I built a tool, cafekit.io, to automate production reporting. I'd love your feedback and see if I can make it solve any other fulfillment related issues for you.
CafeKit will automatically pull in Square Orders, aggregate counts by item and fulfillment date (e.g., “Next Friday: 39 kits; 25 Alfredo; 14 Pesto”), and generate a printable prep sheet for the kitchen. Hope this helps! 

Reach out if you have any questions [email protected]

[MarkSpiegelman]

Also, your suggestion to avoid using the preorder option for the item in question, and instead rely solely on the default fulfillment settings, may have unintended consequences. While the pasta kits do require advance ordering, many other standard shop items are available for immediate purchase and fulfillment.

Therefore, a hybrid approach—using preorder for select items alongside standard fulfillment settings—may be necessary to accommodate both scenarios. That said, the preorder setup might still require occasional adjustments to update availability dates.

[zechcamp]

Good point, if you have other items in your store, making the changes I suggested will affect all your online store items. I suppose you could use preorders and manually update the availability dates at the start of each week, don't know of a way to automate that otherwise. 

[PizzaDive]

Good Afternoon! Just a thought, I think you could accomplish this without using pre-orders at all, just adjust the prep time for those specific items to 24 hours. That way the customer can't order for the same-day online. It doesn't work well with Doordash if you use that, but neither do pre-orders. I would recommend adding it to the item/category labeling that it requires 24 hour notice. I've seen a lot of places do this with Catering orders.