A good morning needs a good place to land.

At 7:15 AM the line reaches the door, a stroller is parked beside the pickup shelf, and the two-top by the window has held the same laptop since opening. That's the room we start with.

Small rooms get the front shelf

We sell the whole range, over 1,000 products. Seating, tables and booths fill most of it: chairs and bar stools, table tops paired with bases, and booths, with outdoor pieces, benches, and accessories on the side. Our starting point is cafe furniture, because in a coffee shop or a bakery, two feet can decide whether the queue bends around the corner or stalls at the door.

So the product pages put size first. Read the listed dimensions in inches, hold them against your own floor, and only then argue about the finish. A table six inches too wide is a table you walk back out to the truck.

Where cafes usually start

• The counter and window ledge: backless bar stools slide in under the edge, so the queue keeps its room.
• The front room: coffee shop chairs, along with stacking and wood styles.
• Small tables: a 24-inch square seats two. Go to 30 inches and the plates fit as well; go to 36 and the table takes four.
• The sidewalk: patio chairs, which are listed for outdoor use. A wood-framed indoor chair left out there fades, swells or rusts, and the warranty doesn't cover that.

One plan for each zone

Counter, window, back room: give each its own cafe plan. Save a piece with its options, a count and a note, and the plan keeps the price you saw. Plans live in your browser on this site, so there's no account to make, and each browser holds 30 plans at most. Cleared cookies or a new browser mean the saved plans can't be opened, which is why the project sheet is worth downloading once a layout settles.

Moving a plan to the basket reprices every line against the current catalog. Opening a second shop? Copy the plan and change the counts.

Do the arithmetic before the order

Say your dining area is 600 square feet and you run counter service. Counter service and fast casual rooms plan out at roughly 11 to 14 square feet per seat; at 12, that is 50 seats. Those are early planning ranges, and local code limits come first. The planning guide goes through table sizes, aisles, and the seat count in order.

How an order goes

Choose the options on each piece, add it to the basket with a quantity, and send the order together with the ZIP code of each delivery address and a few lines about the door, the step, and who will be there to receive. Someone reads the order first, and nothing is confirmed until they have. The email that follows, within a business day, holds the final order, a freight quote per address and the way to pay. How to order walks through every step. Order at least eight pieces, any blend of tables and chairs; a booth order skips that minimum.

Freight and returns in brief

Furniture travels as LTL freight on pallets. The standard service puts pallets down at a dock or tailgate, and unloading is your job. Four extras (liftgate, inside delivery, limited access, residential) cost more and are booked when you place the order. Standard pieces: between 14 and 21 business days. Custom pieces run longer, to about 8 weeks. Transit is extra either way. Give the delivery page a read before the truck gets close.

A stock item that goes back costs 35% of its value to restock, and freight is yours both ways. Custom items cannot be returned. The returns page has the rest.

Who this store is for

Owners opening a first shop on a small budget and a fixed opening date. Managers swapping a dozen chairs without closing. Operators about to open a second location who want the layout to repeat.

Not sure which stool suits a counter? A counter about 34 to 36 inches high goes with stools about 24 to 26 inches tall. Free samples of swatches and finishes are one request away, and a specialist will call back if you book a time. Or pick one zone, read the first dimensions, and write to sales@restaurantfurniture.shop if the numbers don't settle it.