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Hotplate

E-COMM
Velocity5.0

Ecommerce platform for creators and food businesses to sell limited-drop products with scheduled sales, waitlists and payments

www.hotplate.com ↗

Post-rebuild, Hotplate is shipping the food-creator features its old portal couldn't.

food-commercecreator-toolsdropspaymentsmobile-appportal-rebuild
◆Current state
Having rebuilt its seller portal in March to move faster, Hotplate is now cashing in that velocity: review replies, a native iOS portal app, an expanded referral program (20% of fees for a year), self-serve gift cards, payment links for manually created orders, and an 80-plus-item batch of portal improvements including an AI 'Get help' assistant. It serves 5,000+ independent food creators running drop-based sales.
◆Where it's heading
The direction is completing the operator toolkit around drops — payments, reviews, gift cards, referrals, and mobile — for solo food businesses that previously stitched these together with Venmo, DMs, and spreadsheets. Each release closes a manual workaround, consolidating the business into the portal.
◆Prediction
Expect continued net-new features on the rebuilt portal — the team signals many more requested workflows queued — with mobile and drop-management depth likely next. No pivot beyond deepening the drop-commerce platform is visible.

◆Recent moves

  1. 2d ago

    Reply to reviews

    Sellers can now reply to storefront reviews, with the customer notified by text — a top-requested feature that closes the feedback loop on the storefront.

  2. 23d ago

    Hotplate portal iOS app launches

    The Hotplate portal ships as a native iOS app with push notifications, giving chefs a mobile surface for running their business — a new platform for the operator toolkit.

  3. 23d ago

    Our NEW referral program 🎉

    The referral program now pays 20% of a referred chef's fees for a full year with monthly payouts, up from just the first month — a real change to Hotplate's growth economics.

  4. 1mo ago

    Create a gift card 🎁

    Chefs can create gift cards directly in the portal for giveaways, fundraisers, or store credit, with balance and order tracking — a new monetization tool built into the storefront.

  5. 1mo ago

    Send a link to pay for created orders

    Payment links for manually created orders let chefs handle custom and one-off requests inside Hotplate instead of juggling Venmo, DMs, and separate invoices.

  6. 3mo ago

    80+ new-portal improvements; old portal extended

    A large batch of feedback-driven fixes and features — payout tab restored, full live-drop editing, live drop analytics, and an AI Get-help assistant — while old-portal access is extended during the transition.