Toggled – August 2026
What a summer it’s been here at Toggle. Between launching a brand new integration, getting Christmas well and truly underway, and rolling out a few improvements behind the scenes, August has been incredible. So here is everything that has happened this month at Toggle HQ.
storekit joins the Toggle gang!
Big news to kick things off: Toggle and storekit are now officially integrated, and it’ a partnership we could not be more excited about.
So what does it all mean. If you use both Toggle and storekit, your guests' gift cards now slot straight into the storekit checkout when they order at the table. The balance is recognised the moment they go to pay, ready to spend there and then. Effortless on their side, completely hands-off on yours.
For you, it means gift cards that get spent sooner, and guests coming back to spend whatever is left on the balance. Two brilliant platforms, now working as one.
We have gone into the full detail over on the blog, so if you use both platforms, this one is well worth a read: Toggle x storekit: gift cards, sorted at checkout
Getting ready for the holiday season
The busiest gifting weeks of the year are coming up fast, but fear not: we happen to have a few gifting experts in the building, and we have spent August prepping everything you need to head into the season with total confidence. From here on we will keep the top tips and insights coming, all the things you can do right now to grow your bottom line before the rush arrives.
And the opportunity is enormous. Our customers drove just under £100 million in gifting revenue last year, with gift card volumes up 36% year on year and physical card sales up a huge 56%. Around a fifth of all annual gifting revenue lands in that golden window between Black Friday and Christmas Eve, so the next few weeks really do matter. We dug into all of it in our Gifting is Booming blog, and the numbers speak for themselves: Gifting is booming, and our customers are flying
Mark your calendar: design deadlines
To make sure your cards are printed, polished and ready in good time, here are the two dates to get in your diary.
Standard Physical Gift Cards: 14 September
This is your last call to have your physical gift cards designed, printed and sitting pretty on your counter in good time for the festive rush. If physical cards are part of your plan, now is the moment to get those briefs over to us.
On Demand vouchers and Greetings Gift Cards: 28 September
Your On Demand range and Greetings Gift Cards gives you more ways to capture gifting demand right up to Christmas. Get your designs in by 28 September and you will be ready to make the most of the whole window. Send those briefs over and we will take care of the rest.
Not on Toggle yet? There is still time to get in on the festive action. Get in touch today at sales@usetoggle.com and we will have you set up and ready to make the most of the biggest gifting season of the year.
Your festive reading list
We have been banging the drum on gifting lately, and we have pulled together a couple of reads to help you get a head start on the season.
Naughty or nice? Our Christmas checklist. Think of this as your festive readiness MOT. It walks you through everything worth ticking off before the rush hits, so you can head into December knowing you are firmly on the nice list: Naughty or nice: your Toggle Christmas checklist
Tips and tricks for winter gifting. Packed with practical, do-it-today ideas to squeeze a little more from your gifting range over the colder months. Small tweaks that add up to a real difference when it matters most: Tips and tricks to make the most of your gift cards this winter
Andre Johnstone from Upside on running your gift card shop
Andre Johnstone of Upside is a real Toggle champion, and this month he has written us a guest piece that is a proper must-read. Andre built and scaled the gift card programmes at Wagamama, taking them from £300k to £3 million, and at Côte to past £2 million a year, so when he talks gift cards, it pays to listen.
His take is a good challenge for any operator: a gift card shop is not something you set up once and leave to tick over, it is a channel to be actively run. Too many get loaded with a £10 and a £20 card, a link in the footer, and then forgotten about. As Andre puts it, that is not a gift card programme, it is a vending machine you forgot you owned.
The good news is that the opportunity is already there in the shop you’ve got. In the piece, Andre digs into exactly how to unlock it, from the numbers most operators miss to the simple shifts that turn a quiet shop into a proper revenue channel. It is well worth ten minutes of your time: Gift Cards are in growth – are you?
New Venues on Toggle
A big warm welcome to the venues who joined Toggle this month!
- The Bulls Head Belper
- The Clive Arms
- Mulligans Manchester
- Camden Enterprise
We're chuffed to have you all on board, and we can't wait to help you grow your gifting.
Now Live: A smarter postage and packaging setup
We have also given the postage and packaging side of Toggle some real attention this month, just in time for the festive rush.
The postage settings page has had a refresh, with more guidance built in to help you shape a strategy that works for your sales. You can now also edit the postage costs your guests pay at checkout right there on the page, and see exactly what you are covering as you go. The page also lays out our standard SLAs and key information, with Christmas timescales clearly signposted so you always know where you stand.
It all flows once orders are on their way, too. Orders now show the exact dispatch date and time, and tracking is far easier to read at a glance, showing a tracking number where one is available, a note if tracking was not selected at checkout, or a heads up if the order has not been dispatched yet.
Want to get your postage strategy sorted before the orders start rolling in? We have put together a handy video walkthrough over in the Academy: Master your postage strategy for physical gifting
Always Evolving
Alongside the big stuff, we have kept a few smaller improvements coming across Toggle this month, too.
We have brought back the offline page for inactive stores, and given it a useful upgrade while we were at it. Now, if a guest lands on the webstore of a store that is not currently active, they will find handy links to check their card balance or register a card, so they can still get what they need in just a couple of clicks.
And there we have it for August. Between storekit, the festive prep and everything in between, it has been a cracking month. With Christmas now firmly on the horizon, there is plenty more still to come, so we will see you back here next month.
