Privacy Policy

1. Who we are

Stovefront (“Stovefront,” “we,” “us”) is an independently operated, unincorporated software service based in California. You can reach the operator about privacy at support@stovefront.com.

Stovefront is commerce software for independent kitchens. We are not a food seller, a restaurant, or a delivery service. Food is sold by the individual cooks who use Stovefront. Payments go from customers to cooks and may be processed by Stripe or another payment service chosen by the cook (see “Payments,” below).

2. Information we collect

From cooks (sellers)

• Account details: name, email address, and a securely hashed password.
• Kitchen details: business/kitchen name, location or pickup area, logo and photos, menus, dishes, prices, and operating settings you enter.
• Payment-handle information you choose to display so customers can pay you — for example a Venmo username, PayPal.me link, Cash App cashtag, Zelle contact, or your own payment link. These are the details you would already share publicly to get paid.
• Subscription billing information for your Stovefront plan, processed by our payment provider (see §5). We do not store your full card number.
• Photos you upload — including dish photographs and, if you use the Premium storage tool, photographs of supplier receipts.
• Dish details you submit for AI image generation or photo enhancement (dish names, descriptions, ingredient lists, chef notes, and the photograph itself), which are sent to Google's generative AI service to produce the image.
• Records of which Premium features your kitchen has used, so we can show usage and enforce monthly allowances.

From customers (buyers)

• Order details: the items you order, quantities, pickup/delivery choice, and any notes.
• Contact details you provide at checkout: your name, required email address, and any phone number you provide so the cook can coordinate your order and we can send your confirmation.
• Optional account details if you choose to create a lightweight account for reordering.

Automatically

• A session cookie (or, in our mobile app, a securely stored token) to keep you signed in.
• If you install our mobile app and enable notifications, a device push token so we can alert cooks to new orders.
• Basic technical and usage logs (such as IP address, device/browser type, and error data) used to keep the service running and secure.
• Rate-limiting records keyed to IP address and email address, kept for short windows, so we can block automated sign-up, sign-in, and ordering abuse.

What we do not store: Stovefront does not store full card numbers or bank account credentials used to pay for food. When Stripe card checkout is used, Stripe collects the payment details and sends Stovefront limited transaction information, such as payment status, amount, and transaction identifiers.

3. How we use information

• To provide the service — publish storefronts, take and display orders, and let cooks manage their kitchen.
• To notify cooks of new orders and status changes (including push notifications, if enabled).
• To bill cooks for their subscription and provide support.
• To keep Stovefront secure, prevent fraud and abuse, and troubleshoot problems.
• To improve the product and understand how it's used, in aggregate.
• To comply with legal obligations.

We do not sell your personal information, and we do not use it for third-party advertising.

4. How information is shared

• Between customer and cook. When you place an order, the order details and the contact information you provide are shared with that cook so they can prepare and hand off your food. Cooks are responsible for how they handle their customers' information.
• Service providers. We share limited information with vendors who help us operate Stovefront, only as needed. These currently include our database and hosting providers, our image hosting provider, our subscription payment provider, and our push-notification provider (see §5).
• Legal and safety. We may disclose information if required by law, to enforce our Terms, or to protect the rights and safety of people using Stovefront.
• Business transfers. If Stovefront is involved in a merger, acquisition, or sale of assets, information may be transferred as part of that transaction.

5. Payments and third-party services

Your Stovefront subscription (the fee cooks pay us) is processed by our payment provider, Stripe. Their handling of your billing details is governed by their own privacy policy.

Food payments are made from the customer to the cook. If a cook enables card checkout, Stripe processes the payment through that cook's connected Stripe account and shares limited account, checkout, and payment-status information with Stovefront. A cook may instead offer another service such as Venmo, PayPal, Cash App, Zelle, or an external payment link. Each provider handles information under its own privacy policy.

We rely on the following providers, who process data on our behalf:

• Neon — database hosting. Stores all account, kitchen, menu, order, and customer records.
• Stripe — subscription billing, connected-cook onboarding, and optional card checkout for food orders.
• Vercel — application hosting and custom-domain provisioning.
• SmugMug — image storage for the photos you upload.
• Resend — transactional email. Receives the recipient's email address and the contents of the message: sign-up and verification emails, password resets, new-order alerts to cooks, and order-history sign-in links to customers.
• Google (Generative AI) — Premium AI image generation and photo enhancement. Receives the dish details and any photograph you submit for that feature. Only used when you use that feature.
• Google Fonts — web fonts on our public pages. Loading a page requests the font files from Google, which receives your IP address and browser type as part of that request.
• Expo — push notifications to the cook's mobile app. The notification payload includes the order code, the customer's name, the number of items, and the order total.

6. Cookies and similar technologies

We use essential cookies only — there is no advertising and no cross-site tracking.

• A session cookie that keeps a cook signed in to their kitchen.
• A separate session cookie for customers who use a kitchen's order-history page.
• In the mobile app, an equivalent securely stored token instead of a cookie.

We also use your browser's local storage to hold your working state — your cart, your display preferences, and, for a signed-in cook, a cached copy of their own kitchen's menu, customer, and order records so the app stays usable during a brief connection drop. This data stays on your device and is cleared when you sign out or clear your browser data.

7. Data retention

We keep information for as long as your account is active and as needed to provide the service. After that:

• Account, kitchen, menu, order, and customer records are deleted within 90 days of a verified deletion request, except where we must keep them longer for tax or legal reasons.
• Billing and tax records are kept for 7 years, as required for financial record-keeping.
• Sign-in sessions expire after 30 days. Email verification, password reset, and order-history sign-in links expire within minutes to hours of being issued.
• Rate-limiting records are discarded once their window closes.
• Technical logs are retained for up to 90 days.

You can ask us to delete your account and associated personal information (see §9).

8. Security

We take reasonable measures to protect your information — passwords are stored using strong one-way hashing, connections are encrypted in transit, and access is limited. No online service can promise perfect security, but we work to keep your data safe and to address issues promptly.

9. Your choices and rights

You may access, correct, or update your account information at any time in your Stovefront settings. You may request a copy of your personal information or ask us to delete it by contacting us at support@stovefront.com. Depending on where you live, you may have additional rights under laws such as the GDPR or CCPA; we will honor applicable requests.

Cooks can manage new-order notifications from within the app, and can turn them off at any time on their device or in Settings.

10. Children

Stovefront is intended for adults and is not directed to children under 18. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children. If you believe a child has provided us information, please contact us and we will remove it.

11. Where information is processed

Stovefront and its service providers are based in the United States, and information may be processed and stored there. If you use Stovefront from outside the U.S., you understand your information may be transferred to and processed in the U.S.

12. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy as Stovefront grows. When we make material changes, we'll update the effective date above and, where appropriate, notify you in the product.

13. Contact us

Questions, requests, or complaints about privacy may be sent to Stovefront at support@stovefront.com.