This article is about the Proxi admin app at app.proxi.co.
Restaurant week works best as a Passport: diners check in at participating restaurants, rack up points, and compete for prizes — and you get real foot-traffic numbers for every restaurant. Here's the full playbook, using a made-up "Downtown Restaurant Week" with 22 restaurants over 9 days.
1. Round Up the Restaurants
If your restaurants are already listings in your workspace (they should be — that's where their hours, phone, and photos live), create a collection: Collections → New Collection → From my listings, check off the participants, and name it "Restaurant Week 2026."
Not in listings yet? Add them on the Listings page first — Add Item searches for the business and pulls in its details, or Import CSV handles the whole roster at once. Then build the collection from them. It's a little setup that pays off every event after this one.
2. Add Each Restaurant's Deal
The deal is a field on your collection:
On the collection page, click Fields → Add a field, name it "Restaurant Week Deal," and choose the Special offer type.
Open each restaurant and fill it in: check Include a special offer, write the Offer details ("3-course dinner, $35 — mention the passport"), set Starts and Expires to your week, and add any fine print under Terms ("Dine-in only, not valid Saturday").
Collecting deals by email? Paste them all in at once with Bulk Edit instead of opening 22 restaurants.
3. Create the Passport
Go to Passports in the sidebar and click New Passport.
Name it — the wizard suggests the shape: "Downtown Restaurant Week Passport."
When it asks where places should come from, choose Use existing collection and pick your restaurant collection. This is the important choice: the passport stays synced, so a restaurant added or dropped from the collection updates the passport automatically.
4. Choose How Diners Check In
In Setup → Settings, find Check-in Methods and pick what proves a visit. You can enable more than one:
Receipt Check-in — diners snap a photo of their receipt. The most on-theme for restaurant week since it proves a purchase, not just a walk-by. Add Receipt Instructions ("Snap your itemized receipt — any amount counts") and decide whether to Auto-approve Receipts or review them yourself in the activity feed.
Code Check-in — each restaurant gets a code diners type in. Set each restaurant's Check-in Code on the Places tab (short and memorable — "TACO22"), then use Export Codes → Download Check-in Codes (CSV) to send each restaurant theirs, or Download All QR Codes and pick the PDF — Branded format for print-ready table tents with your logo on them.
Geolocation Check-in — GPS proximity with a radius you set. Zero setup for restaurants, but a diner walking past could check in without eating — pair it with receipts if that matters to you.
Also worth a look in Settings: Visit Frequency. "Once ever" is the default, but restaurant week often wants Daily — so someone can earn points at the same restaurant twice if they genuinely go back.
5. Set Up the Game
Points — on the Places tab, expand each restaurant and set its Point Value. Flat points (10 each) keeps it simple; bonus points for the far-flung spots spreads traffic beyond the obvious block.
Awards — in Awards & Badges, click Add New Award. The templates cover the classics: "First Check-In," "Halfway There," and "Challenge Champion." For each you set the name, a short description, an icon, and the Success Criteria — like Places visited with a threshold of 5, or check the All box for a finish-everything award. Use the Completion Message for redemption instructions: "You did it! Show this screen at the info booth for your prize entry."
Bonus activities — the Activities tab adds point-earners beyond check-ins. "Rate the Plate" and "Snap a Selfie" are ready-made; each has its own point value and feeds your photo gallery.
Leaderboard — keep Show Leaderboard on in Settings → Display Options. Friendly competition sells more dinners. (Participants can pick a display name at registration — see below.)
6. Build the Registration Page
On the Registration Page tab:
Write the Heading and Description — say what the passport is, what it costs (if anything), and what winners get.
Under Form Fields, turn on Require Username so the leaderboard shows names people chose, and collect phone numbers if you'll send text updates. Add a custom field like Zip Code if your sponsors want to know where diners came from.
Charging an entry fee or taking donations? Switch on Charge Participants and set it up right there — payments show up later under Participants & Activity.
Flip the header's Registration switch on early — people can register before the week starts even while the passport itself is still in draft.
7. Test It, Then Go Live
Register yourself, then in Participants & Activity → Participants, open your row and click Make Tester. Run a real check-in or two — codes, receipt photo, whatever you enabled. (Full walkthrough: Testing Your Challenge or Scavenger Hunt Before Launch.)
Clean up: Reset Progress on your tester row so test check-ins don't pollute day one.
Set the Start Date and End Date in Settings → Schedule — check-ins only count inside the window.
Flip the Live switch in the header. The go-live check will flag anything unfinished before it lets you launch (then: confetti).
8. Spread the Word
Click Share in the passport header — you get the registration Link, an Embed snippet for your website, a downloadable QR Code for posters and table tents, and a Join Code diners can type at play.proxi.co. Give every restaurant the QR so their own tables recruit players.
9. During and After the Week
Watch Participants & Activity → Overview daily — you'll see which restaurants are getting traffic and which need a push.
Use Messages for a mid-week email or text blast: "4 days left — these 5 restaurants are still waiting for you." Automated welcome messages greet new registrants for you.
Afterward: the Participants CSV is your prize-drawing list, the Locations tab shows check-ins per restaurant, and if you charged entry, Payments has the money side. Those per-restaurant numbers — "the passport drove 214 verified visits" — are exactly what brings restaurants back next year.
Beyond the Passport: How Successful Restaurant Weeks Run
Tips from organizers who've run these for years (including a study of restaurant week organizers in seven cities):
Schedule it in a slow season. Mid-winter and early spring are the classics — the whole point is filling seats when restaurants actually need the traffic.
Use fixed price tiers, let each restaurant pick one. The standard format is a 3-course fixed-price menu at two or three city-wide tiers (Washington DC's long-running week uses $25–$35 lunch and $40–$65 dinner). Diners know what they're getting before they book. Put each restaurant's tier and menu in its Special offer field so the passport is also the menu hub — one central place for every menu is one of the biggest diner complaints solved.
Make joining effortless for restaurants. Hand every participant a ready-made kit: logo, hashtag, menu template, pre-written social posts, and their check-in table tent. A busy owner should be able to say yes in one email.
Add a charity tie-in. A small share of sales to a local cause gives restaurants a second reason to join and reliably earns press coverage.
Start marketing 4–6 weeks out — announce the lineup early, invite food bloggers and local media to a preview tasting before launch, and post daily during the week under one shared hashtag, resharing diners' photos (your passport's photo feed is a ready supply).
Measure while it's fresh. Survey diners and restaurants right after (a gift-card drawing lifts responses), and pair survey answers with your passport's per-restaurant check-in counts for the full picture.
Worth a read: a peer-reviewed study of restaurant week best practices, WebstaurantStore's restaurant week explainer, Sprout Social's marketing timeline, Tourism Currents for DMO-side promotion, and two real-world models: Metropolitan Washington Restaurant Week and Ann Arbor Restaurant Week (run by a Main Street organization).