Sides Restaurants Digital Signage Powers Its UK Expansion

"Which Side Are You On?" glows in bold white letters above a storefront lined with digital displays cycling through menu items, staff faces and scan to order prompts. This is Sides, the restaurant chain founded by YouTube collective the Sidemen, and behind that bright, constantly shifting visual identity sits a quieter operational story, one built around Sides restaurants digital signage and the platform now keeping every location consistent as the brand expands.

A Brand Built for a Generation Raised on Screens

Founded in 2021, Sides has built a distinctive identity centered on vibrant restaurant spaces and a strong connection to its Gen Z audience, a demographic for whom digital presentation matters as much as the food itself. As the brand has grown, delivering that same engaging experience consistently across every new site has become an increasingly central operational challenge, one Sides has addressed by turning to NowSignage to manage its digital signage estate through a single centralised platform.

Speed and Consistency at Scale

The platform allows Sides to roll out campaigns across its entire estate in under 15 minutes, while maintaining complete menu consistency across every location. That speed matters considerably for a fast growing brand, where a delay in updating pricing or promotions across dozens of sites could otherwise create confusion or inconsistency between locations customers expect to feel identical regardless of which city they're in.

Time Saved, Redirected Toward Growth

Beyond consistency, the system has helped the marketing team save up to one hour per day when uploading and updating content, freeing that time for broader marketing activity rather than manual screen management. Georgia Hobson, marketing executive at Sides, described the platform's role directly. "The NowSignage platform has been a huge support, as Sides continues to grow," she said. "As we open new locations, having a platform that is reliable, flexible and easy to use is really important. The system makes it simple to manage content across our estate, whether we're updating every store or targeting specific locations with different offers."

New Locations Ready From Day One

That reliability has proven particularly valuable during store openings. Working alongside AV partner Microman, screens are installed and configured ahead of each launch, ensuring new venues can deliver the full Sides experience immediately rather than ramping up gradually. Recent openings in Glasgow and Liverpool benefited directly from that preparation, each location opening with its digital presence already fully operational.

What the Screens Actually Deliver Commercially

The impact extends well beyond aesthetics. At Lakeside Shopping Centre, Sides used internal and external screens to promote a staff discount offer, resulting in a 60 percent increase in redemptions during the first month of digital promotion. Across the wider business, targeted promotions displayed on screens have contributed to an 18 percent increase in sales of promoted menu items, figures that demonstrate digital signage functioning as a genuine commercial driver rather than simply decorative branding.

A Partnership Built Around Simplicity

Rebecca Benson, customer success manager at NowSignage, framed the collaboration around ease of use as much as technical capability. "Supporting Sides as they've expanded has been incredibly rewarding," she said. "From day one, our focus has been on making digital signage simple to manage, while helping the team deliver an engaging in store experience that reflects the brand."

What a Screen Full of Content Really Represents

Behind every scrolling menu update and staff discount banner sits a fast growing restaurant brand betting that consistency, delivered quickly and reliably across dozens of locations, matters as much to its young audience as the food itself. As Sides continues opening new sites, that bright neon question above the storefront will keep asking the same thing, backed now by a system quietly ensuring the answer looks the same everywhere.

More information is available on the official website at sides.co.uk. Further reading on the restaurant industry is available at hospitalitycareerprofile.com.