Booking page audit · 17 September 2026

Making House of KI NO BI easier to book.

House of KI NO BI sells its gin seminars through a TableCheck page. At the moment that page still prints dates that have already passed, lets one person pay for a seminar that needs two, and asks guests to read forty lines of notices before they can see what is on offer. This review collects 13 things the venue can change itself, from its own TableCheck admin and its own marketing channels, and orders them so the quickest wins come first.

13
past seminar dates still printed under "Valid Dates" (the calendar blocks them, the text doesn't)
2
future dates shown for the English seminar, and none after 30 September
1,102px
venue message height on a 375px phone before anything is bookable
5,244px
scroll distance to the submit button on mobile
0
photos of the machiya on the booking page (the Restaurant Guide page has three)
01

What a guest sees today

Captured live at 1440px and 375px on 17 Sep 2026. Numbers on the screenshots match the list beside them.

Desktop view of the TableCheck booking page: a small greyscale logo, then a long block of venue text filling the whole first screen, with no photo and no bookable item visible.
Desktop, 1440 × 900. The whole first screen is the venue message; the first photo, price and date all sit below the fold.
  • 1
    101 × 100 px greyscale logo is the only image above the fold.The Restaurant Guide page holds three machiya interior photos that never reach the booking page.
  • 2
    Message advertises a "Kyoto Craft Seminar" and a 15:00 seminar.Neither exists in the bookable list below. The English seminar runs 16:00–17:00.
  • 3
    Cancellation policy sits in the message, then again per item, then again in a modal.The rule that decides whether a seminar runs at all, the two-guest minimum, is about 3,000px further down, inside a survey question.
Mobile view at 375px: the venue message fills the screen; the date, time and party size fields are not yet visible.
Mobile, first screen. 1,102px of message before the form, and the first bookable item at 1,598px.
"The minimum number of participants for a seminar is 2 … we will notify you around evening the day before."

That sentence lives in an optional survey question at the bottom of the page. The seminar items themselves say Order Limit 1 ~ 8. A solo traveller can pay ¥5,000 and only find out the evening before that the seminar will not run.

02

What the venue can change

Everything below is within the venue's own reach, either through the TableCheck merchant admin or through its own marketing channels. None of it needs TableCheck to change its platform.

Track A

Content & configuration

Owner: House of KI NO BI, through the TableCheck merchant admin. No code is needed, and this is where most of the impact is.

  1. A1
    Past dates still listed under "Valid Dates" Moderate

    English seminar lists Aug 21, Aug 25–26, Sep 2, 4, 8–9, 11, 13; only Sep 18 and Sep 30 are in the future. Japanese seminar lists Aug 2 through Sep 10, all past, plus Sep 17 and 24. The calendar itself refuses past days, so nobody can book one by mistake, but the text under each seminar makes the schedule look far busier than it is and leaves the reader to work out which dates are real.

    Remove past dates from the description as they pass. Publish a rolling 8–12 week schedule; Kyoto visitors plan months out.

  2. A2
    Booking horizon ends 9 October Serious

    Gin Palace set: "May 01 ~ May 30, Jun 01 ~ Sep 30, Oct 09". Anyone planning November sees nothing.

    Set valid dates to a rolling 90 days, reviewed monthly.

  3. A3
    Venue message describes programs that don't exist Serious

    "Kyoto Craft Seminar [15:00–16:00]" and "Tasting Seminar [14:00–15:00 or 15:00–16:00]" are advertised; the bookable English seminar is 16:00–17:00 and no craft seminar is listed.

    Rewrite the message against the four live items, in EN and JA in the same sitting.

  4. A4
    Solo guests can pay for a two-person minimum Critical

    Seminar items show "Order Limit 1 ~ 8" and "1 ~ 9". The two-person minimum appears only in a survey question near the submit button.

    Set minimum order quantity to 2 on both seminar items; add "min. 2 guests" to the item title line.

  5. A5
    1,102px of text before the first bookable item Serious

    Forty-line venue message. On a 375px phone the first item starts at 1,598px and the submit button at 5,244px of a 5,714px page.

    Cut the message to 6–8 lines: walk-ins welcome, phone for bar seats, seminars need online booking. Move cancellation terms into each item.

  6. A6
    Written steps contradict the form Moderate

    Message says "1. select seminar, 2. participants, 3. date". The form puts Party/Date/Time above the menu on desktop and Date/Time/Party on mobile.

    Drop the numbered steps or rewrite them to match the actual field order.

  7. A7
    Untranslated and inconsistent admin strings Moderate

    Seat category "セミナー予約" on the English page. Titles mix "〇" and "○". "Meals: Tea, Dinner" is internal jargon.

    Translate seat categories, normalise title prefixes, hide or rename meal periods.

  8. A8
    English copy needs an edit Low

    "We will guide you explore the production process, ingredients and our philosophy."

    Copyedit all four descriptions; keep each under 60 words with the practical facts first.

  9. A9
    No atmosphere photography Serious

    Only 113 × 85 bottle thumbnails and a greyscale logo. A 100-year-old machiya with a karakami bar is the whole selling point and is never shown.

    Upload a wide cover image and one in-progress photo per experience.

  10. A10
    Room-charge rule buried Moderate

    "If your companions do not order a set menu, a room charge of ¥2,000 per person plus one drink order is required" is the last line of the Gin Palace description.

    Make it the first line, in bold.

  11. A11
    Restaurant Guide page is thin Moderate

    Bar/shop hours missing (only reception hours Wed–Sun 14:00–20:00), single tag "Bar", no reviews, three photos.

    Fill hours, tags (Gin, Tasting, Seminar, Distillery), price range and a full description.

Track B

Distribution

Owner: the venue's marketing. Where the bookings come from.

  1. B1
    Reserve with Google not verified Serious

    TableCheck supports Google Business Profile booking buttons; its own case study reports 58,282 Japan bookings via that channel in 2021. Whether this venue is connected is unknown.

    Check the Google listing for a Reserve button; enable it in merchant admin if absent.

  2. B2
    Outbound links need locale and attribution Low

    kinobigin.com, Tripadvisor and Tabelog link to the booking page. Links should carry /en/ and UTM parameters so the venue can see which channel converts.

    Update the three outbound links.

03

What to do, and in what order

Phase one needs no engineer and removes the findings most likely to cost a booking or a refund today, above all the two-guest minimum that the form does not enforce.

  1. Content fixes in merchant admin

    Track A. Everything the venue can do this week.

    1. Menu items: purge past dates, extend to 90 days, set seminar minimum to 2, fix titles and seat categories, copyedit, move the room-charge rule to the top. (A1, A2, A4, A7, A8, A10)
    2. Venue message: rewrite to 6–8 lines matching the live items and the form order; move cancellation terms into each item. (A3, A5, A6)
    3. Media: cover image plus one photo per experience. (A9)
    4. Restaurant Guide: hours, tags, description, price range. (A11)
    5. Check on EN and JA, on a phone and a laptop: the first bookable item should be visible without scrolling on a phone.
    ~2 hoursMerchant admin access

  2. Distribution

    Track B. Make the fixed page findable.

    1. Verify or enable Reserve with Google.
    2. Fix outbound links on kinobigin.com, Tripadvisor, Tabelog.
    ~1 hourGoogle Business Profile access

  3. What the page could feel like

    A working prototype in English and Japanese of the flow the content fixes are aiming at: experience first, guests second, dates generated from today so none can be stale, the two-guest minimum enforced by the stepper, the Gin Palace room charge priced live, and a short summary that follows the guest down the page. Nothing is submitted; the last step is a clearly marked demo confirmation.

    Open the prototype 日本語版

    ReferenceUse it to agree on the target before editing copy.
04

How we'll know it worked

Acceptance

  • No past dates printed on any item; horizon at least 60 days
  • Seminar minimum of 2 enforced by the form, not by a survey question
  • Venue message at most 8 lines and consistent with live items in EN and JA
  • First bookable item visible without scrolling on a 375px phone
  • At least one photo of the room on the booking page
  • Reserve with Google verified or enabled
# past dates still on the page?
curl -sL "https://www.tablecheck.com/en/shops/thehouseofkinobi/reserve" \
  | grep -o "Valid Dates[^<]*"

Risks

RiskLikelihoodMitigation
No merchant admin accessHighPhase 1 becomes a written brief for the venue; the prototype shows the target.
Seminar schedule really is sparseMediumRemove the past dates anyway; a short list of real dates is better than a long list of expired ones.
EN and JA drift apart againMediumEdit both locales in one session; keep canonical copy in the repo.