Cookie Policy

Cookie Policy for DonerKnives.com

Welcome to the Cookie Policy of DonerKnives.com (the “Website”). This policy explains what cookies are, why we use them, how we use cookies from our own site and third parties, and how you can manage your preferences. We are committed to protecting your privacy and complying with the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the ePrivacy Directive. Our goal is to be transparent and user-friendly, so you can easily understand our use of cookies.

What Are Cookies?

Cookies are small text files that a website saves on your computer, smartphone, or other device when you visit. These files contain a small amount of data that help the website remember information about your visit. Cookies serve a variety of purposes, such as enabling core site functions, remembering your preferences, and collecting analytics data. In practice, cookies make your experience on websites smoother by keeping track of certain choices or actions you’ve made.

There are different types of cookies:

• First-party cookies are set by the website you are visiting (in this case, donerknives.com) and are typically used to ensure the site functions properly or to remember your settings.
• Third-party cookies are set by external services or providers that we integrate into our site (for example, Google or Facebook). These cookies can track your browsing across different sites and are often used for analytics or advertising purposes.
• Session cookies are temporary cookies that last only while your browser is open and are deleted once you close it.
• Persistent cookies remain on your device for a set period (specified in the cookie) or until you delete them. They help remember things for your return visits (such as keeping you logged in or recalling your preferences).

Why We Use Cookies

We use cookies and similar tracking technologies to improve your experience and to ensure our website operates efficiently. Different cookies serve different functions. Some cookies are necessary for technical reasons, while others enable us to understand your use of the site or to support our marketing efforts. In summary, we use cookies to:

• Make our website work correctly (Functional/Necessary purposes): For example, cookies help remember the items in your shopping cart, keep you logged into your account as you browse, and enable core features like checkout and account management.
• Remember your preferences: We use cookies to recall choices you’ve made on our site (such as language selection or display preferences) so that we can personalize your experience and avoid asking for the same information repeatedly.
• Analyze and improve our website (Analytics): Cookies allow us to collect information about how visitors use our site, such as which pages are most popular, how long users stay on each page, and how they navigate through the site. This helps us understand what works well and what could be improved. We do not identify you personally through analytics cookies – we look at aggregated, anonymous data.
• Support our marketing and advertising (Marketing): Certain cookies help us with marketing efforts, such as showing relevant advertisements or measuring the effectiveness of advertising campaigns. For instance, if we run ads on Google or social media platforms, cookies might be used to track when you’ve visited our site and whether you’ve taken an action (like making a purchase) after seeing our ad.

By using cookies for the above purposes, we aim to enhance your overall user experience, keeping the site secure and easy to use, while also improving our services and outreach. We do not use cookies to collect sensitive personal information or to pass your personal details to third parties without your consent.

Types of Cookies We Use

To give you a clear overview, we’ve grouped the cookies on our site into categories based on their purpose. Below we explain each category and provide examples of the cookies in use.

Strictly Necessary Cookies

These cookies are essential for the basic functioning of our website – without them, the site would not work properly. They are always active because they do not require user consent under the law (they are used solely to provide a service explicitly requested by you, the user). Strictly necessary cookies do not collect any information for marketing or analytics purposes. Instead, they enable core features such as:

• Shopping Cart & Checkout: For example, when you add products to your cart or proceed to checkout, a cookie helps remember your cart contents as you navigate between pages. This ensures that the items remain in your cart until you complete the order.
• Account Login and Security: If you log into your account, we use cookies (or similar means like session storage) to keep you logged in as you move from page to page. Likewise, we use cookies to support security measures, such as remembering your session ID and preventing others from impersonating you, and to help protect against fraud (for instance, by throttling repetitive login attempts).
• Site Stability and Network Management: Some necessary cookies help distribute website traffic between multiple servers to ensure the site remains available and speedy for all users, or they might be used to remember consent choices you’ve made regarding cookies (so we don’t keep asking you on every page).

Examples: A cookie named woocommerce_items_in_cart (used by our e-commerce platform) may track the number of items in your cart, and a session cookie might be used to assign an anonymous session ID to your visit (allowing the site to remember that you are the same user as you click around). These examples are strictly necessary for providing the shopping functionality and are active by default. Without them, basic e-commerce actions like adding products to a cart or logging into your account would not be possible.

Functional Cookies (Preferences)

Functional cookies (sometimes called “preferences cookies”) enable additional features and remember choices to improve your experience on our site. While not strictly necessary for the basic operation of the website, they make using our site easier and more personalized. We use these cookies to remember settings that you have selected, so you don’t have to set them every time you visit. For example:

• Language and Region: If our site is available in multiple languages or if we display content tailored to your region, a cookie might save your preferred language (e.g., English) or country so that you see the appropriate content without having to choose each time.
• User Preferences and Features: If you use any filters or sorting options when browsing our product catalog, a cookie might store those filter selections (for instance, if you filter knives by size or type, the site can remember and maintain that filter as you continue to browse). Similarly, if you adjust certain site settings or indicate preferences (like opting in or out of certain notifications), functional cookies can save those choices.
• Enhanced Features: Functional cookies might support embedded media or social sharing features. For example, if we allow you to share a product on social media or play a video on our site, functional cookies may help those features run smoothly (though in many cases, these would also involve third-party cookies – see the Third-Party section below).

Functional cookies, unlike strictly necessary ones, typically require your consent because they are not absolutely required for the service you requested. However, they are aimed at making your experience better. If you disable or do not consent to functional cookies, some of these conveniences (like remembering your preferences) may not work, but the main functions of the site should still be available.

Examples: A cookie such as language_choice might store the language you selected, or a plugin cookie might remember that you’ve seen a certain tutorial or pop-up so it doesn’t repeat. Another example is if we use a tool that lets you chat with customer support or provide feedback; it might set a cookie to recall your user name or chat session. These cookies simply remember changes you’ve made or features you’ve engaged with, to personalize your next visit.

Analytics Cookies

Analytics cookies (also known as “statistics cookies”) help us understand how visitors use our website. We use this information to analyze traffic, user behavior, and overall site performance, which in turn helps us improve the website. We only set analytics cookies if you have given consent, as these cookies are not strictly necessary for providing our services.

On DonerKnives.com, we use third-party analytics services, primarily Google Analytics (a web analytics service provided by Google). Google Analytics uses cookies to collect data such as what pages you visit, how long you stay on the site, what links you click, and other usage patterns. This data is aggregated and does not identify you personally. It provides us with statistics like the number of visitors, which pages are most popular, what website or advertisement brought users to our site, and how users interact with our pages. We use these insights to make our content better and to troubleshoot issues (for example, if a particular page is causing users to leave quickly, we may investigate why).

Key points about our analytics cookies:

• They often include cookies with names like _ga and _gid (set by Google Analytics). For instance, _ga is a cookie that assigns a random unique ID to each visitor so that Google Analytics can distinguish between different users. This cookie can persist for a long period (often 2 years) unless you clear it, and it helps count how many people visit our site and how they navigate it.
• We have configured Google Analytics in a privacy-friendly manner. For example, if available, we may have enabled IP anonymization so that Google Analytics does not store your full IP address (this means the last digits of your IP are masked, reducing the chance of identifying you). Google Analytics also does not provide us with information like your name or exact location – it focuses on broader statistics.
• The data collected via analytics cookies is used only for statistical analysis and website improvement. We do not use it to profile you or to target advertisements to you (analytics data stays separate from advertising data in our practices).

Example: When you consent to analytics, Google Analytics will set cookies such as _ga (to recognize you on future visits) and _gid (to store a session ID for your visit). These cookies might tell us, for example, that 100 people visited our product page today, that 60% of them were new visitors, and that the average time spent on the page was 2 minutes. This information helps us gauge interest in our products and understand if users are finding what they need.

Marketing Cookies

Marketing cookies are used to track visitors across websites and show them relevant advertisements or promotions. These cookies are typically set by third-party advertising networks or social media platforms and help us measure the effectiveness of our marketing campaigns. We will only use marketing cookies if you explicitly opt-in, since they are not essential and involve sharing some browsing data with third parties (like Google or Facebook) for advertising purposes.

Marketing cookies on DonerKnives.com enable functions such as:

• Ad Performance and Conversion Tracking: We may run ads about our products on platforms like Google Ads or Facebook/Instagram. Cookies help us know if you clicked one of those ads and then later made a purchase or performed some action on our site. This information is valuable because it tells us which ads are working. For example, the Facebook Pixel (also known as Meta Pixel) is a piece of code on our site that, with your consent, sets a cookie to track when you visit our site via a Facebook ad. It helps us understand the audience that is interested in our products and can allow us to “re-target” you with relevant ads on Facebook or Instagram. A typical cookie from Facebook for this purpose is named _fbp, which identifies browsers to provide advertising and site analytics services.
• Personalized Advertising: Marketing cookies can record that you visited our site and what products you viewed. Advertising partners like Google or Facebook can use this information to show you ads that are more likely to interest you. For instance, if you looked at a specific döner knife on our site, you might later see an advertisement for that knife (or a related product) when browsing other sites or on social media. This is commonly known as “re-marketing” or “retargeting.”
• Social Media Ads and Sharing: If we use any social media “like” or “share” plugins, or if you interact with our own social media content through our site, those platforms might set cookies as well. While these could be considered functional (for enabling the feature), they also allow the social platform to track engagement for advertising purposes. However, we currently primarily focus our marketing cookies on advertising and analytics integration rather than on-site social sharing features.

We want to be clear that accepting marketing cookies will result in some of your browsing data (such as the fact that you visited donerknives.com and looked at certain products) being shared with the respective third-party (e.g., Google, Facebook). These parties may then combine that information with data from other sites you visit to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant ads. If you do not consent to marketing cookies, you will still see advertising online (that’s unavoidable), but those ads will not be specifically tailored based on your visits to our site.

Examples: A Google advertising cookie named IDE (from Google’s DoubleClick domain) might be used if we run Google Ads campaigns; it helps with ad delivery or re-targeting. Similarly, as mentioned, Facebook may set a cookie like _fbp to identify users who have visited our site for ad targeting. These cookies typically persist for a few months up to a year unless cleared, and they carry information that our ad partners use to show you Doner Knives promotions on other platforms.

Third-Party Cookies and Embedded Content

In addition to the cookies we set, we also use third-party services and content on our website that may set their own cookies. These third-party cookies might fall into the categories above (e.g., an embedded video might use functional cookies, or an analytics script from a third party sets analytics cookies), but we want to highlight them separately so you know which external parties might be involved when you use our site. We only integrate third-party tools that we trust and that are aimed at enhancing your experience or our understanding of site usage. Key third-party integrations on DonerKnives.com include:

• Google Services: As noted, we use Google Analytics for site statistics. We might also use other Google services like Google Ads (for marketing) or Google Maps (for showing a store location or shipping origin, for example). Google Analytics and Google Ads set cookies as described in the Analytics and Marketing sections above. Google Maps, if used on the site (for instance, on a Contact Us page), may set cookies to remember your preferences or track usage of map features. All Google cookies are governed by Google’s own privacy and cookie policies. Google’s cookies often start with identifiers like _ga (Analytics) or have names like NID and IDE (for advertising).
• Facebook and Instagram: We have implemented the Facebook Pixel for advertising and analytics related to Facebook/Instagram. This means Facebook may set cookies when you visit our site (provided you consented to marketing cookies). These cookies allow us to measure the effectiveness of ads we place on Facebook and to reach people who are likely to be interested in our products. If we ever embed content from Facebook or Instagram (such as an Instagram feed on our page or a Facebook share button), those services could set additional cookies to facilitate that functionality or for analytics/advertising on their end.
• YouTube Videos: We may feature product videos or demonstrations on our site via YouTube embeds. YouTube is a Google-owned platform, and when you play an embedded YouTube video on our site, YouTube may set cookies on your device. These cookies can be used to track video views and to remember your settings (like volume level or video quality preferences). Some YouTube cookies are also used for advertising or tracking user behavior across sites – for example, YSC is a cookie that YouTube uses to track viewing of a video, and VISITOR_INFO1_LIVE helps measure your bandwidth to optimize video streaming. If you have not consented to functional or marketing cookies, we will either block these YouTube cookies or use YouTube’s privacy-enhanced mode (which limits tracking) where possible.
• Social Media Plugins: Besides Facebook/Instagram, our site might include features from other social platforms (Twitter, Pinterest, etc.) – for example, “Tweet this” buttons, Pinterest “Pin it” buttons on product images, or similar. If these are present and you interact with them, those services may drop cookies. These cookies could recognize you as a user of that service (if you’re logged in to Twitter, for instance) and allow the social network to record that you shared or viewed content on our site. They might also be used for analytics or personalization on those social platforms.
• Payment and Security Services: When you make a purchase on our site, you may be directed to or interact with third-party payment gateways (for example, our payments are handled by a provider like Mollie, and shipping by Fraktjakt as mentioned in our Privacy Policy). While using those services, you might encounter their cookies. For instance, when you go to the secure payment page, the payment provider might set a cookie to remember your transaction session or to implement fraud prevention measures. These cookies ensure that your payment is processed securely and that you can be redirected back to our site with your order confirmed. They are usually short-lived and used only as needed for the transaction.
• Other Embedded Content: Occasionally, we might embed content from other websites to enrich our pages (such as a map, a widget, or external media). Embedded content from third parties behaves as if you visited their site directly, meaning those third-party websites might set cookies and collect data about you. We strive to minimize this and will inform you when significant third-party content is present. In all cases, such cookies will not be loaded unless you have given consent to the relevant category (e.g., a map might require functional cookies consent, a third-party analytics script would require analytics consent, etc.).

Important: Any third-party cookies on our site are not under our direct control. However, we carefully choose our partners and ensure that no unnecessary third-party integrations are present unless they provide value to you as a user or to us in operating the website. We will update this policy if we introduce new third-party services that set cookies, so you remain informed. You can also find details of specific cookies (names and purposes) in the cookie settings interface or in the detailed cookie list on this page (if provided below).

By default, no third-party cookies (like those from Google, Facebook, YouTube, etc.) will be set unless you have allowed the relevant cookie categories in our consent banner. For example, if you decline marketing cookies, the Facebook Pixel and Google Ads cookies will not run; if you decline analytics, Google Analytics will not track your visit.

Your Consent Choices and Managing Cookies

Your privacy and choice are very important to us. We want you to have full control over which cookies you accept or reject. Here’s how our cookie consent works and the ways you can manage cookies:

• Consent on First Visit: When you first visit donerknives.com, you will see a cookie consent banner or notice. This banner lets you know that we use cookies and asks for your consent for different categories (except strictly necessary cookies, which are always active by default). You can choose to Accept All cookies, Reject All non-essential cookies, or pick and choose categories (e.g., only accept analytics but not marketing, or vice versa). No analytics or marketing cookies will be set until you make your choice. If you simply continue using the site without interacting with the banner, we will treat that as a refusal of non-essential cookies (they will remain inactive) unless the banner indicates some other default. In line with GDPR and ePrivacy requirements, we do not load non-essential cookies unless you give us a clear consent signal.
• Cookie Settings Icon (Change/Withdraw Consent): After your initial choice, you can change or withdraw your consent at any time. Our website features a Cookie Settings icon (often a small cookie symbol or a gear icon) that remains accessible (for example, it may appear in the bottom corner of the page or in the footer as “Cookie Settings”). By clicking this icon, you can reopen the cookie consent preferences. You’ll be able to see which categories of cookies you have allowed or blocked, and you can adjust your selections. If you previously accepted certain cookies and have changed your mind, you can deselect those categories (withdrawing consent), and our site will stop using them. Likewise, if you initially declined cookies but later decide you want to enable (for instance, to get a more personalized experience or to help us with analytics), you can do so through this settings panel. Changes you make are usually applied immediately. For example, if you withdraw consent for analytics, we will stop loading the Google Analytics script on your browser and it will no longer collect data on your visits going forward.
• Browser Settings: In addition to our website’s own controls, you have the option to manage cookies through your web browser settings. Most browsers allow you to view the cookies stored on your device and delete them individually or all at once. You can also typically block cookies from certain sites or from all sites. For instance, you can configure your browser to block all third-party cookies or to notify you when a site is trying to set a cookie. If you prefer, you can delete all cookies when you close your browser. Using browser controls is a more general way to manage cookies and will affect all websites, not just donerknives.com. Please note, however, if you disable all cookies via your browser (especially if you block even necessary cookies), our site may not function correctly – features like the shopping cart, login, and other essential components rely on cookies. Blocking only third-party cookies will still allow our site’s essential first-party cookies to operate.
• Opt-Out Plugins and Tools: Some third parties provide their own opt-out mechanisms. For example, Google offers a Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on that you can install, which prevents Google Analytics from collecting data on any site you visit (not just ours). Facebook and other advertising networks sometimes allow you to adjust ad preferences in your user account or through industry opt-out sites (like the Your Online Choices website for EU users, which can control many advertising cookies from participating networks). While these tools are outside of our website’s direct control, we mention them as additional resources if you want to take extra steps in controlling your data.
• Do Not Track: If your browser is set to send a “Do Not Track” (DNT) signal, our approach is to treat it seriously. When feasible, we interpret DNT as an indication that you do not want to be tracked for analytics or advertising. Our systems will attempt to disable analytics and marketing cookies for visitors with DNT enabled. However, not all third-party services honor DNT signals reliably, so using the methods above (cookie settings or browser blocking) is the most surefire way to enforce your preferences.

Please remember: Necessary cookies cannot be turned off via our cookie banner or settings icon because they are needed for the website to operate (though you could still block them in your browser, at the risk of breaking site functionality). For all other cookies, the power to consent is in your hands. If at any time you have questions or encounter any difficulty with changing your cookie preferences, feel free to contact us for help.

Finally, keep in mind that your cookie choices are device and browser-specific. If you consent to analytics on your laptop, we won’t automatically know your preference on your phone – you’ll see the cookie banner again there. Likewise, clearing your cookies will reset your preferences, and we’ll ask for consent again the next time you visit.

Updates to this Policy

We may update this Cookie Policy from time to time to reflect changes in the cookies we use or for other operational, legal, or regulatory reasons. For example, if we start using a new analytics tool or add an advertising partner, we will update the relevant sections of this policy. We encourage you to review this policy periodically to stay informed about our use of cookies and related technologies. We will notify you of significant changes by updating the “last updated” date of this policy and, if substantial changes are made, we might provide a more prominent notice (such as a warning on our site or an email notification if appropriate).

By continuing to use our Website after any updates come into effect, you acknowledge the revised policy. However, we will not make any change that retroactively reduces your privacy rights without obtaining your consent.

Privacy Policy and Contact Information

For more detailed information about how we handle personal data (beyond cookies), including data protection measures and your rights under GDPR, please refer to our Privacy Policy (available at https://donerknives.com/privacy-policy/). That document covers how we collect, use, and protect your personal information, of which cookies and online identifiers are just one part.

If you have any questions or concerns about our use of cookies or this Cookie Policy, you are welcome to contact us. You can reach our team via email at contact@donerknives.com or through the contact form on our website. We value your privacy and trust, and we will be happy to assist you with any inquiries or requests related to your cookie preferences or personal data.

Thank you for taking the time to read our Cookie Policy. We hope this explanation helps you feel comfortable and informed while using DonerKnives.com. Enjoy your browsing, and happy shopping for high-quality döner knives!