Essay on Maximizing Profits: Accurate Food Menu Design & Human Psychology

This is the science of accurately designing food menus in order to realize the most profitable and fashionable items to be sold in order to get more profit. In order to realize most of the profits from the menus, it is essential to understand the connection between food, prices, and human psychology. The creativity involved in the design of the menus includes the mix of colors as well as other vital elements that will draw the attention of the customers. The inclusion of the food prices will also make the process more difficult as these prices need to be optimized such that they would pose as too cheap neither intimidating.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

Menu design engineers have come up with various strategies that will encourage the creation of the best and optimally designed menus through various formatting and styling tips. In an article by Webreastraunt (2018), it was found out that the customers spend an average of 109 seconds looking at the menu at any one time. From this information, it is, therefore, necessary to establish the principal instruments that must be used in order to capture the attention of the customers at this short period. The first key aspect is to make the menu scannable such that the reader does not have to battle with overcrowding words or small fonts. The section headings, as well as the dish titles, should be clear and visible so that the customer may be drawn to make quick and precise choices.

The choices provided in the menu should also be limited to at least seven items since a high number of choices induces anxiety; hence the customer may not arrive at the best of choices. The size of the menu should also be sizeable in order to provide simplicity and ease of handling. This may not cause any discomfort during exchange or reference and can assist in the easy placement on tables and restaurant surfaces. The menu should not be more than two pages; otherwise, the ease of choice and selection from the many options will be a challenge (Menu Cover Depot, 2019).

With an optimal menu design, it is still not enough to make the customers spend at the restaurant. It is necessary to add some color and other attention-grabbing features on the menu. A photo or colored graphics with shaded boxes and borders serve to highlight the dishes as well as placing them at the center, top right corner or the top left corner of the menu. The items to be sold at most profitable prices are require to be placed at the top and the bottom of the list. The customers may tend to put reasonable concentration on the items at the top or bottom of the lists hence the placement of these items at the top or bottom may assist in influencing their choices (Singh & Heldman, 2001).

Also, allowing one food item to act as a decoy for the selection of another may assist in planning for the appropriate choices made by the client. Expensive foods may be bordered with more reasonably priced dishes which will assist in providing alternative hence the buying of the dish. At the same time, it is reasonable to include various sizes and levels of a dish in order to enable the customers to feel comfortable while acquiring the different sized products according to their needs (Norman, 1986). This will ensure that the needs of the customers have been met without having to haggle on prices and sizes. Photos should be used sparingly while color should be employed generously in emotional and subconscious techniques. For example, the use of bright red, yellow and orange assist in capturing and triggering appetite while a combination of the restaurant colors with those of the menu attract and reinforce aesthetic associations (How to Use Menu Engineering to Create a Profitable Menu, 2019).

Pricing on menus may also be delicate as some symbols, or money signs may be interpreted differently hence best avoided. Price columns should also be avoided as the grouping of prices will make the customers compare prices rather than spend time on the selection of the food. The idea is to have the customers' eyes glide over the menu and make a non-price influenced decision hence it is essential to have the fonts of the prices and those of the dishes being the same (Menu Cafe Black Images, Stock Photos & Vectors | Shutterstock, 2019).

The menu above has implemented the previously discussed instances of food menu engineering and design. The food and the prices are all grouped according to the type of meal as well as the corner method of grouping employed. At these instances, the food selected to be placed on the menu are most susceptible to selling on the upside and may earn the restaurant the most amount of profits. These trends in the modern society consumerism require that the food is backed up by dessert or at times a drink or appetizer. Mostly, individuals in modern society prefer snacks and quick dishes compared to slow cooking and dishwashing. Family meals may also be served during this time.

References

Menu Cafe Black Images, Stock Photos & Vectors | Shutterstock. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.shutterstock.com/search/menu+cafe+black?ref_context=keyword

How to Use Menu Engineering to Create a Profitable Menu. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.webstaurantstore.com/article/89/menu-psychology-the-science-behind-menu-engineering.html

Menu Engineering: How to Raise Restaurant Profits 15% or More | Menu Cover Depot. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.menucoverdepot.com/resource-center/articles/restaurant-menu-engineering/

Singh, R. P., & Heldman, D. R. (2001). Introduction to food engineering. Gulf Professional Publishing.

Norman, D. A. (1986). Cognitive engineering. User centered system design, 31, 61.