Last week, we talked a little bit about designing the perfect menu for your restaurant. Today, we’re going to talk a little bit about some menu blunders (and exceptions to the rules) that we’ve seen out in the wild.
- Handwritten price corrections
There are two things which handwritten price corrections do for your patrons, and neither of them are terribly good.
- Tells the patrons that you’re too cheap to get the menu reprinted with the correct pricing.
- Draws attention to the fact that you’ve changed your price, making the customers less likely to order.
Pricing changes are just a matter of course for any restaurant. There are market fluctuations, and those fluctuations are naturally handed on to the customer. They’re MORE likely to notice it if there is handwriting there.
- Cut and pasted menu items
This passes on a similar message as the first one, but this can also play into your hands by demonstrating that you’re willing to change the menu to reflect the customer’s tastes and styles.
The cynical part of the equation asks what was wrong with the item that the new item is covering to make it need to be replaced.
- Paper menus
We’ve been to one restaurant where they had paper menus, because the menu changed every day. This was a down-home restaurant where you got the feeling that you were eating with your Aunt Shirley at the dinner table.
If, however, you’re running a pizza place that has a static menu, it’s probably best to get some plastic covers to protect it from damage.
- Proofreading challenged
Above everything else, proofreading is the most important thing that you can do with your menu, else you’ll end up in a blog post titled 10 menu mistakes that will crack you up.
At best, having a menu that is riddled with typos is funny. At worst, it presents an unprofessional image that taints the experience of being in your restaurant.
- Pretentious
This is about word choice. It’s also about matching the language of your menu to the people who are coming into the place. If you’re not running a formal dining place, you can write that you’ve got green beans instead of haricot verts.
The menu that you have can propel your brand quite easily. Overdo it with some of these blunders, however, and the experience turns from being a trip through a magical wonderland into being a meh meal that diners won’t want to return.
