Posted by One of the first things a customer interacts with at a restaurant is the menu, perhaps before a cashier or waitress and always before your meal. It is imperative to ensure that your menu leaves a great first impression.
A menu with an excessive quantity of items, poor writing, terrible photos, or an odd design will have a negative impact on a diner’s experience, putting pressure on your cuisine and service to make up for it. If your menu is appealing, well-written, and perfectly represents your brand, your guests will immediately feel they have made the best restaurant decision.
By highlighting lucrative menu items before restaurant menu printing and creating a positive first impression with customers, a well-designed menu can also significantly impact income. While it may be tempting to concentrate just on aesthetics, a menu redesign will be far more successful if you’ve done a menu engineering analysis to determine the profitability and popularity of your menu items. When building your menu using this data to your advantage, draw the reader’s attention to your most profitable items.
You can use these seven restaurant menu design ideas and suggestions to help you decide on your menu layout. Continue reading to discover menu design tips and get motivated by successful eateries.
1. Think about eye movements
When reading a menu, our eyes frequently start in the middle of the page, move to the top right, and then to the top left, or what is known as The Golden Triangle, according to some experts in menu engineering. Some contend that readers’ eyes naturally scan the page’s top or the text’s top right corner as they read.
Nevertheless, a third of your diners are more likely to order the first thing they see, per a Korean study published in the Journal of Global Business and Technology. In contrast, a San Francisco State University study claims that customers scan menus like books, beginning at the top left.
Tip – Cover all of your bases. Place meals with high margins on the menu’s top left, top right, and centre positions.
2. Good Use of White Space
The human eye doesn’t like clutter. According to studies, using adequate white space might increase reader comprehension by up to 30%. Plan to include significant white space in your food menu design if you want the items and descriptions to stand out.
Tip – Leave some space to enhance aesthetics and prevent overwhelming the visitor.
3. Use Boxes and Colour to Direct Views
Highlight a dish on the menu if it is significant or, better yet, if you know it will be profitable. Use design elements to guide your customers through your menu by focusing their attention where it belongs.
If you have the budget, hiring a graphic designer or artist to develop your menu is a terrific approach to ensure that diners remember your brand. Following whatever menu engineering data you may have, a professional menu designer may also assist you in creating your menu. They can skillfully use lines, colours, and pictures to highlight your Puzzles (high profit, low popularity) and Star menu items (high profit, high popularity).
4. Dollar Signs are Gone ($)
A Cornell University study found that clients who made their selections from menus without dollar signs ($) spent significantly more money than those who made their selections from menus with standard prices.
Ultimately, your guests know what the number next to the menu item implies. Dollar signs should be avoided because they negatively affect spending money.
Tip – Consider taking away the dollar signs, and avoid listing prices in a single column because this encourages comparison.
5. Lessen the Weight of Choice
According to a Bournemouth University study, there is a happy medium between having too few and too many menu options. The selection of restaurants is already overwhelming for diners. Don’t have customers search through countless selections after they’ve decided on your establishment.
Additionally, each item on your menu should be distinct to aid your customers in choosing. Although serving two distinct steak dishes may give the impression of abundance, in reality, it only makes it more difficult for your guests to decide and puts the two meals in direct competition.
A lengthy menu can also reduce sales since it slows down table turnover, which means your front-of-house employees will serve fewer customers during shifts. A short menu is significantly easier for back-of-house operations and can result in better execution of each item.
Tip – Keep your menu concise and well-curated before going for restaurant menu printing.
6. Make Use of Words’ Power
To convey a dish’s flavour, use the item description. The words “savoury,” “buttery,” and “crisp” produce an immediate feeling of hunger. Use descriptions to show the character of the restaurant and the care you put into each dish.
According to a study by Dr. Brian Wansink of Cornell University, descriptive menu labels boost an item’s sales by 27% and make diners more satisfied with their meals. It resulted in more positive consumer feedback (as long as the product lived up to the highly favourable description).
Tip – Use evocative wording when composing your menu description.
7. Think About Using Pictures
Gregg Rapp, a well-known menu developer, discovered that placing a pleasing image beside a food item boosts sales by 30%. However, a word of advice: Avoid using subpar pictures on your social media or your menu. A lack of images is preferable to poor photos.
Note that you can write out your restaurant’s Instagram username on the menu with a call-out like “check out our Instagram if you want to preview any of our dishes” if you don’t want to utilise images on your menu because printing them can be expensive. You may also include a QR code or a bit.ly link for simple access. Make sure you routinely refresh your Instagram with stunning new photos.
Tip: To draw customers to your online ordering page (more on that below), think about using shop front signage high-quality photographs of high-margin items, especially when designing digital menu boards.
Get The Best Menu Printed with Bloom Graphics
When reading a menu, our eyes frequently start in the middle of the page, move to the top right, and then to the top left, or what is known as The Golden Triangle, according to some experts in menu engineering. Some contend that readers’ eyes naturally scan the page’s top or the text’s top right corner as they read.