If you think that your appetite is responsible for the order you placed in a restaurant, you are sadly mistaken. What you eat or what you order has nothing to do with the cravings. It has everything to do with the way your favorite restaurant’s menu is presented to you and the way it exerts powerful sway over what you are going to have for dinner.
Here are a few tricks that menu cards play on you
Mouthwatering language
In one study, when a menu item was described in great detail, its sales increased by 27 percent. This carefully researched technique convinces you not only to purchase the item, but to also enjoy it more.
Fonts
Menus play with fonts to catch your eyes. People tend to view bold listings 42 percent more than plain type when they read, research shows. If an item is bold, chances are the restaurant wants to sell more of it. Customers also pay more attention to dishes that have a contrasting font, font color, or type size.
Mentioning price
Menus often avoid using decimals and currency signs. An item listed as 14 will sell better than one listed as $14.00. More numbers make the price seem higher, and sign draw attention to the price. Some menus also prefer not to line prices up in a straight vertical line, so you are forced to read each item and be tempted by the alluring dish descriptions rather than scan for the least expensive one. Also: The first section of the menu and the beginning of each subsequent section are prime places for expensive entrees, because that is where diners tend to scan first. Similarly, items placed on the top and bottom of columns have 25 percent higher sales.
Pictures
Illustrations, icons, or photos of dishes are there for one reason to make you satiate. Its basic marketing: Consumers pay more attention to ads with graphics. They also notice color ads before black-and-white ads, and look at color ads more often and for longer periods of time. The same thinking applies to a pretty photo, whether it’s mouth watering BBQ or a decadent chocolate dessert.
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