PSYCHOLOGY OF

MENU
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GROUP 2
BARRO
CELLON
TABI
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 Psychology of Menu Design
Every menu is a carefully constructed to persuade you into making certain decisions, predominantly ones that

will ultimately make you spend more money. The psychology behind menu engineering is backed by science
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and countless hours of research, and covers aspects such as positioning, color theory, use of buzz words,

controlled costing and more.

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The psychology of menu design helps restaurants implement menu engineering techniques to influence diner

decisions and changing the way of every customers.

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 Menu Engineering
The concept of menu engineering is developed in the early 1980’s by two professors at the

Michigan State School of Hospitality. Rooted in scientific analysis and practical knowledge, its
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goal is to subconsciously influence customer’s menu selections in order to maximize profits. In
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short, “How can I get my guests to buy the item I wanted them to buy?”
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 The Menu Engineering Process
The menu engineering can be a hefty undertaking, but its benefits far
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outweigh any costs or time investments. In fact, most restaurants
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improve profits by up to 2 to 10 percent from a reengineered menu.

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 Evaluating Menu Profitability
The process begins with an evaluation of your menu’s profitability. To do
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this, you must calculate each menu item’s contribution margin, or the menu
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price less the total cost of ingredients.

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 Determining Popularity
Determining the menu item’s popularity is another way of calculating it’s demand.  Popularity is

determined by comparing sales of items to expected popularity. The expected popularity is the
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predicted menu mix (sometimes called the sales mix) if each of the menu items in a category were
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equally popular.
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 Identifying Stars, Plowhorses, Puzzles and
Dogs
Using the following chat, plot each menu in one of the four quadrants. This helps to identify the

menu items that are contributing most of the sales-and items that you will use to drive in the future
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 Stars
Stars are often menu items that will get ordered — because of their uniqueness or high quality

— even at a higher price

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 Plow horses
Popular menu items with low contribution to profit margin 

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 Puzzles
Unpopular menu items with high contribution to profit margin 

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 Dogs
(low profit, low popularity): dishes that do not get ordered and that cost you a lot of money to

prepare.
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 HOW RESTAURANT
PERSUDE US TO BUY
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MORE
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 Color Confusion
The colors on the menu can affect what we order. Green implies the food is fresh,
and orange stimulates the appetite. Yellow
c is a happy hue and is used to catch the

diner's attention .Red encourages action and is used to persuade us to buy the
meals with the highest profit margins.
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 Empower the Customer
Restaurant wine lists can rival the average novel in length, especially in high end
establishments. This is a deliberate marketing
c tactic designed to empower guests
to make a decision, the more information listed about each vintage, the more
likely we are to choose the wine.
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 Negative Space
If a menu scrammed with text, the eye will naturally be drawn to any open
spaces. Menu designers use this to their advantage
c items with the largest profit
margins are often set in their own space, away from the hustle and bustle of the
rest of the descriptions
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 Material World
The material of the menu is used to communicate the brand image.
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 Glossaries
Look out for a glossary section the menu. You're more likely
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to order the pricy steak if you know exactly how it's prepared
and produced
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 Story Telling
Most items on a menu will chave descriptions of a
similar length to fit in with the general layout of the
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page.
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 A Blast From The Past
Nostalgia is a powerful force. A carefully worded description can load almost
any dish with an emotional resonance thatc is hard to resist.
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 Controlled Costing
No matter how tempting each dish sounds, diners still take the price into
account. .Restaurateurs use this to their advantage-for
c example a meal priced at
$10.95 makes us feel like we're getting a good deal. Exclusive establishments
tend to use round numbers. Adding an air of chic sophistication.
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 Limited Choices
A huge menu might seem like a good idea, but being forced to choose between
hundreds of options can make us feel stressed.
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seven dishes in each section-enough to make us feel like we have plenty of
options without overwhelming us
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 Feeding the Imagination
Restaurants pay close attention to how each meal description is written.
Superlative clams descriptions like “the cworld’s best burger "line-caught or can't
possibly be true and diners will simply ignore them. However enticing adjectives
will feed the imagination and get our taste buds tingling
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 Covert Currency
Paying for a meals the biggest point when dining out. Crafty restaurateurs remove
currency signs from the menu to take thec emphasis away from the cost of the
items you're ordering. Beware of prices written out in letters-this tactic can
encourage us to spend up to 30 percent more
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 Subconcious Scheming
We subconsciously order the top two items in each
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menu section more often so restaurant owners tend to
list their highest-margin dishes first.
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 The Golden Triangle
When we look at a menu our c
eyes typically move to
the middle first before traveling to the top right
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comer and then, finally, to the top left.

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 Decoy Dishes
Some restaurants try to deceive their diners by placing a slightly more expensive
item at the top of the menu. This makes all
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bang for your buck. It also gives us the impression we're getting a bargain,
encouraging us to spend more.
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Thank you!
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