Going out for a restaurant meal is often a treat and choosing a dish that sounds mouth-watering is a personal choice. But you’d be amazed at just what goes on in the background to help you decide which mouth-watering dish you actually want when you read the menu.

Restauranteurs use all sorts of clever tricks to get you to buy the dishes that they want you to buy.

And if you don’t believe us, take a look at some of these tricks and see if you’ve succumbed to the charm of the well-placed menu item before…

They use fancy words

Menu writers add clever jargon or fancy words to make a dish sound better. So if the dish is simply a chocolate brownie, the writer may say, “Californian sticky chocolate brownie” – I mean doesn’t that sound divine? We would buy it, even if we didn’t want pudding.

The more copy you write on the menu item, the less it costs in a customer’s mind because it’s perceived by the customer that you’re giving them more for their money. (Study conducted by a number of American universities)

So a simple chocolate dessert for example could be written as ‘decadent and silky chocolate pudding’ which sounds so much better. The study also revealed that customers rated the more descriptive menus items as opposed to the plain text items. We think that says a lot about how you describe your menu items.

They use mouth-watering images

Often you’ll see a photo of the dish on the menu and according to research, you’re 30% more likely to order a dish on a menu if you can see a well-placed photo of the food on the menu.

We ‘eat with our eyes’ so to speak, so a good photo will help food sales to increase for a particular item.

They don’t use rand signs or they make the money look good

Sometimes menus won’t include the monetary sign such as R for Rand. In other words, if your steak is R125, it will simply be written as 125 on the menu. Apparently this is a clever way of helping you forget that you’re actually spending MONEY.  

Also interesting to note is that perception and money are linked to how you write this down on a menu. For example, if you have a burger that’s R30, it’s often perceived to be a less friendly price than R29.95 – which is perceived to be more reasonable. As ridiculous it might look, it certainly works according to studies in the USA.

They show a connection between food and family or they use food terms we like

Restauranteurs call certain menu items by nostalgic terms such as Grandma’s Chicken Pie or Aunty Polly’s Pancake Supreme. People love to be transported back to their childhoods or to a time where they could identify specific foods with warm and happy feelings.

But it doesn’t end there – there is also mention of ‘home-grown’ or ‘Authentic’ or ‘Wholesome’ which can be a little subjective.

We’re sincerely not suggesting that restauranteurs are lying, but how far is home-grown actually?? (There’s no researched distance as a specific fact or answer, it’s really just an opinion) Authentic is also often an opinion and wholesome covers so many different angles…technically all true.

But we still love to hear or see the words on a menu because we’re big softies.

They get clever with word placement, colours, fonts and more

Guests are more likely to order a food item from a menu if it is in a separate box/compartment, if it’s written in bold or in a special colour or font, or if it’s referred to as the ‘Today’s Special’ , according to research.

Also important to note is that the top-right or bottom-left of a menu corner are the first places your eye will go to when you read a menu, so often expensive items are placed in these areas.

The colour red is statistically more stimulating to your appetite and yellow is more attractive to hold your attention.

Are you thinking of the same fast food restaurant we are right now?

They use expensive menu items to make normal items look cheaper

Think about this – you see the Exotic Seafood Platter for one at the top of the menu and it’s a whopping R250. And you’re think ‘gosh – I can’t afford this restaurant’. Until you look below this item and everything else is much cheaper and you’re feeling relieved and happy to order. See what they did there?

They made you think the rest of the menu items were more reasonable – even if they weren’t. 

Sold out / nearly sold out

‘Specials’ are sometimes placed on the menu with a sticker or label saying ask your waiter. Of course when your waiter arrives, he or she cleverly tells you that the lobster special is just about sold out because the lobster was caught this morning and a long and interesting story ensues….and then they say “There are only 2 left” and you say, “Great, I’ll have the special!” and frankly, they’ve just got you to buy an expensive item you would possibly never have considered before.

We aren’t here to give restauranteurs a nasty rap. We think they’re smart for using these ideas to sell more of what they want to sell. Be that as it may, you may think twice about your menu choice next time you’re out for dinner.

Tell us your thoughts in the comments section below, we would love to hear from you.