I just got back from a trip to Las Vegas and every single restaurant we went to had a QR code + online menu. Now, I am not sure if it was related to the reasoning stated here, but all the menus were also very short, with only a few items each. Personally, I was quite happy to view the menu on my phone. I know for a fact though my parents and grandparents would have hated such a thing.
If you went to higher-class restaurants, small menus are the norm. I'm no expert, and my wife only has a culinary degree from 10 years ago gathering dust, but some possible reasons:
- A smaller menu lets the chefs focus on learning to make those dishes at the expected level of quality. These items also usually require more skill and knowledge to just be passable.
- It's not so much that fancy places have small menus, as it is that non-fancy restaurants can have bigger menus. Their kitchens can have an assembly-line style that optimizes simplicity and time, letting them hire cheap cooks. When every dish is "throw each part in the oven/fryer/pot, wait 10 minutes, put on plate," adding 50 dishes doesn't put as much strain on the cooks.
They're just Sysco resellers... the second highest margin items on menus are desserts, which are almost always Sysco microwave desserts or similiar preps.
The very short menu is an interesting change as well. It makes sense in a couple of ways I think. First it signals that they've really thought about what you should have and that they are super practiced at making it. Second it makes things cheaper and operationally simpler for the restaurant. I'm not sure which of those is a bigger deal.
There's diminishing returns when you cook the same thing over and over. People that are excellent cooks on round 1 aren't going to be a whole lot better on round 500 than they are on round 100. Also, they often rotate the short menu.
In San Francisco everywhere has QR codes and the same format.
Had wine and charcuterie: food and separate drink menu on two different QR codes.
It's not perfect, many times the checkout system is haphazard, doesn't make use of Apple Pay or anything built into the phone. Requires user to input their table number into the checkout process.
Or its just a surrogate for normal waiter / server experience and they come up to you eventually (which is fine).
People all seem willing to tolerate the experience, and all the older luddites and technophobes are still in their prepper bunkers or just not in the city.
Interesting how much the last decade of technology and proliferation has prepared us for this. QR codes, mobile phones, highly available high speed internet. Just going back 10 years in many major cities, even San Francisco and New York, this would have been much much worse to adjust to.
My restaurant has been trying to implement a contactless ordering & checkout system since the initial shutdown in CA back in March. Our CEO refuses to open, even for takeout, until our dining experience is seamless. The trouble is is that nowhere has a completely seamless order-and-pay-from-your-phone system because it doesn't exist.
We've been working with one company that has integrated their web-app with our existing POS, but there's a lot of bugs with some wonky workarounds that we aren't comfortable with. They've been developing new features for us for months at no cost due to their pandemic program, however it's just not up to our CEO's expectations.
Now we're looking into switching to a completely new, modern POS that supposedly has a working order/pay from your device feature. Trouble is, the entire check has to be ordered (drinks, appetizers, entrees, desserts) all at once and paid for before it even gets sent to the kitchen. This is what the other company we've been working with has been trying to set up for us - guest sits down, scans the QR on their phone, orders at their own pace and checks out whenever they're ready - this is how our restaurant has been set up from day 1. We previously had iPads with a custom iOS app that the guests could order from. Our CEO believes this won't be an acceptable system moving forward as shared iPads aren't seen as sanitary as personal phones.
> Our CEO refuses to open, even for takeout, until our dining experience is seamless. The trouble is is that nowhere has a completely seamless order-and-pay-from-your-phone system because it doesn't exist.
Having spent significant time in the Industry, in both Europe and the US, I honestly think this is exactly what will give Ghost Kitchens the edge over the traditional dine-in places.
>a completely seamless order-and-pay-from-your-phone system because it doesn't exist.
(disclaimer: founder) Yes, this is literally what Zerocontact does. Contactless waitlist, menu, order, pay. Hybrid ordering so staff and guests can add items to one check. Fully supports courses. Add dessert at the end of th meal. Still, the customer has one check to pay (apple pay or google pay, or CC). We may even support your legacy POS or you can use ZC in standalone mode. It's a full order-management system for contactless on prem and off prem dining.
Website and service looks solid - would have definitely reached out had I seen this 6-8 weeks ago (and if our legacy POS wasn't such a disaster already).
We're negotiating with Toast at the moment since the offer the whole deal, hardware included, other than the ability to leave the guests' tab open once their order is started from their own device.
Good luck, I can imagine the cognitive dissonance. Many of their contracts dangle cheap / free hardware with expensive services and hidden over-priced processing in a bundled SAAS. And yet feature wise, it "does it all" except the very things you want it to do. (coursing and hybrid (open tab) ordering, and good guest experiences like apple pay on checkout). So you upgrade into something supposedly better but not actually what you wanted. If you get stuck, DM me (name in profile) and we can help you out with a full solution that actually does all the stuff. We've done >$1B orders so this is easy for us.
okay what are the non-derogatory but also accurate words here? I am aiming to use language to convey a message for:
"a person opposed to new technology or ways of working."
and
"a person who fears, dislikes, or avoids new technology."
which is literally a copy and paste job from the definitions on google.
They are older than the people going out.
edit: ahhh if that one irreconcilable line dilutes my message for people here I don't really care enough about this conversation to placate whoever that got the attention of. I added to the discussion maybe others have a relatable experience. Moving on.
