As a restaurant removes the symbol for currency from its menu, customers pay more for their meals without recognizing the reason for their behavior. By examining various sources that analyze the layout of menus, researchers find that this result occurs consistently across different countries and price levels. It is common for a number that stands alone without a symbol to appear as a mathematical amount rather than as a financial cost. If a business writes out "dollars" instead of using a symbol, the result remains largely the same. There is a quality in the visual display of currency that activates a reaction in the human brain associated with the avoidance of payment.
Built to Move Your Money
A menu is not an objective list of items - it is a document that people create through multiple stages of evaluation so that they can guide the focus and the funds of a customer toward specific choices. On many menus the removal of the currency symbol serves as one method for this purpose. For another method, businesses use language that provides many details. As items receive descriptions that include specific or fictional histories, they sell more frequently than identical items with simple labels. In those cases the data shows that sales increase by close to a quarter. And restaurants utilize a long standing technique where they place a high priced item at the beginning of a list. Because of this placement, the items that follow seem to be at a fair price relative to the first item, even though their actual costs remain the same. With the addition of a name that refers to a relative, a specific location or a traditional method of preparation, a serving of pasta appears to have more significance than the same food with a standard name.
It's the Map, Not the Words
Many individuals believe that if a menu influences their choices, it does so through positive descriptions. As an example they might think that a well crafted sentence about "hand-cut fries" is what leads them to purchase the side dishes - but that factor is only one component and it is likely not the most significant one. On the menu the placement of items and the ease of selection perform the primary work.
In many cases the location of a dish on the paper is as important as the text that describes it - it is common for customers to scan a menu instead of reading the entire document. As they look their eyes move toward specific and expected areas, which are frequently in the top right corner. Whatever sits in that spot gets a high amount of focus from the customer, regardless of the food's quality.
Too Many Choices Hurts
By design restaurants manage the fact that a large number of choices causes people to pause instead of feeling satisfied. Most menus keep sections small, though reports disagree on the ideal count, some suggest five items while others suggest seven or ten based on the price level of the establishment. To explain this reaction, one report links the difficulty of choosing to a physical feeling. It describes brain scan studies where the loss of money activates parts of the brain that relate to physical suffering. Due to the fact that this claim originates from only one source, it is necessary to view it with doubt - but the idea is consistent with the dollar sign effect that is visible in many other contexts.
Not an Ad. A System.
In combination those sources indicate that a menu functions like a physical structure rather than a commercial advertisement. It is not a tool for persuasion as much as it is a system that guides your existing movement. By this design the menu makes specific choices more accessible to you than others. And the images are important because they produce effects that are both positive and negative. When a photo shows food that looks appealing, it causes physical hunger in the viewer - but some reports state that this same photo creates a feeling of letdown if the actual meal is small or lacks order. Due to the risks, other reports claim that a low quality photo does more than fail to impress. If a photo is poor, it causes the customer to lack confidence in the establishment. To avoid this reaction, some expensive restaurants do not use photography and provide a basic drawing instead. There is no complete agreement among the sources about why photos fail but they agree that this failure is possible.
The Comma That Switches Sides
One report quotes a hospitality professor explaining the limitations of these methods. It is possible for the design of a menu to influence which of your existing desires becomes most prominent - but this design is not able to create a new desire. You are not going to choose the grilled octopus because a font is attractive if you do not like to eat that animal. If a dish with a high price is at the top of the list, it serves to make other prices seem lower. And yet you must already feel a need for the item to choose it.
There is a minor fact hidden in one description that represents the overall intent of the practices. The same restaurants that strip the comma from a regular price to make it look smaller will add that comma right back when they cross out an "original" price to show a discount, because now they want the number to look as large as possible. By looking at how the same restaurants operate, one can see the strategy clearly.