The Art of Menu Engineering: How Restaurants Strategically Influence Diners' Choices
Restaurants use various techniques to influence diners' food choices and boost profits. These include menu engineering, where sales data and food costs are used to set prices and highlight certain dishes. Other tactics involve incorporating boxes, placing expensive dishes in the top right corner, using detailed descriptions (which increase the perceived value and price), and considering the pricing format (whole dollar vs. cents). These strategies manipulate diners' emotions and visual attention to entice them into ordering more expensive items.