Menu Engineering Part 2 of 2
By Joe Ritorto | MenuCorp

As suggested in my previous menu article, if you calculate, cost and record the sales of each dish, then you can design your menu to be as profitable as possible. Use suggestions (recommendations), positioning, positive descriptions and perhaps illustrations to guide your customers to certain selections. Allow your clients choose dishes from the menu that are, in an ideal world, nourishing, tasteful and value for money – as well as produce a healthy and nourishing bottom line for you.

In this article I hope to show you some basic design techniques that may assist to direct attention to certain dishes that you have calculated to be profitable ones. In the previous edition (April 2008) of this series of articles on menus, we discussed how to determine which dishes are profitable ones. We spoke of obtaining an up to date food costing for each dish based on a percentage of the selling price as well as the actual dollar value. Armed with this information we can begin to sell more of the profitable dishes (Stars) and less of the unprofitable ones (Dogs). To do this we need to become an Expert!

Today we live in a society of experts, in various fields; consultants, specialists etc. who all affect various facets of our lives. These people may range from a personal trainer to a specialist teacher to a specialist medical practitioner. The point here is that we all have learned, or have been conditioned to allow others, to make decisions for us. We accept that there are people that know more than us in certain facets or areas of our lives.

Why don't you become the expert in your chosen field of expertise? Develop a reputation to be, in the eyes of your customers, consciously or subconsciously, the expert. If customers feel confident that there in the right place then their more likely to be receptive to your suggestions, and, your advice. Evidence of this may be when a regular comes in and says, "What's good on the menu today?" This is a genuine recognition of your opinion and the way you do things. The art, however, is to make as many customers align themselves with the same positive expressions of interest.

Being an expert is easy for me to say. Right! Unless you have an enviable position that allows you to replace one customer with another, we must make the customer feel that their in good hands and we must be able to instill confidence by making our customers feel that their experience, in your premise, is positive. Always!

To do this, as previously touched on in the first article (Dec 2007), every facet of the operation must be scrutinized so that service procedures front of house and back of house work together in a team environment where continual service systems improve and flourish.

Position, ambiance, general service levels are hard to quantify as to how they translate in the eyes of your customers unless data is obtained through the use of well conducted and analyzed internal surveys containing specific questions relating to specific criteria.

Your menu is the only real sales tool that measures the success of you venue based on total sales, average sales, no of sales and a further breakup of each using manual or automated POS systems. Every one of your customers has to read it, so why don't we Advertise it on the menu.

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