Designing Your Restaurant Menu:
5 Creative Tips

Producing a restaurant menu that catches the eye of customers is crucial in hospitality. The menu is often the first thing a customer will see – or at least how they will identify your restaurant – so it must be spot on.

Here are five tips for creating a menu that is both innovative and easy to digest.

Menu 1
1. Make Your Menu ‘Scannable’

Patrons do not go to an eatery to do heavy reading. They want to scan the menu and order quickly.  Use clear section headings that stand out and, if your menu card design is vertical, put your big-ticket items at the top and bottom of the page. Menu engineers suggest that this is where our eyes spend the most time lingering.

Menu 2
2. Choose Your Fonts Wisely

It’s possible to design a creative restaurant menu with a limited number of fonts or typefaces. We recommend using 2-3 fonts or typefaces to maintain a balance between the readability and creativity.

Menu 3
3. Display Your Pricing with Care

Get smart with your pricing by playing with customer psychology.  A good trick is to take out the $ sign and put the price in a lighter text colour – this way you are removing the pain point. You don’t want the cheapest dishes on your menu to jump out at your customers too readily either.

Menu 4
4. Use Photos Sparingly

Having a photo of every dish can make your restaurant menu look busy and unorganised. Instead, enlist the expertise of a food photographer to snap high-quality photos of just a few of your speciality dishes. Humans are inherently visual and respond positively to attractive images, so use this to your advantage. Stock photos are an absolute no-go – your menu must be authentic.

Menu 5
Try Separators, Outlines & White Space

If your menu contains a lot of information it can be overwhelming for customers, so organise your offerings into sections. Use creative separators like outlines, boxes and horizontal dividers when designing your menu templates. Maintaining white space between different sections is visually appealing and easier for a reader to digest.

Keep these 5 creative tips in mind the next time you design your menu, and you’ll guarantee happy customers and repeat business!

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