Off the Table: An Obituary for the Traditional Restaurant Menu

“I’ll be your waiter this evening” - said no one.

The hospitality industry has taken to digitalising its customer service processes like Facebook took to Meta. The transition was fast, futuristic and seamless, depending on whom you ask. 

Against staff shortages and a significant customer drop during peak season, Australian venues had to internalise the ‘she’ll be right’ Aussie spirit, integrating new processes and compensating for losses without as much as a *sigh*.

With the introduction of QR code contact tracing systems and ‘two square metre rule’ density requirements, venue operators were among the first to sink or swim in the COVID world.

For restaurateurs, the shift to platforms like Mr Yum, a QR code ordering system designed to increase customer spending and reduce staff labour while delivering marketing insights, circumvented some of the COVID curveballs disrupting the customer service industry.

If you ask them how they feel about their odds today, their answer will likely indicate a newfound dependence on technologies designed to streamline the customer experience. Enter Mr Yum. 

On the other hand, ask a patron how they feel about the customer experience 2.0, and they might sing a very different tune. One of resistance to change, a desire for face-to-face interaction and a longing for the days of leather-bound menus that represent so much more than an à la carte offering.

At the risk of sounding dewy-eyed, the nostalgia that comes with the weight of a hand-held menu, the unsticking of laminated pages, or the old book smell that hits like home, is a hard act to follow for wannabe e-menus.

But it’s not only the ASMR enthusiasts that’ll miss the tactile print menu. Those who prefer eye contact to phone contact will find it jarring to order device-in-hand with payment upfront. 

Lest we forget the ‘oldies’ who still enjoy dining out, for whom smartphones and QR codes are a thing of the future. Okay, friends and family can take care of the ordering, but it might alienate the more mature folk among us.

Gone are the days of table service and “I’ll be your waiter for this evening” across many Melbourne venues. In their place are “You’ll get a ding when your order is ready to be collected” and “For our specials, ask Mr Yum”. Not exactly romance-inspiring. 

Sentimentality aside, the QR code menu also brings with it a subtle increase in what customers pay for their food and beverages. Where the traditional dine-in experience would likely result in a credit card surcharge upon payment, digital order processing systems are designed to collect this fee per transaction. For an app built to increase customer spending and in-seat ordering, patrons can expect to pay more today using QR code menus than they would have in a pre-COVID world.

Given the position of restaurateurs and the less-than-hospitable landscape in which they now operate, offloading merchant fees onto customers is not an unreasonable ask. But it does beg the question: who benefits from integrating QR order processing systems? Certainly not the customer – nor the venue operator. 

We’d be remiss if we didn’t mention the convenience QR code menus bring to venues seeking to protect their staff and customers against COVID-19 transmission. Where physical menus are passed from one table to another, digital ones circumvent all risks of shared resources. Not to mention the reduction in person-to-person interaction that inevitably occurs in traditional waited table settings.

Today, risk mitigation and management are the sexiest measures whispered back-of-house, and for good reason. Without them, dining in would be off the menu again, and nobody wants that. 

This is not a diss blog nor a sponsored pitch for OG venues that have kept it old-school. This is an ode to the bygone world of delicious and delectable opportunities - to the romance of those hand-held, physical menus. 

Rest in peace.