QR codes on menus – thoughts?

by BundleDeFormula

38 Comments

  1. BLOODWORTHooc

    “QR codes on menus”

    So now I have to use a QR code on my menu to get to a menu with a QR code? You might be on to something…

  2. Melgamatic214

    I don’t mind a QR code menu, but then please let me pay using a QR code at the end of the meal instead of the credit card back and forth.

  3. Disastrous-Fee8374

    I’d prefer literally anything other than a qr code

  4. Diced_and_Confused

    Fucking Fucking Fucking Fucking Fucking Fucking hate it.

    Edit: I realize that first bit doesn’t offer a great deal of guidance. I come to your place to relax, enjoy myself, and probably to have something I can’t be bothered to make myself. I’m looking for atmosphere and escape. Then I have my phone shoved back into my hands. Menus are unsanitary? So is my phone – clean your fucking menus or print new. I’m ok with something you print yourself – have fun with it.

  5. I really prefer chalk board menu over QR code. I never loved paper menu tbh. It gets dirty and everyone is sharing them. Gross. I’m autistic tho.

  6. High_Questions

    It encourages people to be on their phones more when they should be focused on the people of the food, also I just like reading the menu every once in a while

  7. papamikebravo

    I prefer a real menu, mostly because most restaurants QR menus are lowest bidder shit-ware with terrible UI, and seemingly never can display/zoom properly or are just a PDF in legal sized landscape orientation that require me to pan around like I’m looking for fucking Waldo. Even worse are online menus at restaurants with poor reception/no wi-fi. “Hi yes, I know I’ve been her 15 minutes. No I’m still not ready to order. I can’t get your menu to load, and it’s been stuck on “salads” since you were last here.”

  8. security-device

    I don’t know if it’s just me getting older, but I don’t like having to use technology for such simple things. I miss knobs in my vehicle, I miss tactile response! I miss software and apps that you could actually change settings for easily. Things are so user friendly nobody bothers to understand the technology they’re actually using! /ranting at clouds

  9. kahle_rese

    As a customer, I hate them. I want to see everything in one go & get my face out of my phone for a moment to engage with what’s going on around me.

    As an operator, they’re orders of magnitude less expensive than reprinting physical menus every time they get damaged or there’s a change, don’t require labour to keep clean, can be updated instantly, and, if needed, offered in other languages through something like Google Translate.

    I can’t deny their utility. Still don’t like them though

  10. Nater5000

    If a server is going to wait on you, they might as well give you a physical menu, otherwise you’re making an easy part of the service more difficult without any real benefit to anybody. Either wait on us or don’t. I shouldn’t have to handle part of the process myself on my own device that I’d rather *not* have to pull out at all.

    *However*, I’ve been to places where you sit yourself and use the QR menu to place your order which is then delivered to your table. That is a good use of this technology and I generally prefer this kind of service over having someone wait on us (at least depending on what I’m looking for). If you’re going to utilize an interactive service, make it worth doing.

  11. Red1Monster

    It *can* be useful in certain restaurants where the menu changes super often

    Otherwise i don’t like it. I’m on my phone all the time, don’t force me to use it at the restaurant too

  12. Oc3anWubz

    I hate it. Especially if there’s no cell service in the restaurant and you have to ask for the wifi password or use their dogshit guest wifi

  13. EyeStache

    I go to a restaurant to not use my phone.

    Don’t make me use my phone to order food.

  14. Biscuit_risk_assesor

    Depends on the setting.

    If I’m eating in a restaurant, like sit down with table service, I want a physical menu. If there are specials, those can be communicated by the server, or on a Separate flyer, or I guess a QR link for just the specials wouldn’t be terrible. Of those options the server knowing it and describing to me is the best scenario.

    We have a few spots in this town that are essentially bars with food trucks, and you can scan a QR code, order from any of the trucks, or from the bar, and put in your table #. They bring it over to you. In that instance, hell yes QR codes.

    So, it depends.

  15. Tug_Stanboat

    Seeing as I don’t have a phone that can read QR codes, if I see that it’s the only option, I go somewhere else.

  16. Anoncook143

    Need a real menu so I can point in secret when I can pronounce something and don’t want to embarrass myself

  17. Wrathchilde

    I only will use them at the airport bar because otherwise… it’s going to be a while. That’s not a huge “full service” environment in any case.

  18. JeremyILM

    I don’t trust the quality of food when I see a QR menu. It means the menu changes often or they’re too cheap to print new ones. If they’re skimping on $100 of paper, I’m skeptical and question where else they cut costs.

  19. KennethPatchen

    Also: BRING BACK PAPER MENUS WITH PICTURES OF COCKTAILS ON THEM GODDAMIT!

  20. Senior-Pineapple-177

    This is the boomer hill I will die on. Absolutely the fuck not. Hard menu in my hand.

  21. sgtragequit

    honestly i *was* ok with it until i went out for friends for the day, and i went to get dinner afterwards but my phone had died. restaurant i went to had a QR code menu and literally no other way for me to view it.

  22. UpperLynx3856

    Hate it. I just really dislike sitting down with someone and immediately we both have to pull out our phones.

  23. I want to use my phone less in a restaurant. Not more. We are not fans at all.

  24. I hate them personally, paper is cheap – print the fuckin menu

  25. Well, they are kind of stupid and gimmicky. It’s not like they’re easier to change menu items on, which one might think would be an upside, because most are hosted on a third party platform. Good stock paper, thin enough for your copier, on a clipboard or some such holder, and you have a hard copy menu without the printing cost of a commercial product.

  26. NTufnel11

    Yeah this isnt a boomer complaint. I don’t want to scroll through the entire menu viewing half of each item one at a time and having to horizontally scroll to read each item. And that’s assuming the restaurant even has good cell signal, which is not a given.

  27. 410757864531DEADCOPS

    QR code menus tell me that you care more about your own convenience than the customer experience, which makes me wonder why you’re in the hospitality business.

  28. hankbobbypeggy

    Really don’t like them. Don’t make me and my party sit around staring at our phones. My phone also sucks at them, so I usually end up having to just go to their website and search for the menu. Lastly, I like to refer to the menu while I’m eating because I’m a nerd and want to understand all the components of the dish, so i usually ask them to leave a menu at the table.. again I’d have to be buried in my phone throughout dinner with no physical menu

  29. ladeedah1988

    It takes me twice as long to use a QR Code menu, maybe three times. Then, I can’t remember the specific glass of wine I wanted or something else. I totally miss parts of the menu. When will they learn that it is terrible.

  30. BananaHomunculus

    QR code menus are not where I wanna eat

  31. NitrogenMustard

    Real menu always. I feel like a menu should compliment the aesthetic and culinary direction of a restaurant. It’s a way to get the customer to experience the restaurant and the vibe it is trying to portray.

    We go to restaurants to eat, but secondly, for an experience and a shared one at that. QR codes means I’m on my phone not engaging with others.

  32. spenghali

    Millennial here and I want a god dam paper menu!

  33. SockSock81219

    As a customer, there are so many tedious things I’d prefer to a QR code. I’d rather fill out a weird-ass golf card piece of paper with a little ikea pencil, like they sometimes did at sushi places. I’d rather have the server list everything verbally (though I’d feel terribly for them), then stop them at what sounds good. I’d rather have a dim sum conveyor belt, cafeteria style, or stoned-beyond-belief counter service where you have to look up at an awkward angle to see their smudged hand-written menu then stand…somewhere? Maybe near the souvenir t-shirts? Until the guy making the sandwich can remember the ingredients. I’d much rather a restaurant just sell one meal and I can just sit down and be like “two meals and two beers, thanks!”

    All that said…at a standard lousy diner in a busy airport, where the servers have to deal with half a concourse of jet-lagged, stressed-out people, and you’re kind of in a rush / aren’t here for a leisurely chat with your dining companion? Yeah, just give me a QR code to order & pay for another glass of wine, thanks, and here’s a 25% tip to show I’m not some asshole.