Menu Analysis

The menu is the most important tool influencing the success or failure of a food and beverage operation. It's also the major piece of advertising that communicates to the customer exactly what is being sold. Therefore, the types of items, the way they are described, the price, and placement of the food and beverage items need be a forethought rather than an afterthought.

Two common measurements of menu items are their 1) Profitability and 2) Popular. A profitable menu item is one that generates above average contribution margin and a popular menu item is one that generates above average popularity. After conducting a menu analysis, each menu item can be classified as either a star, plowhorse, puzzle or dog. Depending on a menu item's classification, there are a number if approaches a menu planner can take.

MENU ANALYSIS - The STAR :)

STAR – High Popular and High Profitable
This is often a restaurant’s signature or prestige item. An item that is unique to the particular operation.

1. Leave the item alone. Don’t mess with a good thing, “If it isn’t broke, don’t fix it.”

2. Hide the item on the menu assuming it’s taking up a prime location on the menu. If an item is popular and customers know about it, they will find it no matter where it is. The reason for hiding is to provide an opportunity for some other potential good item to sell by giving it a good space. The idea is kind of similar to network TV where there is a hit show at a prime time slot. The networks sometimes move the show to a different hour and give some other potential shows the previous time slot in order to let them shine.

3. Attempt to sell the item more. Outback Steakhouse and Chili’s promoted the heck out of the classic onion ring appetizer by re-creating them into the “Awesome Blossim” and the “Bloomin Onion”. They advertised them not only with prime space on the menu, but also suggestive selling through service staff and also TV commercials. Why not! These items were stars. They were profitable (about.50 to produce and they sell them for about $7.95) and they were popular.

MENU ANALYSIS - The PLOWHORSE

PLOWHORSE – High Popular and Low Profitability
Having some of these on the menu is not necessarily a bad thing. They may appeal to a price conscious customer and/or may be used as a loss leader. A loss leader is an item that is highly popular and yet purposely low to no contribution margin in order to motivate buyers. The greatest concern is having too many plowhorses on the menu.

1. Hide the item on the menu assuming it’s taking up a prime location on the menu. This way, if people want the item, they find other more interesting (and better contribution margin) items before they get to it.

2. Increase the contribution margin by:
A) Raising the price
B) Lower the food cost
C) A little bit of both
But be careful with extremes. Any noticeable differences to the customer may be perceived as negative and therefore cut into popularity.

3. Try combining it with a lower cost item to achieve a greater contribution margin. Ex: Don’t just sell a steak, but make it possible for the customer to also get a combo platter of steak and chicken. There typically is greater margin and chicken and with the hedonistic combination, the margins may be closer to balancing one another out.

MENU ANALYSIS - The PUZZLE

PUZZLE – Low Popularity and High Profitability
The puzzle menu items are puzzling to management. They are items that are priced right, but we can’t sell them. The goals is to find a way to make them attractive to the customer.

1. Reposition the item to a prominent location. Prime space is limited, therefore the space needs to be utilized for items that are going to produce a good margin. Four prime locations include: A) Top of a column, B) Bottom of a column, C) Middle of the page, D) Create your own space (through the use of boxes, symbols or text emphasis.

2. Consider renaming the item or ingredients. Perhaps “prunes” don’t sound too romantic to the customer.

3. Consider reworking some of the ingredients. Some items could be tweaked to better emphasis on the vision of the dish.

4. Promote the item through merchandising. Servers can suggestive sell or place the item on a specials board or specials card.

5. Lower the price a tad to test for price sensitivity. The item could sell if the price sounded a bit more attractive. In some cases, the differences between $9.00 and $8.95 is only .05 but to some customers the difference is $1.00.

MENU ANALYSIS - The DOG:(

DOG – Low Profitability and Low Popularity
1. The natural inclination is to wipe out the dog menu items. (Personally, I think this category should be called “cats”) They are not selling and if they do sell, they don’t make an adequate margin. Possibly, they may cost the restaurant to even stock the ingredients in-house.

2. Raise the price and keep them on the menu. Why? Imagine a party of four goes to dinner at a steakhouse where one of the guests doesn’t care for red meat. All steakhouses have chicken, pasta or seafood in addition to steak because they realize that not all customers can or want to eat red meat. If the price is raised on a dog item, they still may not sell, but when the non beef eating customer comes into the restaurant they are going to pay for the item because their other options (starving yourself) don’t seem as desirable.

3. Remove the item from the menu, but keep the ingredients in-house (assuming they are relatively shelf stable) in order to make special orders when the situation arises. And this item should still be priced higher.

WRITING MENU DESCRIPTIONS

The idea behind menu descriptions, are to provide just enough information about food and beverage items that entice the consumer and provide some necessary selective information.

The GOAL…make the food sound appetizing

1. Balance the information

Find the correct balance of not enough and too much information. Generally, listing major ingredients, cooking methods and/or origin of some products should be adequate. With some items, portion size and/or quality may be important determining factor for the consumer.

* Salmon versus Copper River King Salmon versus Cedar Planked Copper River King Salmon

* Chicken versus Chicken Breast versus Grilled Chicken Breast

* Steak versus Porterhouse Steak versus Grilled Porterhouse – 21 day dry aged USDA Prime grade.

* House Salad versus Mixed Greens with Mustard and Dill Vinaigrette

2. Select a menu description format.

The heading with a description or heading as a description. Each one contains variations within them

A. Heading with a description

CHICKEN
Grilled 8-ounce boneless breast of chicken with mustard mayonnaise and steamed broccoli and carrots.

B. Heading as a description

Grilled boneless breast of chicken with mustard mayonnaise and steamed broccoli and carrots.

3. Stay Away from Abbreviations and Slang:

Example: w/ for “with” & for “and”
grat for “gratuity”

Example: veggies for “vegetables”

4. Use Capital Letters Appropriately and Consistently

Option A –Use capital letters for the first letter of each word except for conjunctions.

•Grilled Chicken Breast, Orange and Raisin Couscous, French Green Beans with Roasted Red Pepper Coulis

Option B –Use capital letters for the first letter of the first word in the sentence and for each proper noun.

•Grilled chicken breast, orange and raisin couscous, French green beans with roasted red pepper coulis.

5. Be Aware of Commonly Misspelled Words

•Cesar instead Caesar
•Carmelized instead Caramelized
•Portabella instead Portobello or portabello or portobella
•Barbiecue instead Barbecue or Barbeque
•Potatoe instead Potato
•Vinagrette instead Vinaigrette
•Desert instead Dessert
•Ah joos instead Au jus
•Hors douvre instead Hors d’ oeuvre
•Blue cheese – any blue-veined variety. “Bleu” cheese is the French spelling
•Fillet – a boneless piece of meat, fish or poultry. “Filet” is the French spelling

6. Truth in Menu Laws

These laws govern menu descriptions. The federal government’s pure food, drug and cosmetic act of 1938 forbids the use of any pictoral or language description that misrepresents an item.

Truthful representation involves more than just the description. Photographs, graphic illustrations, printed advertisements and verbal descriptions by employees must also be accurately represented.

It’s important that “what is said, stated and shown” is ACTUALLY what is ultimately delivered to the customer. Otherwise a restaurant can be liable for fraud

1. Representation of QUANTITY – Size or quantity must be accurate. Steaks must represent pre cooked weight. Shrimp cocktail advertised as 6 jumbo shrimp need to be 6 jumbo shrimp.

2. Representation of QUALITY – 21 day, dry aged prime grade needs to be that. Not wet aged prime grade.

3. Representation of PRICE – If pricing structure includes a cover charge or service charge, it needs to be brought to the attention of the customer. If extra charges are incurred for all white meat, or side of guacamole, then it needs to be stated at the time of ordering.

4. Representation of BRAND NAMES - Any brand name product that is advertised must be the one served. A generic product may not be used in place of it.

5. Representation of PRODUCT IDENTIFICATION – Substitutions are commonly made when product has run out or was never delivered. However, the customer needs to be informed of this. Maple syrup instead of maple flavored syrup, Turkey lunch meat instead of Fresh turkey, whipped topping instead of whipped cream.

6. Representation of POINTS 0f ORIGIN – Products identified by the point of origin must be authentic. Lake Superior Whitefish, Florida Stone Crab, Maine Lobster, Champagne.

7. Representation of MERCHANDISING TERMS – Exaggeration in advertising is acceptable as long as it doesn’t mislead. Serving the best gumbo in town is very different than saying we use the finest meats around indicated prime grade. Other phrases such as: Fresh daily, Black Angus beef, Kosher meat, Organic, grass raised beef, Fresh squeezed orange juice is different then fresh orange juice..

8. Representation of MEANS of PRESERVATION - Fresh – not previously frozen, not processed, and with no preservatives or additives. Frozen orange juice is not fresh orange juice.

9. Representation of FOOD PREPARATION – This may often be a determining factor in a customer’s selection. Grilled is not griddled, microwave is not steamed, sautéed is not stir-fried.

10. Representation of VERBAL and VISUAL PRESENTATION – whole strawberries pictured on a shortcake are different than sliced, six shrimp are different than 5, broccoli is pictured but it’s not in the dish, sesame bun is pictured or described but not given..

11. Representation of DIETARY OR NUTRITIONAL CLAIMS – Accuracy in this area is essential, particularly if the restaurant is dealing with a captive audience from a nursing home or school. Foods listed as salt or sugar free need to be exactly that. Certain phrases or claims may need to be documented and verifiable such as:

· Low fat – generally the product contains no more than 3 grams of fat per serving (for meat, no more than 10% by weight, for milk no more than 2% by weight.

· Low sodium contains no more than 140 milligrams of sodium per serving, Salt free indicating no more than 5 milligrams of salt per serving.

· Lite or Light contains at least 25% less fat, sodium, or calories than the original product.

"Bridging the Gap"

In most restaurants there is a natural downtime most often during the period between lunch and dinner. Consider “bridging the gap” between lunch and dinner downtime by creating events to build and bring in revenue. Ex: a raw bar, an afternoon tea, a wine tasting, tapas, book clubs, happy hour appetizers etc.