Show HN: interactive digital menu

3 points by justinireland 13 years ago | 8 comments

I've been developing a brand new concept for an interactive digital menu. I have never actually seen one of these anywhere but it seems to me like a no-brainer. The idea is that you would replace the printed menu at the front of the house with an interactive touch screen application. People could browse the menu and learn more about the establishment while they wait to be seated. You can see it here: http://innerfacelabs.com/products/interactive-digital-menu/

I haven't been promoting it too much yet because I am still developing it but so far the feedback I've gotten is "we think our customers prefer the simplicity of printed menus". I find this feedback valuable because it shows me what the market sentiment is but at the same time I believe it is wrong. Yes, there may be some people that are intimidated by this kind of technology but I also think that attitude is fading with older generations. There are so many more advantages of a software vs printed menu like sorting, filtering by ingredients, images, video, nutrition information, etc. Younger generations will grow up expecting this type of interaction that their grandparents are resisting.

So my question is: am I in denial that this type of product is beneficial or am I just so far ahead of the technology curve that the real challenge for this type of product is a general fear of technology?

YuriNiyazov 13 years ago |

Here's a fundamental challenge for you: can you show how this technology would lead to increase in sales? Let me give you one way in which it might lead to a decrease in sales, and it is up to you to give a convincing argument for why I am wrong, and for how there are other ways in which it will increase sales, thus making the investment a no-brainer.

People who walked into a restaurant are looking to eat. It's as simple as that. They look at a printed menu with fairly limited information, decide that an entree sounds good based on the printed ingredients and description, and order it. See, psychologically, they are already predisposed to ordering something, and they need to have a very small push over the edge to order something.

Now, consider what happens when you start showing a lot more information to a potential patron. Will this information make them even more likely to order, considering that they were likely to order already? Probably not. However, there's the potential that it might make them less likely to order - for example, they find out that the dish has a lot more butter than they think is healthy. Or that the meat comes from a farm whose name came up on the news recently as being a place that mistreats its cows. Or they decide that a dish, though it sounds good, doesn't look good in a photo.

And the counterarguments that you give to this would be "well, it's a good thing that customers eat less butter, or they don't patronize restaurants that patronize places that mistreat cows, and those restaurants should really invest in good food photographers". And these things might improve the world in general if everyone did them, but they aren't going to improve the restaurants' bottom line. The "people like paper menus" is just an excuse. The real answer is "You are someone who's a technologist first, and a businessman second (or third, or last), and you really don't understand our business model"

You are definitely not that far ahead of the technology curve. You are just behind on the "selling to a business that cares about making more money" curve.

Edit: more paragraphs.

Edit: removed a "not" that changed meaning

justinireland 13 years ago | |

Now THIS is good feedback. I totally agree that how I've been selling the product up to this point is weak and (admittedly) I haven't pushed it as hard I should because I feel like I need to develop more of the product before I can show the real features and benefits.

But to address your first point, what you are basically saying is that when a person walks into a restaurant they are ready to buy - its just a matter of what to buy. That may be true for some (or most) cases. But suppose someone walks into a restaurant on a busy strip for the first time, looks at the menu, reads only descriptions (because that is the only information available) and they do not like what they see so they move on. Who has not had that experience at least once? Or what if the dish they ordered looked worse than what they had in mind and made them regret their order and that bad experience causes them never to return to that restaurant?

I guess the value proposition I am making is that with more information, consumers are able to make better informed decisions and that results in lower uncertainty and remorse of the decision. How that affects the restaurants bottom line would be very difficult to measure. But if any business thinks that depriving their customers of information is more beneficial then there is a fundamental problem. I hope that is not the case.

YuriNiyazov 13 years ago | | |

I did have the experience of looking at a menu on a busy strip, saying "meh", and walking away. I even thought about including my rebuttal to that particular point in the original paragraph I wrote. Here's what I have to say about that:

Just the fact that someone is using your digital menu device doesn't mean that the contents that they present (like the photo of the food, and the descriptions) will automatically look good. They still have to hire a good food photographer. They still have to hire a good dish description copy writer. It's like saying that because we went from print to digital, visual design and good copywriting don't matter anymore. As the trend of websites in the 90's will readily attest, design and copywriting matter a whole lot.

A restaurant that failed to have an enticing printed menu on a busy strip will now have even more opportunity to hang itself with one of 'em new-fangled digital menus.

As for saying "if any business thinks that depriving their customers is more beneficial there is a fundamental problem" - you've just outed yourself as incredibly naive and idealistic. Information asymmetry is almost fundamental.

kohanz 13 years ago |

"...am I just so far ahead of the technology curve that the real challenge for this type of product is a general fear of technology?"

Considering that there are at least a couple of restaurants that use iPad interactive menus in my city, which is not a large metropolis nor ahead of the techonlogical curve, I think the answer here is no. It's about making a compelling business case.

exnav29 13 years ago |

I think you are on to something. But how would your idea compete with T1Visions solution? http://finance.yahoo.com/news/t1visions-showcases-intouch-tm...

justinireland 13 years ago | |

The holy grail of this kind of technology is the ability to interact and order directly from every table. That seems to be the approach T1Vision is taking. The problem with that (at this stage) is the huge initial investment required to make that happen. Not only is the hardware cost high but it is also very challenging to integrate with existing POS systems. Not to mention changing the workflow of taking orders and getting food to tables.

Where my approach differs is that it is one screen in the front lobby. It would be used to draw people's attention and provide an informative experience and bypasses the challenge of actual order taking (for now) which makes the software simpler to develop and the hardware requirement much less so the total cost is actually reasonable for smaller/independent restaurants.

calebio 13 years ago |

I think my only problem with this is that this can serve one person at a time whereas a large printed menu or individual printed menus can serve more than one person in a small amount of space.

justinireland 13 years ago | |

Yes this is a drawback however:

- There is nothing preventing the restaurant from making printed menus available to waiting guests.

- If the interactive menu can only serve one person at a time and is occupied nearly all of the time then it would prove a success, no?