Take Currency Symbols Off The Menu, Restaurant Patrons Spend More
Have you ever noticed that the menus in nice restaurants leave the currency signs off prices, or spell them out in words rather than Arabic numerals? The intended effect is pretty much what you would assume - to remove the association between prices on the menu and actual money. Now, there's actual academic research showing that half of this theory is true.
The study was conducted by Cornell University's Center for Hospitality Research at a restaurant of the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, NY. Also known as "the significantly more delicious CIA." The study had an unexpected result, in that guests spent more when presented with a menu listing numeric prices with no currency sign ("20") than with the prices spelled out ("twenty dollars") This was the opposite of what psychological theory predicted.
"People who tend to be more price conscious, they'll start adding up what their part of the check is going to be," [study co-author Sybil Yang] said. "If you make that process a little more difficult for people by not presenting a number in Arabic numerals but rather as text, it becomes so much harder to add."Instead, the authors figured the dollar sign and the word "dollar" reminded folks they were about to spend money. The number format with no dollar reference took away that emphasis.
Fascinating stuff if you're in the food service industry, or if you're interested in retail psychology. Though this phenomenon did not escape the notice of Stuff White People Like.
On menus, dollar signs matter [Myrtle Beach Sun] (via Steve)
$ or Dollars: Effects of Menu-price Formats on Restaurant Checks [Cornell University]
(Photo: johnjoh)
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Comments:
@Porcelina: I like taking symbols out of my amateur design works simply because it looks better that way.
Rabbit Rabbit Rabbit, $39
Duo of Beef, $42
It's nice to that high end restaurants have naming conventions no better than Outback.
NM, just caught the last sentence of the article.
Hilarious site though.
And when prices are spelled out in arabic characters, people spent even MORE!
twenty dollars = العشرين دولار
Pretty brave there, using the term "Arabic numerals". 'Round here, we call 'em "Merikan numbers".
Wow, that's how much they cost? I always thought that was how many calories were in the food. Maybe that explains the recent weight gain.....
@MostlyHarmless: Wow. No need to be mean. I am not an amateur, I just have to make things to the specifications that my company tells me to. I don't just go around making them for myself. So, while I am DOING MY JOB. I asked if it really made a difference in the profits, and I was told yes.
@Laura Northrup: Just the Arabic numerals.
@Preyfar:
Yeah... but the quality of food is so much better at Farmhouse (the restaurant whose menu is shown above). Outback purchases products based on cost and they try to keep costs low. Farmhouse uses sustainable products and only the highest quality meats and produce.
@morganlh85: +1 for that site.
Isn't this concept very similar to to using tokens, chips, cards, etc. for video games and gambling. The entire point is to disassociate [is that a word] what you're doing with spending money.
@SafetyMachete_GitEmSteveDave: And also explains the inexplicably high bill at the end of your meal?
@RandomHookup: Maybe in France and Arabia where you lefties live. They're called, "Murikan numbers" in REAL Amurika.
@Porcelina: Whoa whoa whoa... Thats not what I meant at all.
All I was saying is, that I do it because, to me, it looks better. I do that with most symbols that i can remove or replace with text without obfuscating the meaning. I was only noting a personal preference, and saying that it probably looks more elegant that way anyways (seeing as how higher end restaurants do care for such details).
And I am not objecting to the observation at all. You are the professional here, clearly you know more. If you say that it brings in cash, and if a study says it does, there's really no reason or grounds for me to object to that one.
Also, it would be naive to assume that restaurants do it only because it looks elegant, and not because it brings in cash. The elegance is merely a side effect.
@Porcelina: I'm not sure @MostlyHarmless: was intending to be mean, just that she's an amateur designer and likes to do that.
@MostlyHarmless: You know this, but comment boards are have the sensitivity of email x10.
Our inability to solve word problem has come back to bite us in the ass.
@SkokieGuy: Conversely, when I was in Morocco, I was offered a menu in English. I can speak French, but they insisted. The results were..well, hilarious. I wondered if I could order "Shrumps" with "??????" on the side.
@Porcelina: If you're this sensitive over one line that was clearly not mean, then you must have a heart attack every day you go online.
@MostlyHarmless: My bad! I guess I am just sensitive today! Eeek. I totally get you now that I re-read it. And, yeah, it IS more aesthetically pleasing to the eye. For sure.
Doesn't work for me--if I see a menu with just numerals and no punctuation or decimal places, I think, "whoa, expensive--back away."
I hate it when restaurants leave off the dollar symbol. I don't think it looks elegant, just different or incomplete. Also, it is ambigous. I've always wanted to attempt to pay in some alternate form of currency, maybe wampum or seashells.
@Porcelina: heh heh heh.. happens.
Though i do like what nakedscience said :P
@ARP: AND WTF DO YOU MEAN _SHE_ ????
Just because i am harmless for the most part and my profile pic implies that I might be fat (i am not, for the record) does not mean that i am a She. Shame on you buddy.
@swearint: It's ambigous? How difficult is it to ascertain that, if you are in a restaurant in the US, they accept US currency?
@Porcelina: Do yo do that thing where the concept of two decimal places gets thrown out the window too? I hate that. If some uber-trendy appetizer costs $14.50, then show me that, not "14.5"
(not venting at Porcelina so much as at "things I hate about menus")
I actually don't think I have ever noticed if there was or was not a dollar sign or a decimal point on my menu.
I wonder when McDonald's will tap into this research and say "Is your order correct on the drive-thru order screen? This is a BigMac for 3, medium fries for 1 and a large Coke for 2?
Quarter Pounder avec fromage 4
@larrymac: I hate that $14.5 thing! It's one of my major pet peeves about hipster hang outs after the awful house music. a) It doesn't make sense for them to have decimals in their prices when you know the prices are inflated to hell already. b) If their menus got any more pretentious you could hang them on the wall and call them art. They might as well just round it up to $15. (Or "15" as they tend to do.)
@MostlyHarmless: Sorry about that. I use "s/he" when I'm unsure and my hands went faster than my brain. I didn't make any assumptions based on your name and fat penguin avatar (cute- BTW), just hands that were too sloppy.
@squinko: I see what you did there. Numbers are Arabic. Why do all of you want the terrorists to win? If you really love Amurika, we'll have to go back to hash marks or Roman Numerals....and no Algebra.
@swearint: Ha funny point. I'm sure at one point in time their will be some jack*ss who will argue that there should be some sort of indictation on the menu as to what form of currency the numbers on the menu are referring to when they try and pay for their bill in monopoly money.
@Robobot:
Maybe they did a mail merge for their menu and they didn't have the column format correct in Excel :P
@Cant_stop_the_rock: I was insinuating that it was ARP's insinuation :P
Lets stop before Ben insinuates that we gtfo :P
@ARP: I am seriously surprised no one has used that logic to satirize far right yet. Maybe I will, the next time they do/say/incite something appalling... which should be any time now.
If you need to ask, you can't afford it.
![[img198.imageshack.us]](http://img198.imageshack.us/img198/5376/webynh.jpg){kind=link}
I create menus for restaurants (I am the graphic designer) and for any higher end location, we always do this. It really does bring in more money.