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The Restaurant Industry’s Worst Idea: QR Code Menus

• JoeAltmaier 4y ago
  If the restaurant didn't have a printed menu and asked me to scan something, I always got up and left.
  • toomuchtodo 4y ago
    I personally like the QR code menus. To each their own.
  • throwaway5959 4y ago
    If having to scan a QR code to access a menu is enough to get you to walk out, you did the staff a favor.
    • systemvoltage 4y ago
      So be it. I’ll join the resistance. I don’t want phones involved in a restaurant. It’s the same as loud music or other bad aspects of restaurants. Just because vast number of people like it doesn’t mean I have to as well.
    • Gigachad 4y ago
      It’s not just scanning a QR code. It’s that the sites almost always require you to verify your phone number so they can track you across orders. I mentally blacklist any store with online ordering and leave a negative review.
      • crazygringo 4y ago
        Almost always...? Across orders? We're just talking about QR codes that open up a PDF or HTML page that shows the menu. It's not online ordering. I mean I've seen online ordering as an option at a couple of places that I thought was cool, but you didn't have to. Literally everywhere else I've been (in NYC) it's just been a static menu. Not tracking you.
        • Gigachad 4y ago
          In Australia I have very rarely seen QR menus used where it wasn't also the method to order and pay.
          • bombcar 4y ago
            In the USA it's been 90% a redirect to some massive print-ready PDF stored on AWS, the other 10% it's a redirect to a hand-coded HTML file that is badly out of date.
    • JoeAltmaier 4y ago
      sure jump straight to the ad-hominem. Classy. But obviously no, I did the restaurant no favor. I financially deprived the restaurant of income, and the server unfortunately of a tip. And I tip big. I don't owe the restaurant a visit. They do owe me an experience. If it begins with struggling with their QR menu system, I'm opting out for a variety of reasons. And a struggle it is. First find the mode where QR results is something actionable (I have an older phone) Hopefully their WIFI is exceptional, and the password not onerous. Then answer their marketing questions. Finally peer at a too-small menu you have to scroll through on a tiny screen with terrible pictures. Find something interesting? How to share it with your dining partner(s). No, can't point to their menu or say "Page three on the bottom!". No, you have to give them your phone. Oops! They touched something or it scrolled or went into low-power. It's a fairly miserable experience for some of us.
    • pessimizer 4y ago
      Yes, nothing the staff like more than losing sales over a minor issue.
  • csdvrx 4y ago
    If I'm hungry, I ask the same thing as whoever is close by and whose dish looks remotely edible. If I'm not really hungry, or if the food isn't easily visible, I do the same as you do: yes, I carry a computer, but refuse to use it in most restaurants. If McDonalds can afford some wall poster with pictures + names and prices, I'm sure most restaurants can. So the question is more why don't they want to? Even a flier by the door would be enough for me! However, on a site were most people love pushing tech even when the best solutions are not technological, I wouldn't be surprised if we were in the minority and people tried to rationalize using QR codes.
    • deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    • c22 4y ago
      I'm not saying you're wrong, but it's kind of weird to hold up the largest restaurant chain in the world by revenue as a baseline for what most restaurants can afford.
      • CogitoCogito 4y ago
        You're replying to someone who said: > Even a flier by the door would be enough for me! I wonder how many restaurants there are who can't afford paper flyers. They might even be faster/easier than maintaining an online menu.
        • bombcar 4y ago
          In fact, in many parts of the world and even in the US the standard for listing food available for order is just that - a flyer on the counter or even better, some pictures of the various dishes. (You know the food's going to be good when the picture is faded from 15 years of sunlight.)
  • tkiolp4 4y ago
    Same. But in my case it’s because I usually don’t carry my phone with me.
• CaliforniaKarl 4y ago
  https://archive.ph/cgEXf https://archive.ph/cgEXf
• jasonjamerson 4y ago
  I went for sushi this week and of course there's a hundred things in twelve categories. I couldn't even figure out how to get back to the daily specials, once you move on, you can't see them again. It's a fundamentally horrible experience and will definitely keep me from going back.
  • eru 4y ago
    For a counter-anecdote: I've ordered sushi electronically in a restaurant just fine. However, I would probably not go back to a place that had a terrifyingly horrible UI for ordering, either.
• fellowniusmonk 4y ago
  For outdoor picnic table style dining it's my new preference. The ability to easily leave a tab open and progressively order food and drinks on demand is amazing. Not that it should replace all dining experiences but wait staff free dining when ordering from a bar + kitchen is superior for these instances. The ability to just get up an walk off without synchronous negotiation is a more relaxed dining experience, the ability to have people progressively join and leave your party is also fantastic and can facilitate an old school community dining hall experience. There are a few UIs I like for mobile, many are quite poor though.
  • deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  • thepra 4y ago
    could you point out this UIs?
• crazygringo 4y ago
  I like it. It's annoying to wait for the waiter to come over with menus, it's annoying to wait to ask them to bring a menu back because you want to order more, and it's gross when you get a menu that hasn't been wiped down properly and is sticky with god knows what, and it's wasteful when they're printing hundreds of fresh menus a day for the places that give everyone a fresh one. Keep a few backup printouts for those who need them (like your phone gets no signal), but otherwise it's a fantastic step forwards. Goodbye to grimy wasteful printouts. Plus the bonus of never having to experience "oh sorry we're out of that" if they update the menus dynamically is fantastic.
  • nmeagent 4y ago
    It's also annoying to have to bring a phone to a restaurant. Not everyone carries them everywhere. I resent having to have one with me to participate fully in modern society, always listening and collecting data for its corporate masters. I occasionally wish I could throw mine into a large body of water; who knows, maybe some day I will.
    • JoBrad 4y ago
      You don’t have to bring a phone. You can ask the server to bring one, or ask them what is on the menu, if they don’t have one.
      • CogitoCogito 4y ago
        Or you can ask them to bring you a real menu I guess.
        • JoBrad 4y ago
          That’s actually what I meant, but my comment didn’t describe very well.
      • SantalBlush 4y ago
        Asking the server to bring a phone instead of a menu could be actual satire.
• browningstreet 4y ago
  I don’t go out to a restaurant to stare at my screen, and screen menus aren’t great. I don’t mind using an app to pay when I’m done though. Especially if I don’t have to wait for the server.
• flkiwi 4y ago
  There are certainly bad QR Code menus, but good ones are just menus. They're fine. Everything in Conor's piece points to an almost incredible lack of self control--he is incapable of not being distracted by his phone--which to me is a bigger problem than the format in which your menu is presented. Besides, give restaurant workers a break: it's one less thing they have to do to serve you, so they can focus more on providing good service. Having said that, I hope we can all agree that paying directly by phone is one of the unambiguously great COVID-era innovations.
  • CogitoCogito 4y ago
    > Besides, give restaurant workers a break: it's one less thing they have to do to serve you, so they can focus more on providing good service. In that case, they could just hand out menus at the entrance. Or if they don't greet you and instead just let you sit wherever, they can just put the menus in an obvious place. Restaurants have done this forever in similar situations. Online menus aren't necessary to solve this problem. > Having said that, I hope we can all agree that paying directly by phone is one of the unambiguously great COVID-era innovations. I don't really agree. At least I don't think it's an unambiguously great innovation. Personally I find the requirement to have a phone much more irritating than to the requirement to have cash or credit cards. That said, I've never seen a place accept payments by phone not accept either cash or credit cards so I guess it's mostly just irrelevant to me.
    • flkiwi 4y ago
      I could probably have phrased it differently and said having the OPTION to pay by phone is great. If I can avoid having to flag down someone who is working 5 extra tables because someone didn't show, just so she can hand me a paper slip ... I mean, it's a plus from my perspective. But I'm at the age that it catches me off guard every time I can do it.
      • CogitoCogito 4y ago
        > I could probably have phrased it differently and said having the OPTION to pay by phone is great. This article and the comments here are complaining about restaurants who _only_ use QR codes for menus. I'd presume there is basically no one against having the _option_ of seeing the menu with a QR code. While I personally find QR codes much inferior to many other simpler approaches (paper slips, menus at the door, menu on the wall, etc.), I don't care if they offer them in addition to traditional methods.
• pedalpete 4y ago
  Though I'm not a fan, I suspect this will be the new standard, kinda like self-checkout at the grocery store. Hated it at first, but now the idea that somebody is going to scan my groceries just seems annoying and antiquated.
  • pineaux 4y ago
    I hate the self scan groceries. It takes me way more time than a fast cashier. It's just a way for extremely profitable businesses that have a semi-monopoly positions on good placement for stores to become even more profitable at expense of my ease of living. To me as a 29 year old, this feels like the same "progress" as that of companies with a customer service without telephone number. If you have a real problem and you need a person on the other side, they don't provide it. It's just cheapskating.
    • gruez 4y ago
      >I hate the self scan groceries. It takes me way more time than a fast cashier. It's just a way for extremely profitable businesses that have a semi-monopoly positions on good placement for stores to become even more profitable at expense of my ease of living. I'm not sure how you could call grocery stores as having "semi-monopoly positions" and being "extremely profitable", when they have razor thin profit margins.
      • mgkimsal 4y ago
        I'm tired of hearing this "we have no margins". You still hold a monopoly-like position in many areas simply because... people have to eat. I can buy a car once every few years. I can rent or buy a house. I can't rent food. I have to buy. In most places it's going to be from one of the major grocery chains. They have economies of scale. They have a captive audience (or whatever it's called when people can't live without what you're selling).
        • bombcar 4y ago
          They have no margins because they blow hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars on these self-checkouts!
• bdcravens 4y ago
  I like the idea. I think some do a terrible job with it, doing little more than digitizing the print menu, with all of the tiny print. An easily scrolled list, with a fast loading modal with more details when tapped, would be far better. Take it one step further, let me create my order, and then show the server a QR code. As they go to each person on the table, they can still answer questions and take the order on the fly if they need to. tldr; It's a UI/UX problem that can be fixed. The idea itself is sound.
• codefreeordie 4y ago
  QR code menus are fine, if made well, for quick-service and casual restaurants where the customer's interest is primarily in a quick and efficient meal (even a quick-and-efficient delicious and high-quality meal). But if you are operating a fine dining establishment(1), where the food is but one component of the experience, and you have a QR code printed on a piece of paper taped to the table ... you're really taking away from the experience you're supposed to be selling. (1) There are some limited exceptions for places which make a quirky tech vibe part of the experience, which mostly comes up in certain types of sushi bars.
  • prvit 4y ago
    > (1) There are some limited exceptions for places which make a quirky tech vibe part of the experience, which mostly comes up in certain types of sushi bars. What kind of sushi bars are you talking about here? When I think of fine-dining sushi bars, quirky tech vibe is sort of the furthest thing on my mind.
    • nicd 4y ago
      Maybe conveyer belt sushi places, or places where robots bring out dishes to the tables.
      • prvit 4y ago
        Tables and conveyer belts are hardly something I’d associate with high end sushi, which is usually eaten immediately after preparation.
  • spoils19 4y ago
    > (1) There are some limited exceptions for places which make a quirky tech vibe part of the experience, which mostly comes up in certain types of sushi bars. Chinese hotpot, Korean BBQ, Japanese dining that isn't just sushi bars, Thai and Vietnamese places (among many others) quite often use digital menus as well as digital ordering. None of these exhibit a "quirky tech vibe", aside from some places which use robots to deliver small side dishes, or beverages. Many of these would also not be considered "quick and efficient", at least how you describe them. It would be good to consider venturing outside your regular dining locales to see what the rest of the world is doing in terms of restaurant experience, and whether the American way is still even relevant.
• ferrocarraiges 4y ago
  They are very annoying when you block JavaScript in your browser.
• konfusinomicon 4y ago
  the only problem is the mobile UI many have..show me a pdf of the actual menu so I can see everything at once or on a few pages snd zoom in and out..it helps me make a choice about what I want when I can compare it more easily with navigation
  • Supermancho 4y ago
    A pdf is the only version I've seen. I don't understand these strange complaints about places that need you to sign up for wifi AND have poor reception which sounds so unlikely (and pointless, since they just hurt themselves) or how it's hard to see or whatever. It's easier for the establishments to maintain and safer and conveniently dovetails into online ordering.
• binwiederhier 4y ago
  Honestly I am very surprised to see so much love for the QR code menus here. I have had nothing but bad experiences with them. First of, on Android, the camera doesn't magically scan the QR code. You have to download a separate QR code scanner app for that. My wife and my parents all have Android phones and have no idea what to do when they see a QR code like that. The waiter usually just says "point your camera to it" because apparently everyone in the world assumes you have an iPhone and that's how it works there. When it doesn't work the waiter now has to do tech support on a random person's phone. Second, as others have said, the social aspect of looking at it together is totally lost. Which is quite big IMHO. Third, scrolling through a PDF or a page on a tiny screen makes it much harder to grasp the entire menu quickly. On a paper menu, I often just jump around and get inspired by the various dishes. Randomly scrolling up/down/left/right on a tiny screen feel awful compared to just letting your eyes drift. My vote is for a QR code and paper menus. Let the people decide what they like without excluding elderly or non-tech savvy people.
  • rrwo 4y ago
    It's even worse when you you don't have internet access, and have to use a restaurant WiFi that requires you to sign up. Also, if you are dining with someone who has a food allergy, then all the "convenience" of online menusgoes away when a waiver has to bring their book of allergens to the table and manually take the order anyway.
    • sdf4j 4y ago
      right, dining with someone with allergies remains as inconvenient as usual.
      • rrwo 4y ago
        And dining as someone with allergies is more inconvenient.
    • ShakataGaNai 4y ago
      Well that also assumes you live in a part of the world that's civilized and has an allergy book. Seen it plenty in Europe and almost never in the US. Most of the time, in the US, if you say you have an allergy to something the waiter says "I don't know" or "I'll tell the chef".
• Willox 4y ago
  I saw these during a holiday in Spain throughout the last week. I have no idea how to use them and didn't see anybody else use them either. It would probably be a different story if my phone had some kind of built-in support for this stuff (maybe it does?). I recall using the "Google Goggles" app for this kind of thing a _long_ time ago but it should be native - and obvious - by now. I have a feeling that the industry has stopped depending on this stuff already... it's hard to tell without knowing how it works.
• kokonoko 4y ago
  I hate QR codes for menus with a passion. Feels so awkward, need another app on Android, not easily read on dimly lit places. Usually I tell one of my friends to tell me the url. On the other hand I love NFC for this. It blows my mind that it's not that common. Works perfectly and feels natural, just place your phone at the NFC tag.
  • nsm 4y ago
    At least the Pixel camera app does native QR code scanning.
    • allset_ 4y ago
      My Pixel 4a definitely did not the last time I ran into one of these.
      • temp_praneshp 4y ago
        Yeah it's just buggy (same phone here). Works 90% of the time for me (but 100% of the time for my wife, who uses a Pixel 5a).
  • bwoodward 4y ago
    I'm with you. NFC is awesome. I use NFC around the house for basic automation (Hue etc) -- and it definitely should be more common. I was in a restaurant the other night that had QR codes printed on NFC tags, mounted on the wall for each table. The process of pulling up the menu was effortless.
  • GnarfGnarf 4y ago
    NFC = Near-field communication
• JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  I'm surprised when I see QR menus at upper-mid and high end restaurants. (Though that's mostly going away now.) For lower-mid and fast food, it's a clear cost reduction and turnover-boosting channel.
• ArcticLandfall 4y ago
  No-touch menus and QR codes don't have to be a binary choice. Menus can be posters on the wall, papers inside a glass table, or anything else.
• tanseydavid 4y ago
  Hoping the QR codes at least are not printed in any Pantone colors! ;)
• dv_dt 4y ago
  I wish that sales receipts go to QR code too
• sbf501 4y ago
  +1 for hate it. I don't bring my phone with me everywhere I go. I don't want to. It's big, and awkward, and annoying. When it works, it is mediocre at best. When it doesn't work, it's a pain in the ass. Plus it means you almost never see a server. Again, great if there are no hiccups, but awful when something goes wrong. And the huge variety of UIs are awful. Maybe in 10 years when everyone lands on one UI that make sense, and there's an IPAD at the table, and servers come by to follow up... maybe then I'll be OK with it?
  • bigbacaloa 4y ago
    You're living in the 2010s. In most of the world a phone is a necessity everywhere one goes. To access bus or metro, to communicate to work, etc.
    • deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    • sbf501 4y ago
      2010's? Dude, I'm still in the 80's. I'm not some GenZ tiktok child who can't be with a screen for 10 seconds and thinks everything needs to be gamified. This dependency on phones is stupid. So I refuse to participate. The more people that do so, the less this BS takes over life. We're responsible for the world we live in.
      • bigbacaloa 4y ago
        Where I live in Europe the phone is used to charge transport cards, to pay at stores, to interact with banks and government, etc. Because of two factor authentication it's basically a necessity to have one for banking and certain government transactions (some of which can only be done online). I could carry around a laptop for work and business but it's far more convenient to use a smaller device.
        • sbf501 4y ago
          For a month I traveled from Seville to Munich in 2019 and didn't need my phone at all. I bought food, tickets, took transit, etc. What I did NOT do was open a bank account. So do these banks issue you a phone if you don't have one? Does the government have a law that requires citizens to own a phone? What brand? What capabilities. There are online-only banks in the US that are only accessed through a phone, but they are not the ONLY banks. I think you are confusing a world that CAN be accessed vs. a world that MUST be accessed via phone.
• jdlyga 4y ago
  QR Code menus work well in China because you're also ordering from the menus too. You don't have to flag down a waiter and place an order unless you want to.
  • autarch 4y ago
    That's exactly how they work in the US too.
    • endisneigh 4y ago
      Not universally. I found usage of mobile order to b e more prevalent in Beijing vs nyc
    • dtgriscom 4y ago
      Sometimes yes, sometimes no.
    • tmh88j 4y ago
      I've only seen that a handful of times. Most of the time I feel lucky just to get a responsive website instead of a PDF that I have to zoom in to read.
    • xtracto 4y ago
      So now in the USA the waiter doesn't even bring you the menu and tell you order recommendations or the day's special? Are they still expecting you to give them 20% of tip/alms ?
      • rdtwo 4y ago
        25%. They don’t even bring you silverware or water literally only thing they do is bring food. It’s infuriating.
        • n8cpdx 4y ago
          This depends on the restaurant or maybe the area. In Portland the restaurants with QR menus (using Toast) always seem to have a server that brings out water and periodically refills. Don’t blame poor service on a QR code.
• korginator 4y ago
  My experience with QR-code menus has been nearly always terrible. Little to no thought goes into the format and presentation for a small screen device. Many restaurants just return a large PDF with microscopic fonts that you have to struggle to read on your small screen. While some restaurants have a waiter taking orders, others enforce ordering via the same webapp. I've almost always run into problems where the order process hangs, or doesn't go through correctly. There's a specially nasty surprise on iOS devices. Sure you can use the built-in QR code scanner and it pops up a webapp where you take 10 minutes to struggle through everything.... and now you just want to check that message from your friend to see if he's on the way, quickly switch to your favourite messaging app and then.... anger at not being able to find where the heck your menu and ordering process disappeared, because you didn't know that you should have explicitly ordered your phone to open the page in safari.
  • bombcar 4y ago
    When presented with ordering via the web app, you often are just getting whatever the server sees on their tablet, filtered through a simple web interface. And then you can have fun ordering the True Impossible orders, like using the McDonalds app to buy a cheeseburger with no cheese, no bun, no sauce, no onion, no pickle, and no meat.
  • zarzavat 4y ago
    > others enforce ordering via the same webapp Hopefully these restaurants will go extinct via natural selection. It takes so much longer to convince these broken portals to take your order. Which means the restaurant is losing money at peak times.
• CoryAlexMartin 4y ago
  I had some friends come visit me here in Nashville for a week earlier this month. We went out to eat almost every day, and I did not encounter a single one of these. Where have these things taken off?
  • rdtwo 4y ago
    Anywhere people don’t want to pay for labor. Blue states mostly
  • umeshunni 4y ago
    I've seen them this year in California, Washington, Spain and NYC.
    • CoryAlexMartin 4y ago
      Interesting. I spent a month in San Diego earlier this year, but maybe I didn't go to the right places, or maybe it's because San Diego is conservative relative to some other parts of California.
      • bombcar 4y ago
        Some restaurants paid a lot of money for QR-code things, and those push it from some kind of "sunk cost" fallacy I feel. Out of 5 restaurants in Miami only two had QR codes, and one revealed menus instantly at the slightest hint that someone at the table couldn't read the code.
  • crazygringo 4y ago
    I'd say basically wherever people wore masks during COVID. It started as a hygiene thing. Now it's stayed as a convenience thing. At this point in NYC I'm extremely surprised whenever I see a physical menu.
• Tagbert 4y ago
  When they became widespread during the covid lockdowns they were a good solution when we wanted to avoid spreading things by touch. Even how, as long as you can still ask for a printed menu, I think the QR code menu is a reasonable default as long as the menu is relatively simple. If there are a lot of options it becomes cumbersome. Now, I f you have to order through their menu site, that almost never works well. Those sites are just not well run enough to pull off ordering well.
• SkyPuncher 4y ago
  I hate QR menu's. Younger me is absolutely appalled at that. Older me just wants a physical menu. * I intentionally don't use my phone at restaurants. In fact, I often prefer to leave it in the car. * In my area (rural America), a lot of businesses have really poor websites (noticeably worse than urban areas). Nearly all of the QR menus are down right terrible. * There's a good chance some one thought it'd be great to have a bunch of collapsed sections and add a terrible animation. I need to manually expand each section and deal with the terrible animation repositioning the screen. * For those less tech savvy businesses, they probably just uploaded a PDF of their menu. Bonus points if the menu is scanned in on their 15 year old printer/scanner combo. * Finally, there's the group of restaurants that have changed menus but either (1) forget to update the website (2) accidentally have multiple, differing copies of the menu
  • Schroedingersat 4y ago
    Honestly the scanned pdf sounds amazing compared to the website they usually have or the forced app install
    • dzhiurgis 4y ago
      Website is easier to translate and likely quicker to load. Search is similar whether its pdf or website. I like qr codes as an option. It all varies by context of course, but I much prefer ordering uk/nz style - order at the bar, pay, grab drinks yourself, food gets delivered by waiter. Much faster, esp when you are getting a single cup of coffee.
      • Symbiote 4y ago
        That's common in Britain for cheaper places, especially ordinary pubs serving food. At most middle or fancy restaurants you order from the waiter who comes to the table.
  • gibolt 4y ago
    Trust me, the majority of sites are not much better even in the most high-tech of areas. Even large chains can have terrible sites and experiences. Just print a few hundred pieces of paper, and your customers will tell your employees which listed items they want.
• indymike 4y ago
  It's amazing how slow and inconvenient QR code menus are compared to a proper mobile app or even better, a laminated paper menu.
  • crazygringo 4y ago
    A QR code opens a link for me in about 5 seconds. A mobile app takes at least a full minute to authorize and download and install over a cell connection. And I sure don't want to install a new app every time I go to a restaurant. A laminated paper menu often takes several minutes for the server to bring around, or worse. QR codes are literally the fastest thing around.
    • bombcar 4y ago
      What are these restaurants that don't have the hostess give you menus? The lowest class ones have menus printed on the little table placemats, middle ones always have a pile of menus the host grabs from when seating you (and calls you Party of X, always), and the highest ones either arrange for wine first, or you're getting a menu from the server right as you're seated by the hostess. I suppose there's some middle-ground "seat yourself" style ones but I can't recall any recently.
      • crazygringo 4y ago
        Like everywhere I go in NYC? Pretty common for restaurants not to have a host, you just ask a waiter nearby and they tell you to sit anywhere you like, and that someone will be by to serve you. Hosts are expensive and NYC restaurants are often quite small so it's very common not to have them.
  • BiometricAndy 4y ago
    Its amazing how slow and inconvenient are America moving towards new technology. In Asia we typically browse using online system and no own fumbled it yet somehow on this tech website, everyone fumbled it.
    • 4y ago
• tonyaiken 4y ago
  I like QR code if the menu is responsive and allow ordering directly. No matter high end mid end or low end, I just want to get my food quick and check out quick. Always having to find and speak to a waiter is a big problem for me.
  • djcannabiz 4y ago
    why not just order takeout at that point
    • tikhonj 4y ago
      ...because you don't want to eat outside or at home?
  • deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
• beachy 4y ago
  This should instead be labeled "the restaurant industry's worst implementation". Just last night we were trying to order from a restaurant that uses a service called qrfy.com for their menu. I assume from the URL that this service specializes in this. Despite that the UI is... poor. The font is too small (probably fine for the 20 something designer that built it). That's not a biggy, but then someone decided to disable pinch zoom. Being techy, I can show the others how to work around that by doing a screen shot, then looking at the result in the gallery, where zooming does work. That's a crap experience though, because I can only see one page at a time. I just want to browse a menu! And I need to do tech support to show others how to do Android screen grab (gorilla swipe from right to left). All so very fucking ridiculous for something that could do easily be so much better.
  • causality0 4y ago
    You should change your browser settings to force-enable zooming on all sites.
    • lmm 4y ago
      Browsers shouldn't need a setting for this. Whoever decided to allow websites to disable zooming should be shot, along with whoever decided to allow them to disable copy/paste or hijack ctrl-f.
      • cuteboy19 4y ago
        I genuinely think that there is no legitimate use case for disabled copy paste. It's just nonsense security theatre (which banks absolutely love)
        • bombcar 4y ago
          There could be a modicum of use for it in some rare, rare cases, but the value provided in those cases is far outweighed by the value lost when it is prohibited.
• tuffacton 4y ago
  Some coffee shops/cafes make it central to the overall experience and I love it. You can order directly from the QR code and the code is tied to your table so they bring the food and coffee directly to you. Split the bill directly in the app when you close out to pay. If a restaurant isn’t going to really invest in an experience like that then they absolutely should go back to paper menus.
  • dmitriid 4y ago
    It's... Not an experience. Don't know about countries, but in Sweden it's never been a problem to split the bill when you're paying. The waiter will just input whatever's needed into the PoS they bring to the table. Why the hell would I need to download and install the restaurant's app for that and trust it with my payment details? All while I'm trying to just have a meal
    • thewebcount 4y ago
      So much this! I want to enjoy a meal with my friends and/or family. I don’t want to play tech games. I’ve been to a few restaurants that have an iPad at the table where you can order additional items, refills, dessert, and pay. Those were fine (so long as you turn them around when eating because they have distracting animations on them). But having to download someone else’s code to my phone. Fuck that.
    • jdminhbg 4y ago
      > Why the hell would I need to download and install the restaurant's app for that and trust it with my payment details? This is why Apple’s “App Clips” functionality is so great. You get a small app-like piece of functionality that you’re not installing or keeping, it works while you’re at the restaurant, then you check out with Apple Pay (or equivalent) so you don’t have to input payment details and don’t have to worry about usable payment details being stored by a potentially-insecure website.
      • dmitriid 4y ago
        This assumes: - there's internet - internet is good and unmetered - the phone is readily available - ... vs. You pay with card/cash at the end of the meal
• anecdotal1 4y ago
  I assume the reason they work so well in China is that they open into some nice UI everyone uses / is fairly standardized in WeChat or AliPay or something. Our internet model is very different from theirs with the Super Apps
  • PakG1 4y ago
    This is it. I lived in China for a decade and only started seeing the WeChat menus for everything only in the last couple of years I was there. It was SO convenient and easy to use. Much nicer than trying to flip through a physical menu, flag down a waiter, have them write down my order, etc. But I imagine it would suck if I had to open a different UI every single time. The UI I used was tried and true, efficient, and user-friendly, could depend on it working well no matter where I went.
  • eru 4y ago
    They work well in Singapore too, but typically don't open in an super app. It's typically just a website. (The restaurants don't really like dealing with the super apps like Grab, because they take a 30% cut.)
• zoklet-enjoyer 4y ago
  I love QR codes and used to put up QR code stickers around town. I hate them for menus though. I sometimes like to go on walks without my phone and stop in somewhere for a meal. Or my phone is dead. Or I just want to have a meal with someone without any phones distracting us. The only implementation I've seen of this that I thought was neat was at a restaurant where it opened up to a website where I could place the order and pay on my phone.
  • Niksko 4y ago
    Huh, maybe that explains why living in Australia, I don't understand the hate for QR code menus. Basically everywhere that has a QR code menu over here these days also lets you order and pay via the same QR code.
    • filoleg 4y ago
      Oh, that's a total gamechanger. If looking at the QR code menu allowed me to also order from it, it would have made it much superior to physical menus, no argument. Sadly, I've never encounteted it across many restaurants with QR code menus in a major city (Seattle). Every single time it was either a link to the pdf version of the printed menu or their website with the menu.
      • px1999 4y ago
        Order and pay is the standard these days in Australia. It's pretty rare to find somewhere that has the menu but nothing else as a qr code (why not just look up the restaurant's website in that case?).
    • zoklet-enjoyer 4y ago
      Here in the Upper Midwest of the United States, it's almost all just links to websites that aren't mobile friendly and PDFs
    • thewebcount 4y ago
      Pardon my ignorance, as I haven’t been to a restaurant since the pandemic started. How does that work when you have 2 or more people you’re ordering for? Do you pass the phone around? Do they have to look at it and tell you what they want and you enter it? Do you ask them, “Do you want X? No? Y? What about Z?” Sounds like a huge pain to me.
• humaniania 4y ago
  I like online menus by QR code and paying by QR code is amazing.
• exabrial 4y ago
  High end restaurants have switched to ipads, but even that misses the mark: it’s bulkk, time consuming, and waaaaay overpowered/priced. Really all that’s needed is an ARM chip from 10 years ago mated to a display of this era.
• majormajor 4y ago
  I love them when they let me pay at the end and there's still staff around to ask questions if needed. Waiting to flag down someone busy to ask to pay so I can leave if I'm not carrying exactly the right cash amount is not helpful for anyone.
  • s0rce 4y ago
    Except you have to tip before you get any service
    • happyopossum 4y ago
      What country are you in where you tip first? That’s literally nuts.
      • s0rce 4y ago
        USA. Many of the places that you now have to pay on a kiosk or electronically with the QR code ask you to pay and tip upfront.
    • eru 4y ago
      Sounds like an American problem? Tipping isn't that common elsewhere, fortunately.
• JohnFen 4y ago
  QR Code menus are the absolute worst. They're a serious pain to use on the phone, and they encourage people to take their phones out when they should be put away. So far, every restaurant I've been to also has paper menus. I'm not sure what I'd do if online was the only way to look at the menu. I'd likely find another restaurant.
• drewg123 4y ago
  I hate QR code menus as they are often poorly implemented. However, I just experienced a QR code check for the first time. That was really nice .. I scanned the QR code with my iPhone, it downloaded the Toast "app clip", which allowed me to pay the bill with Apple Pay. It was totally seamless and far better than handing my credit card to a server to get lost or cloned.
  • dmitriid 4y ago
    > It was totally seamless and far better than handing my credit card to a server to get lost or cloned. In most countries I've been the waiter brings the PoS terminal to you and you pay at the table.
    • reaperducer 4y ago
      In most countries I've been the waiter brings the PoS terminal to you and you pay at the table. We've had this in America for over a decade at big chain suburban restaurants like Ruby Tuesday's and Applebees.
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      • motoxpro 4y ago
        He means most countries that are not the USA. Haven't been to Applebees in ~5 years or so but they didn't do it then either. USA doesn't bring you a terminal on average. I travel around the world for work and my experience is that most countries outside the USA do. Ah, you edited your response. Mine still is valid I guess.
        • reaperducer 4y ago
          Haven't been to Applebees in ~5 years or so but they didn't do it then either. Must have been the Applebees that you went to. I went to one in 2014 that brought the POS to the table. I remember the year because it was in a state that I've only been to once, for a business trip.
• teeray 4y ago
  Really surprised there hasn’t yet been a reckoning with QR code substitution attacks. Duplicate the menu, put up a “type your credit card details” form, and you could probably automate the actual order with the real menu site in the background. Boom—-skimmed. There’s just no way for laypeople to evaluate the provenance of random QR codes. The restaurant industry often uses random third party sites for their menus, so even that is a poor signal. EDIT: Adding second paragraph that was accidentally deleted before submission
  • wrayjustin 4y ago
    I couldn't agree more. Though, just because we haven't heard of widespread cases doesn't mean it hasn't or isn't happening. > There's just no way for laypeople to evaluate the provenance of random QR codes. Arguably, even seasoned veterans may have difficulty confirming the validity. Too often, it's a patchwork of random third parties before the order is completed. > The restaurant industry often uses random third-party sites for their menus, so even that is a poor signal. Which makes this all that worse, as it's contrary to all of the "verify" messaging we've been preaching from the security world.
  • lotu 4y ago
    The menu doesn't ask for payment typically, the server still does that so a qr substitution attack would do nothing useful other than confuse the customers and staff for about 10 minutes before they decide to just rewrite the menu on some paper and deal with the problem after closing.
    • thundergolfer 4y ago
      In Sydney Australia it is common for the payment to happen through the QR code flow. It’s backed by well-known apps though, not unknown 3rd parties.
    • teeray 4y ago
      Sure, I haven’t described the universe of QR code usage at restaurants. The point still stands that a QR code at a table is an abusable trust boundary in some places where it’s used.
• rmellow 4y ago
  Love it or hate it: sometimes QR doesn't work. Why oh why don't QR codes include a URL for users to type manually? No graceful failure here.
• bergenty 4y ago
  My problem with them is that the menu is always some small pdf like thing that you then need to zoom in on and move around. Not a huge issue though. The much bigger problem at some places is it drop you on the homepage for the restaurant then you have to hunt for the menu on it. Also some of them make you sign up for an account which is super annoying.
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• systemvoltage 4y ago
  In a very abstract sense, QR codes in restaurants are same conceptually to me as digitization of things that need not be: IoT gadgets in the home - doors, cars, fridges, TV's and a whole bunch of technology non-sense that society is hooked up on. If I were an artist, I would make art that uses QR codes to exemplify a deteriorating society into technological authoritarianism. Always connected, always watching. See China: https://twitter.com/bfm_jose/status/1556544301743702016 https://twitter.com/bfm_jose/status/1556544301743702016
• cavisne 4y ago
  In some countries this is often a menu + a ordering and payment app. It's very popular to the point that servers actually ask you to use it vs asking them. In America this wont happen because of the tipping culture, so we get the worst bit (reading a menu on your phone) without the useful bit (reliably entering your order and paying without the check/card/away/back/tip dance).
  • tsian2 4y ago
    In some countries there might also be a menu on the table for easier browsing. It does away with the frustrating parts of the experience like needing your orders ready at the exact time the waiter asks for it and having to wait for a bill after you finish. So you can just focus on the company of the people you're with, the food and the atmosphere.
    • eru 4y ago
      Some restaurants here also provide a tablet at the table for your orders. That started before QR codes became widespread. Very convenient!
• idontwantthis 4y ago
  I gave an otherwise good restaurant a 1 star review after receiving an unsolicited text ad after using a QR code menu.
  • happyopossum 4y ago
    How did a menu website get your phone number??
    • idontwantthis 4y ago
      Damned if I know.
• kumarvvr 4y ago
  For a long time I thought QR Code menus were a great idea. But seeing user reactions like this made me re-evaluate a lot of my project ideas. I get it, the convenience of having a simple menu in hand (0 steps) vs. a QR code menu (5-6 steps) trumps whatever interactivity the latter menu provides. I guess the expectation of users sitting in a restaurant is to move away from their phones and technology and move towards socializing and a QR menu brings those back onto the table.
  • bombcar 4y ago
    There's a lot of tech like this - it's flashy, it seems great, but it just doesn't work well enough to be a game changer. To go to extra steps you need to get extra value (and not just "use our app and save 5$" type of value) - something like being able to save custom variations from previous visits, order before and have it nearly ready, etc. Anyways, off to raise $50m for QR-menus-on-the-blockchain, wish me luck.
  • eru 4y ago
    > I get it, the convenience of having a simple menu in hand (0 steps) vs. a QR code menu (5-6 steps) trumps whatever interactivity the latter menu provides. Yes, but on the other hand the QR ordering I've done here in Singapore streamlines a lot of other steps from the rest of the ordering-food-and-paying process. It's especially useful that you no longer have to synchronize with wait staff. You can just order and pay whenever.
• andirk 4y ago
  Bad guy idea: Stick your man-in-the-middle QR code over the restaurant's QR code sticker on the table. Use the same design. Pay thru the app. Mine credit cards! It'll probably only work once, though, because someone will say like "Hey where's my salted milksteak?" and the server will say it wasn't ordered. A fight will ensue and all moneys will be lost.
  • kQq9oHeAz6wLLS 4y ago
    I bet it'd work a handful of times. The first couple times will be attributed to "those darn computers acting up again."
    • bombcar 4y ago
      No, you're thinking too small - do it on companies that HAVE online ordering via the QR code, and tack on "fees" and still place the order through - could even hire contractors to do the actual orders. People might not even notice, just like they don't notice the "18% gratuity included on all orders" that are appearing here and there (and still tip on top of that).
      • andirk 4y ago
        Friends, if we were all evil, this would work seamlessly. The only outstanding item: what do we name the fee? Keep in mind names already taken are service fee, small order fee, heavy order fee, pickup fee + dropoff fee, Chicago fee (regardless of city), and the anti-fee "customer happiness refund".
        • bombcar 4y ago
          Covid-19 Safety Fee refundable Then have a phone number for "refunds" and happily issue them. Nobody will call.
• quickthrower2 4y ago
  I love them. Just order as soon as you sit down. No need to wait to be seen.
  • happyopossum 4y ago
    That’s not a QR code menu, it’s an entire QR ordering system - and I personally think they’re horrible.
• raisin_churn 4y ago
  I have never, to the best of my knowledge, owned a telephone that can open QR codes, and I'm neither interested in finding out for sure, nor buying a different telephone. I've largely stopped going to restaurants anyways because of the outrageous unannounced and mysterious fees that many are now tacking on (I'm not opposed to paying what it costs to produce fine dining, but tell me the cost up-front), but I also will not go to a restaurant that won't just hand me a damn menu. I'm just a drop in the bucket, and no doubt nobody is missing my custom, but who knows, maybe there are more like me.
  • texasbigdata 4y ago
    A quick google shows QR came out in 2002, had apps on all phone platforms in 2010, and was native to iOS in 2017. So at a minimum you are 5 years behind, although you could use an app fairly easily. The average phone life before replacement is 2.5 years in North America [1] so you are somewhere between 2x and 4x outside the median: an outlier but not outrageously so. 1. https://www.statista.com/statistics/619788/average-smartphone-life/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/619788/average-smartphon...
    • raisin_churn 4y ago
      I recently replaced my decade old Blackberry because it either did not support VoLTE or I just couldn't find the appropriate firmware upgrade for the modem, but either way the telecom refused to service it. If it had support for scanning QR codes, it was very well hidden, as I actually spent time trying to get it to do that. I now have a Nokia of some sort, pointing the camera at the QR code doesn't open a web page, and that's all the effort I'm interested in investing, since the entire notion of QR menus only serves to make cellular telephones more mandatory for participation in society, which I wholeheartedly reject. The day I can't walk out my front door without a telephone and accomplish my tasks, I'll move to the mountains and become a hermit.
      • fsflover 4y ago
        But what is the actual reason you hate smartphones, if I can ask?
• silverpepsi 4y ago
  Is the horrid UX of the Android operating system not the worst part about QR menus? You absent-mindedly hit the physical back button once instead of using the restaurant's ultra slow back button for navigation and you end up back at your home screen starting from scratch needing to ask the waiter for the QR code to be brought to your table again. Then another 30 seconds trying to get it to scan because it's scratched or on reflective glossy paper. Same experience in more than ten countries This part of the experience is by itself so aggravating I haven't had time to think any deeper about other potential downsides honestly
  • lxgr 4y ago
    I use an iPhone and find them extremely annoying as well.
• walterbell 4y ago
  You can ask for a paper menu. Nine times out of ten, they will have one. For that one time out of ten, ask the waiter for a menu recommendation, or ask if your preferred staple is on the menu. This has worked in NYC restaurants large and small for the past three years. Some of the better restaurants have since reverted to paper menus. We have the choice to say no to blind redirects-in-the-middle for service transactions with a human server present.
  • switch007 4y ago
    9/10 my experience in UK is: the waiter is already walking away from you before you get a chance to ask, then they just repeat “oh you can just order with the QR code it’s super easy” while walking away again
    • walterbell 4y ago
      That's happened a few times. I thank them for the offer and likewise repeat my request for a paper menu, which usually appears, reluctantly.
• andrewstuart 4y ago
  I won’t go to any restaurant that uses at codes, if I can avoid it.
• yalogin 4y ago
  Yep. QR code menus are just a terrible experience. On top of that companies are just gathering more data points about me forcibly.
• charlieyu1 4y ago
  The restaurant should provide back up devices for anyone who don’t want to use their own device.
• alfiedotwtf 4y ago
  How long before we discover that QR Code based menus were the thin edge to differential pricing based on the customer's profile
  • kristopolous 4y ago
    You can do lots of crazy tricks. Have a menu where you have to scroll horizontally to see the prices and then set them higher based on how indifferent the customer seems to be to look at them. Have each table have a different qr code and then raise the prices if it's a large group on the premise that auditing will be more challenging. There's a bunch of clever executions without even basic profiling.
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• nortonham 4y ago
  As a lowly employee in a giant hotel that is part of a massive global company, I have to say I dislike QR codes (and the micros POS). We had an issue where menu changes were not updated automatically on the QR codes, allowing guests to order things they can no longer order. Further, when orders from QR codes went to printers in the kitchen, either parts of the order were missing, and/or the guest was able to write in certain requests, without being sure we even carried the product. I'm sure QR codes work great in some circumstances, but they didn't in this instance.
• rathish_g 4y ago
  The problem is the implementation. Restaurants started embedding the PDF of the menu exactly as it is and often with complicated zoom/ pan. They could replace it with a neat AR experience using the same mobile devices. It will be expensive but will give the user a nice user experience.
• gcanyon 4y ago
  I'm surprised at all the hate for QR code menus, and QR codes in general, here of all places. Most of the complaints seem to reduce to "QR codes don't work well enough" or "I'm not used to them, therefore they're bad." Sure, QR codes aren't perfect. They'll either get better or they'll die/get replaced. That's the way technology works: we try a lot of things, and some of them work.
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  • batmanturkey 4y ago
• Eleison23 4y ago
  You know what I love? Ordering fast food in advance through Google Maps. I simply locate my target on the Maps App, then I click through to order online, and I pay with my favorite wallet, and when I hop off the bus and waltz in the door, my order is waiting for me. Then I have to explain how it's "for here" and I open it up and beg for plasticware and napkins....
  • bombcar 4y ago
    More and more fast food places let you order ahead all you want, but don't actually start cooking it until you "arrive". It's kinda pointless, even though I understand why they do it. (Taco Bell and McDonald's at least don't start your order until you "arrive" at the drive-thru or pickup area; but if you order Taco Bell for "inside pickup" they seem to start cooking it right away ... sometimes?)
• namelosw 4y ago
  It varies through regions. It is completely the opposite in China because: - No extra app. People scan the QR in WeChat (everybody has it) on the table, it will call a mini-app dynamically (somewhat similar to React Native but interpreted in WeChat). - You are putting orders directly. - You are paying within WeChat as well so it's seamless. - The app is smooth because almost every restaurant is using the takeout giant Meituan's mini-app. - Almost every single restaurants in China is tech savvy enough to use those systems because it's already a take-out centered society. Restaurants not leveraging these systems have virtually zero chance to survive the competition. - You don't have to wait for anything or talk to anybody in the whole process. The problems people mentioned in this thread: - Minorities, people without smart phone or those are less tech savvy, are left behind. - The walled garden and monopolies and such. These problems are real, but it's probably not the QR menu to blame, because it's a far greater problem - in China, you are not allow to go anywhere without WeChat and scanning QR code due to those draconian regulations.
  • eru 4y ago
    I have similar experiences in Singapore. The QR code menus work just fine here. And if you don't have a smartphone, you can still just talk to the staff and order with them. I like that this lets restaurants improve their labour productivity and lower their labour costs. It's hard to run a profitable restaurant.
    • qsi 4y ago
      I agree it's hard to run a profitable restaurant, but I disagree it works fine in Singapore. I just had lunch at a QR based restaurant here and it was a bit painful. Staff shortages are a real problem though in F&B so something has to give. Thankfully printed menus are making a comeback. Even when the apps work fine I still prefer a printed menu.
      • eru 4y ago
        I have a slight preference for having a printed menu available for browsing, _and_ also having optional electronic ordering. > I just had lunch at a QR based restaurant here and it was a bit painful. Interesting, which one? So far I didn't have too much trouble. But I can easily believe that there are many that don't work so well.
• switch007 4y ago
  QR menus was just the tip of the iceberg of a huge downgrade of service during Covid, which still prevails because they’re recovering costs and suffering from huge inflation. There are less staff, worse trained staff, longer waits, reduced menus, increased prices etc in many places now. I get it. It was hard to run a restaurant before the pandemic. I can’t imagine what it’s like now
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• sand500 4y ago
  I think the leading implementation is Toast Tab at least in the Bay. I really like it and hope it becomes more prominent. https://pos.toasttab.com/products/mobile-order-and-pay https://pos.toasttab.com/products/mobile-order-and-pay >With Toast Mobile Order & Pay™, guests can easily scan a QR code to browse the menu, order, and pay, all from their mobile device. Plus with Apple Pay, guests can pay in less than 10 seconds.
• aaronbrethorst 4y ago
  I love them. I just wish they weren't all hosted in some EU-based S3 datacenter.
• ReptileMan 4y ago
  I think that the guys that use NSO products think that this is Restaurant Industry's best idea ...
• zhiQ 4y ago
  I’m seeing more of this post-pandemic. I like it. It’s more evolved than just view-only PDF. Now it’s scan QR to access menu listing, add items to cart and then checkout to payment. Some even with robot server bringing the food to you. Seamless and easier than waiting for a waiter to take my order, especially in a busy restaurant.
  • asdwda 4y ago
• nikau 4y ago
  I don't mind the QR code, what I do mind is having to give out my mobile phone number each time I order through yet another service. Thankfully I can just put in a fake number and normally the order still goes through.
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• mruniverse 4y ago
  I think physical menus are an opportunity to make your restaurant memorable. QR code menus lean toward commodity.
• LightG 4y ago
  My one experience. A group situation where I was the lemon who scanned the code for the table (of 8 people). I was then forced to take orders for the table, with all the back and forth that implies. The worst thing is, everyone had a physical menu. Just the ordering process was initiated by the QR code. Who needs waiters,l when you have technology, eh!? Hell. Never again.
• ouid 4y ago
  The worst thing about QR code menus is that smart phones are fucking terrible, and society should not be allowed to insist that I carry one. Does anyone actually like using these ad infested anticomputers? They're actually just pieces of trash.
  • Symbiote 4y ago
    I haven't seen an ad for years. Install a strong adblocker on Firefox (on Android). Avoid any app where there's a website alternative.
• voidfunc 4y ago
  Hate them. Just give me a damn paper menu. Also, it's the worst when dealing with my senior parents who struggle with technology and basically don't know how to use their smartphones.
• tokamak 4y ago
  I love QR menus. I live in Singapore though were things are well designed and efficient. Pretty much all menus are web applications, some restaurants allow to pay directly from the menu web page.
• DeathArrow 4y ago
  If I were to order using apps and be served by robots I'd rather quit going to restaurants. If the food is the only thing I want, I can order it.
• andrewstuart 4y ago
  The worst dining experience I’ve had was directly attributable to QR code menus. I took a client out to lunch. The waitress came to the table, directed our attention to the qr code and left. I was wanting to connect with my guest but instead had to get out my phone, point it at the qr code then peer at a screen, which is the height of bad manners when you are in someone else’s company, choose what I wanted then hand my phone to my guest, which is a revolting and unhygienic thing to do, nowhere else in society is this expected, then he had to do the same, choose something to eat, then I’m damned if I didn’t have to pay for it there and then at the table, get out my credit card and complete the transaction, just such bad manners and embarrassing. Dealing with money has rules and expectations in our society. Are we meant to go through some sort of “I’ll pay/no please I’ll pay” ritual over a qr code menu at the beginning of the meal? Ugh. I hated every moment of that experience. Instead of enjoying and exploring the menu, chatting lightly about the choices available, I couldn’t wait to get the awful experience over with. The printed menu, and the human interaction with the waiter, are an integral and key part of the experience of eating out, and if a restaurant owner doesn’t understand that then they really don’t know what business they are in. QR code menus are lazy, impersonal, offensively pushing me to use tech when I don’t want to, inconvenient, tasteless and generally the absolute opposite of the experience I want when dining out. Makes no sense to me that restaurant owners think they are a good idea. I can see why they’d be good at Macdonalds or fast food restaurants but that’s it. When I book a restaurant I now ask if the use QR code menus and if they do then I cancel.
  • dzhiurgis 4y ago
    Geez relax I’m ordering coffee and sandwich not an escort
    • bluGill 4y ago
      i want my sandwitch fast. i rarely order fast good, which means i don't know where things are in your app. the user interface on apps are terrible. with training they can be fast, but i don't wabt training on how to find things. train your own people
  • bambax 4y ago
• DeathArrow 4y ago
  The restaurants are trying to maximize profits by not having to pay some meager salaries. But by doing so they are comiting a capital mistake and that is not delivering what the customer demands, which is not only food but services and potential for human interaction.
• DeathArrow 4y ago
  I hate fast foods and big restaurant chains. I like small family owned restaurants where I know I am welcomed, where I can chat with staff and the owners, where people are friendly and have a good disposition. If I would not afford to pay, I would rather cook at home then settle with subpar food and subpar experience.
• Test0129 4y ago
  I have a really hard time ordering. After spending time doing security I do not trust QR codes. They make me really, really uncomfortable. To the point I wont eat at a restaurant with them unless someone who is not as paranoid will get the menu. Aside from me, what about people without phones?
  • pplante 4y ago
    Why are they so terrifying?
    • Test0129 4y ago
      They can be used to start an exploit chain on a phone. I’ve seen 0-days personally that root a phone by triggering a drive by download. The other issue is they are unauditable. You have to almost go to the link to discover what is there. This is a problem, for example, when shell code can own the camera itself.
• GrumpyNl 4y ago
  So many negative reactions towards the QR-code menu and all because they are badly implemented.
• hunglee2 4y ago
  QR codes work fine - as ever it is the local implementation which makes the difference. Experience I've had in Australia, UK, Spain, Portugal all pretty smooth - scan code with camera, click link menu displays, make order, pay bill. Saves on wait staff, which restaurants cannot hire anyway, so this will help keep restaurants in business
• nayuki 4y ago
  I hate the writer's terminology of calling them "QR Code Menus". I would call them web page menus. The QR Code is only used to encode the URL, not the full menu content. The menu is simply a web page, whose address can be obtained by many methods - QR Code, Data Matrix code, Aztec code, PDF417 code, Google search, manually typing text, etc. Furthermore, I don't like how many QR Codes do not have human-readable text. For example, if I wanted to access a restaurant menu on a laptop computer, it makes more sense to type a URL than to awkwardly position its webcam (if it even has one) to scan a barcode. I very much agree with the author's sentiment that requiring a digital device with power and Internet to simply read a menu is user-hostile.
  • zarzavat 4y ago
    “Web page menu” does not distinguish it from the existing practice of a restaurant putting its menu on its website, so that you can read the menu before you visit. Nobody has any problem with that. The problem is most certainly the QR code. The QR code is what is requiring me to have a charged phone (= phone+power bank+charging cable) to read the damn menu. If they gave people devices to read the menu on (e.g. how McDonalds does it) then it would be less problematic.
    • nayuki 4y ago
      Fine, how about calling the practice as "web-only menus on customer's device"? Even if the restaurant didn't use QR Codes, if the table said "Visit restaurant.com/menu", then you would still be forced to pull out your phone. The QR Code is just a way to convey a URL, and there are definitely alternatives like manually typing one.
• mradek 4y ago
  I really like QR codes when it just leads to a simple static site with the menu. Wouldn't mind if that site was a tad more advanced also let me place an order that goes into some order queue. Also wouldn't mind if that site can text me the bill so I can pay using something standard like GPay or Apple Pay. Just don't make it fucking impossible to use, keep it simple and fast.
• club_tropical 4y ago
  It’s really 1) bad reception + no unprotected wifi 2) PDF that you have to zoom into, rather than a nice mobile-adapted static page that makes the experience aweful for me.
• xkbarkar 4y ago
  Reminds me of those messenger restaurants in Sweden. You have to have messenger installed and then you roder, the server comes out with the food and that's the only connection you will have with them. Swedish servers and bartenders and taxi drivers want tips. And they get super pissed if you don't tip them. The espresso house barista never asks for tips, the bartender does and gets mad if you don't tip. All they have done is bring me a plate of food , zero interaction. Why why why should I tip them? Still pisses me off. I actively avoid restaurants that use this system. Takeouts however I am fine with in this way. Also , do not tip in Sweden, ever.
• anonymoh 4y ago
  I'm in Singapore and eat out every meal. Lots of places started having QR menus after Covid and I hate it. I never knowingly go to a QR place, but sometimes I go somewhere new and forget to check. Luckily there's a strong correlation between having QR menus and having poor service, so I could continue going to most of my favorite places.
• dustedcodes 4y ago
  Reading the comments here it’s clear to me that there are two kinds of people: 1) Those that like QR code menus. Going to a restaurant is not pleasure, it’s just an annoying means of getting food and the aim is to make it as efficient as a factory. No talking, no waiting, no eye contact at all if possible, ideally they would have a robot by the table that could spoon feed them so they never have to put their phone down and use their time to be mega efficient by looking at some spreadsheets. 2) people who see the act of going to a restaurant as a way of enjoying life. They don’t mind waiting a little bit for the waiter. They have great company and already enjoy a nice conversation. They probably already have a nice cocktail in their hands which they got from the bar whilst waiting for the table. They love looking around at other people, love looking at other peoples plates to get inspired for what they might want to eat themselves. Those people are in no rush. They don’t need to be anywhere else, they enjoy spending time together so it doesn’t matter where. They love talking to the waiter and ask which items on the menu are customer’s favourites or if the chef has a special recommendation today based on the seasonal produce they managed to source on that day. They love to discover new wines based on recommendations instead of always picking the same drink off the menu. These people take pleasure in the process and the experience and therefore hate QR codes and everything that comes with it. They hate paying via the app before being able to ask the waiter if the tips get fairly shared. These people take pride in whatever they do and enjoy light hearted banter with the staff and can leave a bar man or waiter with a smile even on a long day. Personally I am category two. Life is to be lived. There is a time and place for a quick and efficient meal, but that is takeout and not going to a restaurant for me.
  • kruuuder 4y ago
    > it’s clear to me that there are two kinds of people ... Your entire comment is just an exaggerated caricature of what is actually being discussed.
  • deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  • mihaic 4y ago
    You're hyperbolizing, and making it easier for the people that actually like QR codes to contradict you. In essence, I think you're mostly right though, but I see a hard battle ahead, since most people go with the flow. I remember the barbarous days of smoking inside, and there was no way to sway even a group of mostly non-smokers to go to a non-smoking location.
• DitheringIdiot 4y ago
  Some more annoyances with ordering on your phone: - I couldn’t get a coffee recently because there was a couple complaining that their coffee hadn’t arrived. (They took ages) it turned out they had ordered coffee at the wrong location (it’s a chain). - went for pizza. And had to enable location services to make sure I was in the restaurant. Presumably to prevent the above issue. - allergies - went to a restaurant where a member of staff has to come out and talk about allergies even though they’re on the digital menu. So you end up ordering twice.
• kruuuder 4y ago
  I'm actually surprised that this is an issue. I eat out several times a week and haven't seen a QR code menu in months. QR code menus were a short episode during the pandemic, but it looks like most restaurants in my city switched back to printed menus (I live in Germany).
  • benknight87 4y ago
    Agreed, I'm very happy that a lot of things we just accepted would become norms post-pandemic have just been completely forgotten and life today is largely indistinguishable from 2019.
    • xwdv 4y ago
      I still see acrylic barriers between customer service reps and customers.
      • kruuuder 4y ago
        As far as I know, that's still mandatory in some situations.
  • omnibrain 4y ago
    And taking cash, to be better able to evade taxes.
• vishnugupta 4y ago
  Finally someone had to say this!! For me an allure of eating out is not just the food but the whole experience of it and ogling over the menu card is a big part of that. I don’t have anything else to add except that I vehemently agree with this article.
• dontbenebby 4y ago
  OTOH you could just whatever they have advertised as a special -- I liked in Paris last I went how for a ten euro note you could get a really well designed lunch. What happened to the good old days in America, when people were scared if they so much as connected to my Wifi without permission they'd disappear for a decade? Nowadays it's like any given morning, for all I know those dastardly Distributed Denial of Secrets hackers will be sitting on the corner uploading their latest ill gotten gains. (You don't have to use a computer at all in the restaurant.)
• Max-q 4y ago
  I love the QR code menus as long as the menu is working well on the phone with a seamless order an payment solution. It’s so nice to be able to just leave when finished, at a place where you get your food delivered to the table. Before the pandemic, this system was already in use in a few places. The pandemic made it spread fast (no pun intended).
• mihaic 4y ago
  While I hope QR codes receive an even stronger backlash, I would bet on a general downgrade of the experience. Given that, I have to ask the Americans: how can you still justify that absurd 20% tip?
• anomie 4y ago
  Went out for a meal with my 77-year old father last week and as always he brings a magnifying glass and flashlight as the restaurant lighting is too dim and menus too small almost universally for people with poor eyesight. He’s pretty tech capable and has a big bright phone with large text though so seems to me there’s a potentially huge accessibility opportunity here if they were done well. (Sounds like they’re not well done in practice although don’t have much personal experience- maybe haven’t hit the UK as much yet)
  • willyt 4y ago
    I’ve experienced it once in the UK and either the phone network reception was really bad or the restaurant’s website was ultra slow so it didn’t work. While we are on the subject… The worst app crime is the effing calmac ferry app. All the timetables would amount to about 100kb of data which is updated usually once a year months in advance. Phone reception is non existent or spotty in a lot of the Highlands and Islands, but when you go to the app to check a timetable it tries to download a PDF file! every time you open a timetable page!! It’s a reasonably rare situation where it makes sense to have an app not a website.
• Aleksdev 4y ago
  I hate how 1/3rd of this article is just the author describing his or her experience from using the traditional menu in the past and what a QR code is. Maybe it’s just me but I would really like author to get to the point. Also QR code menus are great. Edit: One thing to add is that the QR code restaurants I have went to have the physical menu as well so if you forget your phone you can still order.
• kebsup 4y ago
  In the Czech republic, there's one app to order in most qr restaurants. It's much better than any restaurant specific website.
• fregante 4y ago
  Digital menus aren't bad, but very few can implement them effectively. I do like having access to the menu for the whole dinner though and not have to wait for the waiter, ever. In general, yeah, give me a piece of paper, there are far more people who can print some text than developers who can make a decent menu page — and it's quite sad, given it should just be a single, flat HTML page with an "index"
• nmstoker 4y ago
  Payment without the waiters is much better for the customer. You'd think that waiting staff would take care with the part where they collect the money to pay their wages but it's incredible how often they go AWOL at that point in proceedings or double down on the "actively not looking towards the customers". In principle I'd like to be on reasonable terms with them but when that happens I'd take automation any day.
• thom 4y ago
  I feel a bit conflicted here. On the one hand I absolutely love having positive interactions with waiters and I will judge my dinner companions on how graciously they treat service staff. Good service can make a great meal even better. But also sometimes you’re at a busy chain restaurant and you don’t want faff. I still hate QR codes that just open PDFs. I hate the default iOS implementation that doesn’t open a Safari tab by default and so disappears if your phone goes to sleep. But if I can do my whole order (including three indecisive kids) from my phone, and then pay, it’s a lot of pressure off.
• duplex_suplex 4y ago
  Instead of QR menus, can't restaurants have landing pages after you connect to wifi that let you view the menu and order. For those that want a waiter you can put a big button on the top to request for physical service. For those know what they want, just select the dishes like you do on a food ordering app and the instructions are relayed to the kitchen. This by no means solves the issues in the article, it might actually expound the privacy related issues and it deepens our reliance on mobile phones. But it does allow the best of both worlds; letting people choose the sort of service they get. The other choice is to have a physical tablet on each table for people to order from (although that sounds very gross).
• SergeAx 4y ago
  I don't want human connection right now, I want to eat, and I want it sooner please, thank you.
• batmanturkey 4y ago
• ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago
  Oh, Gods, I hate those things. The biggest gripe I have, is that I follow the code, and: 1) It asks me to register an account; and 2) Upon finally getting to the menu, my phone is immediately taken over by a full-screen ad, forcing me to scroll down, to see an almost incomprehensible ToC, that is based on whatever they are pushing, as opposed to what I want. When I sit down, if there's no menus, and one of those gegaws is in the middle of the table, I ask "May I have a menu, please?" If they point at the gegaw, I repeat: "May I have a menu, please?" The point generally sinks in.
• cultofmetatron 4y ago
  I'm CTO of a startup in this space so I thought I'd chime in. Yea completely annoying when you run into a qr code and it opens a menu. we try to encourage our restaurants to offer physical menus as a choice. We want people to use our app based ordering system because we put a lot of effort to make it convenient. 1. its not jsut a menu, you can browse and add food to your bill in real time and the waiter gets a push notification about it. its integrated with teh ticketing system so it really cuts down on wrong orders. what you see in the app is what the chef sees in the kitchen. 2 ordering between friends. we make it so you can invite and see a giant list with who ordered what in realtime. 3 hail the waiter from the app. with our system, the waiter gets a push notification if you hail them from a button in the app or add an item. no more awkwardly trying to get the waiter's by looking in their direction and locking eyes awkwardly like two grindr matches in a small midwestern city. 4. pay through the app. so far customers love it. they can simply pay and go instead of waiting for the waiter to bring the machine. 5 registering nor required, we saw that a lot of users were avoiding using the app simply because they didn't wan to register so we made special "lite versions" of our apps that load via instant app (android) or app clips (ios). Thls it sucks that it means we don't get to have a history of what the orders over time, we decided it was better that the system be as convenient as possible. hopefully other nice features like having your payment method stored so you can pay at table without pulling out your card gives people a reason to try the full fat experience we're in 163 restaurants and growing in London so hopefully you be using us soon!
  • ehzy 4y ago
    My experience with paying through the app has been pretty subpar. Usually I'm required to type in my credit card by hand, on my phone. Yuck. If I have to use some app / website to order food at your restaurant it better support Apple/Google Pay. Edit: the number one thing users want in a restaurant ordering system is ease. I'm in a restaurant to relax, eat, and enjoy good company. The last thing I want to do is register for get another app (because none of the restaurants use the same one) and type in my payment details. Some of the things you mention do sound more convenient than the traditional paper menu and human waiter, but if I have to type in a credit card number or sign up for an account, I'd prefer the human.
• skerit 4y ago
  I love QR code menus. My husband (who has terrible vision) also loves it, because he can zoom in and actually read them himself. If you're lucky any specials of the day will also be on it, instead of having to scan the entire restaurant for hastily written signs. And in some restaurants things that are out of stock will be marked so on the website.
• feldrim 4y ago
  There are many applications that try to act as a shopping cart and a kind of cloud electronic cash register for the restaurant. Which sounds like a great idea. But in many places, especially during the (QR-code menu) pandemic, I came across to some QR codes, requiring you to download an application. Unfortunately, the application itself is just a PDF viewer with built-in ads. You still call the waiter to order, you still use POS to pay. Nothing has changed in the process of ordering food but I installed a really shitty PDF viewer with ads at the bottom and the top of the menu, also before and after every interaction. Immediately left the restaurant but still. Why all the hassle?
  • ethanbond 4y ago
    I’ll say there’s at least one extremely good version of this out there and I imagine it dramatically increases the restaurant’s sales: a service called OneDine that is in use by a small regional chain called Bartaco along the eastern US. It’s so easy to keep ordering that I and everyone I eat with indeed just keeps ordering. Every other implementation I’ve seen pretty much sucks though, to your point.
  • caddemon 4y ago
    The times I've come across this I've been able to just go to the restaurant website and download the menu PDF normally from there. Even when the QR code brings you directly to the website it feels like a clunky experience, so I've gotten in the habit of checking out menus before going to the restaurant if I can.
• Aeolun 4y ago
  I hate QR code menus because they feel like a truly lazy way to save a marginal amount of money.
  • ethanbond 4y ago
    Restaurants are an ultra low margin business. If that’s where they’re cutting a corner and it gets them more time in business or prevents a corner cut elsewhere, I’m for it!
• taylodl 4y ago
  These are interesting reactions from the tech-savvy folks who are always wanting to “change the world.” Well, you succeeded. Get over it. QR code menus dominate here where I live in the US Midwest. Here’s the thing - they only replace the physical menu. Wait staff still takes your order, gets refills, etc. just as when we had physical menus. When it comes time to pay many restaurants now bring a device to your table so you can pay. The wait staff no longer disappears with your credit card. Nice. The nice thing about this system is it gets rid of the germ-laden physical menu, eliminates the ability for wait staff to copy your credit card, yet retains the rest of the traditional restaurant experience. No app required. Y’all might want to take a look at how we’re doing things here. As for anyone looking to opening a restaurant, if I have to install an app to dine at your restaurant then I’m walking out. That’s definitely not the experience I’m looking for!
  • jgwil2 4y ago
    > When it comes time to pay many restaurants now bring a device to your table so you can pay. The wait staff no longer disappears with your credit card. Nice. Personally, I prefer not to have a server hovering over me as I figure out how much to tip them.
    • taylodl 4y ago
      The places I go just leave the device with you and say pay whenever you feel like it, no rush. They’re using devices that have a big red light and green light on top. When they bring it to you it’s red. It turns green after you pay. That way they can see at a glance whether you’re trying to skip out.
  • lupire 4y ago
    You are still eating from germ laden plates handled by germ laden people by germ laden table, and handling your germ laden phone before you eat.
    • NotYourLawyer 4y ago
      The plates get washed, and waiters are supposed to be washing their hands on the reg. I expect the plates are a lot cleaner than paper menus.
• sebow 4y ago
  No thanks, just give me the physical menu. If the staff refuses to provide with such "ancient" method, it's probably a shit restaurant anyways. The "it's not implemented correctly" argument is irrelevant. I won't take convenience over the risk of being phished, data-mined or straight out surveilled(see china & not only). I'm there to eat, not to discover the 'amazing' power of their technical staff when it comes to software development. This is not luddism or being anti-tech, it's being anti-stupid-tech. I have no problem ordering food from a tablet or another revolutionary piece of technology that I don't have to carry with me back home or invade my personal space after leaving.
• GnarfGnarf 4y ago
  In theory, it's a good idea. Unfortunately it fails when the restaurant has no Web design skills. I was at a small but prominent Montreal hamburger restaurant recently. I scanned the QR, and was confronted with page after page of whisky, wine and beer, when all I wanted was a hamburger. Six pages down, I finally found the burgers. Irritating.
• magellan292 4y ago
  As an investor in a QR code menu ordering company (StoreKit), I know firsthand that bar/restaurant owner sentiment is also mixed. Some owners see clear value in increased labour efficiency and revenue generation (people order more when using their phones), while others don’t want their customers playing with phones because it cheapens the experience. It’s really just a matter of product-market fit; some venues are naturally more receptive to QR codes than others. The jury is still out as to which venues they are. It’s also a matter of technology catching up to the ordering experience. Who wouldn’t want to see an AR version of their dish and be able to interact with it? Imagine scrolling through every menu item as if it were right in front of you, clicking on it, zooming in, seeing the exact portions, having all dietary and ingredient information readily available and being able to tinker with your order at will, having interactive information about the source of ingredients.. The possibilities are truly endless and fully customizable by each venue. Ordering is also a subtle signalling tool of social status, so taking that away will upset some people, like snobs at The Atlantic. Some people like showing off how much they know about an ingredient on the menu, displaying dominance over waiters/waitresses and even fellow guests, etc. The only way to have mass adoption is to please everyone, which you can’t at the early stages. That’s why it‘s currently being used by venues that are getting a lot of value from it. (Labour efficiency) Journalists are not hired for their imagination, particularly at The Atlantic (establishment conformists). Using tech to order from a menu will only get better over time because, at the end of the day, the paying customer will enjoy the experience. But we’re not there yet for most venues.
  • monkeydust 4y ago
    Bit harsh on the Atlantic - they clearly found a relevant topic where there is contrasting opinions and people want to discuss it, wasnt that their objective in the first place? Reading this thread I see yet again why the super-app approach is probably the best one when adopted front to back in this context - selection,ordering,payment.
    • magellan292 4y ago
      You’re right, that was their objective and I was harsh. And to your point about the super-app, that’s exactly what we’re hearing from venues. They want a one-stop shop that will take care of all aspects of the customer experience.
• UnpossibleJim 4y ago
  I'm a little split on this one. I'm at Disneyland reading this, and (for some places) they do a decent job of it, having a QR code on the outside so you can look at the menu while you queue or wait for your reservation (sometimes even pre-order, I think... I didn't mess with that bit). This was great, it was something to do to kill the time. Inside of the restaurant though, I get my snob on and hate phones at the table. Once the phones come out, the dining experience tends to die quite a bit. You're taking pictures of your food instead of enjoying it, you're interacting with your phone and social media instead of each other. It's horrible. QR codes just facilitate that transition.
• m-p-3 4y ago
  The idea itself isn't bad, it's how well the restaurant executes the idea. Nobody likes to read a 11x17-sized menu in a PDF that you have to constantly resize on a small screen. A well-thought menu that is web-based and responsive will be much less frustrating to use. Bonus point if you can sort by price, calories, and filter for some common allergens, intolerance or dietary choices.
• scrubs 4y ago
  Agree! It sucks. this is the tech equiv of what one Italian NYC restaurant owner pointed out about abstract/modern ambiance: in many cases it's just cheap. not high end
• deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
• washadjeffmad 4y ago
  PDF menus, as well. In 2006, I built some hardware to scan Bluetooth IDs and published a little appliance to record them at the front of one of our restaurants and push a menu with a coupon to uniques. Customers were ambivalent at best. I ended up hating it, though. It was a cool idea at the time, people were still wearing Bluetooth earpieces and IR beaming each other their contact cards after all, but it was easy to decide that as non-opt-in data collection, it violated volition. QR code menus don't all suck, but if you're going to do it, have house wifi, make the codes unique to the tables, and just throw up a captive portal patrons can go ahead and order from. Go "serverless" or not at all.
• egorfine 4y ago
  In Ukraine it's the very opposite. It's available in virtually all restaurants, it works really well and you can pay using Apple Pay incl. tips. Such a time saver and so handy. And no local specific features are required: no apps (think WeChat or similar), no local bank accounts, etc. It just works.
• pvaldes 4y ago
  QR codes are a liability for the restaurant. Restaurants are places where the regulars gather at predictable hours, and predictable days, and predictable tables, and don't see suspicious to give personal dietary info linked with credit cards. Is really surprising that nobody has tried still to swap a chunk of paper or put a stick over the QR code at the table to substitute it with a different QR code hacked, so when you order, they redirect you to the official web and at the same time silently copy your personal info in a different web. Or replaces he lamb dish of a notorius iman with a dish containing pork. Or allows a paparazzi to change the impossible meat hamburguer of a famous vegan actress by something made of real meat. The paparazzi takes photos and sell some profitable outrage disguised as restaurant error. Or change the dish of a CEO allergic to peanuts by one that contains a sauce made with spinach and peanut butter Or spice the dish of a major league baseball or tennis player with a drug, so it fails the next anti doping test. It does not matter that he wear dark glasses, has grown a beard and is unrecognizable. Will be instantly caught by the personal data linked to him. Or orders somebody in a kitchen to put a pinch of polony in that dish in the table 5. Don't need the complicity of the waiter anymore, and the dish will be served with a smile and no sweating by a waiter that will end in jail without even suspecting it. The possibilities to abuse the system are endless. They are like the .exe dancing banana attachment of our time, except that you eat the banana now, so this time the target is your body instead your computer. Most restaurants would not notice the replacement until later (or would never notice it if the next client in that table restores the original QR code). Specially in a world where people don't talk with the waiters anymore, or were replaced by robots.
• fennecfoxy 4y ago
  I see their point but it still reads as the age old "these kids with their x, y, z" which is the story of the ages. As a millennial I don't mind QR code menus at all if they take me to a website for it. If they require me to install an app that's where I draw the line; too much faff - it should be a single step. Requiring an account is a nono as well. However most QR menus I've used so far have been like this, carefree guest checkout. Easy as. I think the sort of thinking in the article is the age old "these kids & their phones" uttered by people who had their heads in newspapers & TV channels their whole lives. Technology is here.