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Damn sad to see the hate. My favorite restaurants in Japan were the ones you could order at will at the table, or where you buy the ticket at the door. No flag

Damn sad to see the hate. My favorite restaurants in Japan were the ones you could order at will at the table, or where you buy the ticket at the door. No flagging down servers, no waiting for the check, waiting to get checked out. Seeing the outrage here just from scanning a qr code for the menu, it doesn't look like any automation is going to be coming any time soon.

pixxel 3y ago
For me, and others, ‘waiting’ is time to think, converse, or watch the world rotate. I also prefer the old fashioned method of communicating with a fellow human to order my food. I want the opposite of what you want, and that’s okay.
- pas 3y ago
  in my experience (here and there in the EU) servers still come and talk to you, simply the menu is a webpage. and nowadays they ask you if you need the hardcopy :)
no_wizard 3y ago
Willing to bet the experience in Japan is superior to the average we get in the US. In the US it’s seen as pure cost cutting measure, and not integrated smoothly as part of the considered experience a lot of the time. When it’s considered as part of the experience it works tremendously well, it’s just not common enough
- Daz1 3y ago
  No it's janky and awful. I live here.
  - diceduckmonk 3y ago
    Same. I’ve experienced over several dozen half baked QR / digital order implementations. I guess it’s an extreme case of the second system effect, where every vendor thinks they can build a better solution than the other 10, but they don’t.
    - Daz1 3y ago
      The only decent one I've encountered is Mr Yum
expertentipp 3y ago
The problem is that they don't do it to create a seamless experience. The temptation to suck in the personal data and exchange money for some "credits" is simply too big... and an excuse not to hire any front staff.
Gigachad 3y ago
QR menus are a life saver for large meetups or people you know casually. You can just scan and pay without leaving the conversation, and there is no headache around trying to recover payments from everyone, especially if you don’t know them all.
WeylandYutani 3y ago
America is a country with tons of available cheap labour. That's why they don't need automation.
iSnow 3y ago
I'm not visiting a restaurant to get food the fastest way, I do it to relax, for the experience, to talk to whoever is with me. I just hate QR workflows for that. Do it for fast food joints, but not in proper dining places.
- vel0city 3y ago
  If it's done well it can be in addition to regular service. One thing I really like is when they make it easy to order another round of drinks or make it easy to pay without having to wait for the server to get me the check or bring a terminal over to me.
- earthling8118 3y ago
  I happen to hate the server based workflow. When I visit a restaurant I do it to relax, for the experience, and to talk to whoever is with me. Not mess around talking to a random employee. It goes both ways.
crooked-v 3y ago
I think a lot of the hate has to do with these being the worst possible implementations of such systems, like requiring you to create an account with a password just to order food.
diceduckmonk 3y ago
Restaurants that have the latter are chains or catering to tourists, and unfortunately not going to have such a system. The latter are ramen and other cheap eats, excluding shokudo. One “boutique” ramen shop owner has told me it was not cost effective to buy a ticket vending machine. I guess you have to be at a particular scale and throughput to have a ticket vending machine. And restaurants that optimize for throughput are usually not the best ones. Again unfortunately. Then izakayas menus are in Kanji and even Japanese people have trouble ordering at times. That’s kind of the experience and point though. Regarding QR code based menus, I’m curious whether you’ve experienced bad implementations. I live here, traveled all 47 prefectures maybe 3 times over, and have used dozens of digital menu implementation. There’s only been 1 or 2 that were smooth, but they were not ubiquitous. The face-to-face business / sales culture here means the tech products that spread are not necessarily the good ones.
peoplefromibiza 3y ago
so you basically want take out outside your home. Japanese do that because eating out is cheap enough that it is an option to go there to just eat, not rarely alone, but it's absolutely not common to go to the restaurant to be left alone. all the things you mentioned as unpleasant are part of the reason why people gather to eat together
- ApolloFortyNine 3y ago
  Who gathers together to wait for the waiter to bring the check?
  - peoplefromibiza 3y ago
    Italians. Like me. While you wait for the check you drink amaro/grappa/limoncello/whatever
numpad0 3y ago
Just gimme that tablet, I hate QR but I wouldn’t mind poking that badly done HTML on Android 6, it just works better. Also feeds us food for nomikai thoughts to discuss what happens if we hit “Send” with “x99: ¥0 - Test Food Please Ignore” on the order.

pixxel 3y ago

For me, and others, ‘waiting’ is time to think, converse, or watch the world rotate. I also prefer the old fashioned method of communicating with a fellow human to order my food. I want the opposite of what you want, and that’s okay.

pas 3y ago
in my experience (here and there in the EU) servers still come and talk to you, simply the menu is a webpage. and nowadays they ask you if you need the hardcopy :)

no_wizard 3y ago

Willing to bet the experience in Japan is superior to the average we get in the US. In the US it’s seen as pure cost cutting measure, and not integrated smoothly as part of the considered experience a lot of the time. When it’s considered as part of the experience it works tremendously well, it’s just not common enough

Daz1 3y ago
No it's janky and awful. I live here.
- diceduckmonk 3y ago
  Same. I’ve experienced over several dozen half baked QR / digital order implementations. I guess it’s an extreme case of the second system effect, where every vendor thinks they can build a better solution than the other 10, but they don’t.
  - Daz1 3y ago
    The only decent one I've encountered is Mr Yum

expertentipp 3y ago

The problem is that they don't do it to create a seamless experience. The temptation to suck in the personal data and exchange money for some "credits" is simply too big... and an excuse not to hire any front staff.

Gigachad 3y ago

QR menus are a life saver for large meetups or people you know casually. You can just scan and pay without leaving the conversation, and there is no headache around trying to recover payments from everyone, especially if you don’t know them all.

WeylandYutani 3y ago

America is a country with tons of available cheap labour. That's why they don't need automation.

iSnow 3y ago

I'm not visiting a restaurant to get food the fastest way, I do it to relax, for the experience, to talk to whoever is with me. I just hate QR workflows for that. Do it for fast food joints, but not in proper dining places.

vel0city 3y ago
If it's done well it can be in addition to regular service. One thing I really like is when they make it easy to order another round of drinks or make it easy to pay without having to wait for the server to get me the check or bring a terminal over to me.
earthling8118 3y ago
I happen to hate the server based workflow. When I visit a restaurant I do it to relax, for the experience, and to talk to whoever is with me. Not mess around talking to a random employee. It goes both ways.

crooked-v 3y ago

I think a lot of the hate has to do with these being the worst possible implementations of such systems, like requiring you to create an account with a password just to order food.

diceduckmonk 3y ago

Restaurants that have the latter are chains or catering to tourists, and unfortunately not going to have such a system. The latter are ramen and other cheap eats, excluding shokudo. One “boutique” ramen shop owner has told me it was not cost effective to buy a ticket vending machine. I guess you have to be at a particular scale and throughput to have a ticket vending machine. And restaurants that optimize for throughput are usually not the best ones. Again unfortunately. Then izakayas menus are in Kanji and even Japanese people have trouble ordering at times. That’s kind of the experience and point though. Regarding QR code based menus, I’m curious whether you’ve experienced bad implementations. I live here, traveled all 47 prefectures maybe 3 times over, and have used dozens of digital menu implementation. There’s only been 1 or 2 that were smooth, but they were not ubiquitous. The face-to-face business / sales culture here means the tech products that spread are not necessarily the good ones.

peoplefromibiza 3y ago

so you basically want take out outside your home. Japanese do that because eating out is cheap enough that it is an option to go there to just eat, not rarely alone, but it's absolutely not common to go to the restaurant to be left alone. all the things you mentioned as unpleasant are part of the reason why people gather to eat together

ApolloFortyNine 3y ago
Who gathers together to wait for the waiter to bring the check?
- peoplefromibiza 3y ago
  Italians. Like me. While you wait for the check you drink amaro/grappa/limoncello/whatever

numpad0 3y ago

Just gimme that tablet, I hate QR but I wouldn’t mind poking that badly done HTML on Android 6, it just works better. Also feeds us food for nomikai thoughts to discuss what happens if we hit “Send” with “x99: ¥0 - Test Food Please Ignore” on the order.