Menu Case Study

tl;dr

Why do I keep ordering the same dishes?

I don't know what to order from the menu.

Restaurant menu is one of the first user-facing artifacts that we encounter as customers. There are inherently many common problems pertaining to how menus display the dishes that lead to questions that we sometimes don't want to bother and ask the waiter/waitress. In order to make this experience more pleasant and intuitive for customers, I identified such problems and redesigned the menu to reflect my findings.

Research

For this typical case, I firmly believe that observation and direct communication with the customers will yield significant insights into my redesign decision. Without a doubt, a majority of customers, including me, shared very common menu firsthand experience:

• Overwhelming lists of dishes (there are actually 10 pages in total!)
• Not clear description of what ingredients are in the dishes
• Repetitive and unnecessary names for some dishes
• Not appealing overall look and feel

Sketches / Wireframe

In order to have a better picture of how the design will layout, I created quick sketches to arrange the visual hierarchy of different sections.

Iterations

I created a few prototypes and this is one of the few versions I tested out for feedbacks. This one definitely gave me a good idea on how I wanted to improve the layout in general for the next iteration.

Final Version

When I was coming up with this final version, I decided to rethink what kind of feelings I wanted to evoke from the customers. What do they expect of walking into a Vietnamese restaurant? Oftentimes, people are very used to the flimsy laminated menus with highly bold, colorfully contrast design. As a result, I want the menu to convey the peaceful and earthy feelings that Vietnam reminds me of.

Thoughts

In a few more years, I wonder how will we be using menus? Or will there still be menus? Since information is certaily more accessible, anyone can check out a restaurant's menu just by a few clicks / taps on their devices. This being said, designing menus is without a doubt a valuable experience because I am able to learn not only about customers' dining behaviors but also how design can affect the business side.