What is Menu Fatigue and How to Prevent It at Your Restaurant

Having many loyal customers is the end goal for most restaurants because recurring clients bring in a constant stream of money that keeps their business profitable.

But loyalty takes time to gain and can easily be lost. One of the main reasons customers choose to never visit a restaurant again is because they are experiencing menu fatigue. They get bored of eating the same few dishes again and again and will seek excitement elsewhere.

If you want to prevent this from happening at your restaurant, check out how to easily avoid menu fatigue.

What is menu fatigue?

Menu fatigue is a problem that restaurants face when clients feel bored or apathetic regarding the menu offerings. It usually happens when the menu is repetitive, too big, or has the same dishes for a long period.

Why does menu fatigue occur?

Customers can become disinterested and stop visiting and ordering from your restaurant when the menu is:

• Very long: A big menu with lots of dishes can lead to choice paralysis. Moreover, it leads clients to believe you focus more on quantity than on offering quality menu items;
• Repetitive: If you have the same menu for a long period, clients who like to experience new tastes will look elsewhere. Even if your food is delicious, a loyal customer can only enjoy it a couple of times;
• Lacking in trendy options: People are always on the lookout for new food trends. If your restaurant doesn’t offer a version of it, they will go to the competition;
• Unappealing: Without professional food photography and inviting menu descriptions, clients won’t be interested in the dishes you sell.

The negative impact of menu fatigue on your business

It can be easy to ignore menu fatigue as another trendy term for the restaurant industry. However, studies have shown that customers seek variety and novelty in their diets for physiological and psychological health.

Therefore, if you don’t put in the work to avoid menu fatigue, your restaurant will end up with:

• Decreased customer satisfaction: Some clients will complain about the lack of variety to your employees or online, and some will just stop visiting your business;
• Less loyal customers: You’ve worked hard to build a loyal following of clients. If you don’t give them what they want, which is more variety, they will turn to the competition;
• Fewer sales: You must monitor your sales by item to notice if you experience a significant drop in sales for a specific dish. This is a clear indicator that it is time to update your menu;
• Drop in reputation: Unhappy customers tend to leave negative reviews. If you get too many bad reviews, your score will drop, and it will deter new clients from giving your place a chance.

How to avoid menu fatigue at your restaurant

The good news is that you can both easily prevent menu fatigue from occurring and combat it if you get complaints. Just follow these informative tips:

1. Keep your menu short

When clients are faced with a big menu, they get overwhelmed by all the choices and find it hard to pick something. This will lead to longer waiting times, which will affect customer satisfaction.

To prevent this, stick to a small one-page menu that clients can easily browse at a glance.

Pro tip: Add a “Specials” section at the top of the menu with your high-profit items that clients will gravitate to as soon as they open the menu.

Read more: Why Restaurants with Small Menus Are More Successful [+ Template]

2. Create an attractive menu

The first step to getting people interested in your menu is to create one that customers won’t be able to resist. It must be intuitive, separated into categories, and full of mouth-watering imagery and descriptions.

If you want to create a persuasive online restaurant menu, use the menu builder from GloriaFood. You will be able to add it to your website in just a couple of minutes:

Check out our detailed guides on how to further optimize your menu:

• 9 Menu Engineering Design Tips & Secrets That Will Boost Your Sales
• 3 Secret Menu Writing Tips: The BEST Food Descriptions that Make You Hungry
• Restaurant Menu Planning: How to Optimize Your Menu to Sell More

3. Update menu items according to restaurant analytics

The easiest way to avoid menu fatigue is to regularly update your offerings. But this should not be guesswork, you don’t just choose a random dish and replace it. Instead, you rely on data.

You can get valuable data about your restaurant’s sales from:

• A POS system: If you use the GloriaFood POS system, you can see your sales by categories and menu items. You also get access to the best-selling and worst-selling dishes, so you can choose the ones that perform the worst for replacement;
• An online ordering system: Take advantage of GloriaFood to monitor the number and value of online sales for each dish. You can also see the number of new and loyal clients to notice if you experience a sudden drop.

Read more: How to Successfully Use Restaurant Analytics to Increase Revenue

4. Try out a seasonal menu

As the seasons change, so do our food preferences. While in the cold season, people are looking for hot and hearty dishes, during summer, clients seek out lighter options.

Give customers what they want with seasonal offerings. You don’t need to change your whole menu; just add a section that features menu items cooked with seasonal ingredients.

This will not only increase customer satisfaction but will also help you lower costs because ingredients that are in season tend to be cheaper.

Read more: The Benefits of a Seasonal Restaurant Menu & How to Implement One

5. Jump on food trends

Food trends get so popular for a reason: a lot of people want to try them. For example, now, everyone is seeking out Dubai chocolate, and every food establishment is striving to come up with a version that will attract more clients.

Therefore, if you want to create excitement around your restaurant, keep an eye out for the latest food trends and try to incorporate some in your menu offerings when they fit your type of cuisine.

Read more: 10 Restaurant Food Trends in 2022 to Help Grow Your Business

6. Offer restaurant promotions

Another great way to get rid of menu fatigue is to spice up your menu with attractive promotions. If you would like to increase your number of orders, try to offer free delivery, a 2+1 deal, or a free item for a minimum order value to encourage big orders.

You can set up a variety of tried and tested restaurant offers in just a few seconds using the Promotions module from GloriaFood. Once added, the promos will appear at the top of your menu, where they can’t be missed.

7. Allow menu item customization

On top of regularly updating your menu, you can allow people to create their perfect dish by enabling menu item customization. For example, you can create different sizes for pizza and offer a variety of toppings that can be added to the crust.

This way, people can create countless new dishes without getting bored. Check out this informative video that shows you how to easily add choices and add-ons to your restaurant menu:

8. Ask for and implement customer feedback

Sometimes, the easiest way to combat menu fatigue is to ask customers directly how you can improve your menu to be more to their liking. They may provide useful suggestions that you wouldn’t have thought of.

By implementing their feedback, you show them that you value their opinion, and you win their loyalty. Here are a few simple ways to gather customer feedback:

• Have the servers ask for feedback at the end of the meal;
• Use social media to find out your clients’ opinions. For example, if you want the answers to be private, you can ask for improvement tips in an Instagram story;
• Send out a restaurant customer survey;
• Monitor your reviews to see if there are any good suggestions for making your restaurant better.

Read more: How to Collect Vital Restaurant Customer Feedback

Final words

Menu fatigue is an issue that a lot of restaurants face and which, if left untreated, can seriously affect customer satisfaction and overall sales. Implement the tips provided above so you never have to encounter this problem and enjoy a growing number of loyal customers.