The New York Times reports that the pandemic-era practice of making menus available to restaurant patrons via the use of mobile devices to scan QR codes seems to be ending.
“Today, even though many restaurants still have ‘scan the code’ cards tucked into napkin holders or pasted onto the corners of tables, customers seem to be ignoring them,” the Times writes. “And many restaurants have returned to using only paper menus.
“MustHaveMenus, a menu management and printing platform with about 7,000 customers across the United States, has seen a falling off in the use of the QR codes it provides to restaurants, said Mark Plumlee, the senior content manager. From April 1 to May 16 of this year, the total number of scans has dropped by about 27 percent compared with the same period in 2021.
Fewer restaurants are creating new QR menus, he said. And about 75 percent of their existing QR codes are essentially dormant, with fewer than 90 views in the last year. (Half had fewer than five.)”
KC’s View:
I never really minded the QR codes, though there is something tactile about holding an actual menu in one’s hands – in some cases, it can actually be part of the experience. I do think that there remains a use for QR codes in such situations, like for offering nutrition information or details about daily specials. (Though a well-informed and opinionated member of the wait staff can be invaluable in such cases.)
I also think there is the opportunity for using QR codes for immediate feedback purposes – there is a company called RealTimeFeedback.com that is doing this in a number of restaurants and other venues, and I think the technology has a lot of potential for supermarkets.
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