Don't Choke on Your Menu

Jack Mardack, of Menukarma recently wrote how surprised he was to see restaurants fail, one after another, because owners and chefs toss their recipes into the marketplace with the most artistic plating methods in the industry while paying little attention to the tastes of the American palate or public.

"I am amazed, given the extraordinary failure rate of new restaurants, how few restaurant operators ever set their sights on what is obviously the base of the pyramid." Mardack said. "Just as you mentioned in a previous blog, however maligned it may be, "fast food" comprises the majority of the American diet. Inexpensive food, obtained quickly is what we eat, nine times out of ten." He added.

Restaurant owners seldom do market research, or pay attention to it if it doesn't meet their personal criteria. This certainly creates barriers that make profitability more difficult than it should be.

Mardack brought up another strong point that will make those with sights on celebrity shutter. 

"Rather than try to steal away some of McDonald's enormous traffic, with value and approachability, the vast majority of restaurants just put themselves in a small market already crowded with too many "fancy restaurants" chasing too few Saturday night dinners. I can confirm that there are not a lot of value-oriented efforts among the new restaurants that are opening."

When he claims McDonald's should be your target, the menu consultant doesn't expect one to go out and erect golden arches or anything similar. However, food that is reasonably priced, especially in today's economy is certainly a better bet than to attempt to imitate Gary Danko and Thomas Keller. They have a mortal lock on a niche clientele. To do culinary battle with these food aficionados is in some respects like choking on a piece of tenderloin in a dark, empty dining room without anyone around to perform the Heimlich. And, whether you are an owner or chef you must realize everyone that serves something to eat is your competition. There is a race which begins every morning to capture the money allocated to energy from everyone on the planet. Whether that money fuels a car or a body t is a fuel allocation. With gas prices sizzling past the $4.00 per gallon mark in California, and topping $3.50 in other cities, you can bet people will be looking at their food allocation budgets with a much sharper eye and pencil to get a better bang for their buck.

Melons in New York City, Perry's in San Francisco, and a handful of other hamburger styled society saloons across the country have been the standard for burgers, beers and social networking long before Myspace came on the scene. And, these places and hundreds like then have survived the test of time and have done so with a steadily increasing crowd and profit. Now this isn't to say throw away your menu and put a blackboard on the wall. But, before you spend a fortune on designing a menu in irder to price yourself out of your neighborhood's market, do some research. Whether you want to believe it or not, your customers vote on your menu every day and night. If it doesn't tempt their taste buds you will know it as soon as you walk into a dark empty dining room and realized your concept has choked.

And when that happens, it may be time to swallow your pride and redesign your menu and your concept.