William Poundstone, author of the new book, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value (and How to Take Advantage of It), recently told New York Magazine how to dissect the marketing tricks built into restaurant menus.
“A star is the name for a popular, high-profit item—in other words, an item for which customers are willing to pay a good deal more than it costs to make. A puzzle is high-profit but unpopular; a plowhorse is the opposite, popular yet unprofitable. Consultants try to turn puzzles into stars, nudge customers away from plowhorses, and convince everyone that the prices on the menu are more reasonable than they look.”
Poundstone uses the menu from the popular restaurant Balthazar in New York City’s Soho district to illustrate these ideas.
1. The Upper Right-Hand Corner
That’s the prime spot where diners’ eyes automatically go first. Balthazar uses it to highlight a tasteful, expensive pile of seafood. Generally, pictures of food are powerful motivators but also menu taboos—mostly because they’re used extensively in lowbrow chain restaurants. This black and white illustration “is as far as a restaurant of this calibre can go, and it’s used to draw attention to two of the most expensive orders,” Poundstone says.
2. The Anchor
The main role of that very expensive Le Balthazar platter is to make everything else near it look like a relative bargain, Poundstone says.
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