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Is this something all HORTers can agree on?

A-freaking-men:



The QR-code menu—which you access by scanning a black-and-white square with your smartphone—has taken off ever since. It may dominate going forward. But I hope not, because I detest those digital menus. Never mind dying peacefully in my sleep; I want to go out while sitting in a restaurant on my 100th birthday, an aperitif in my left hand and a paper menu in my right. And as eager as I’ll be for heaven if I’m lucky enough to stand on its threshold, I want one last downward glance at a paramedic prying the menu from my fist. In that better future, where old-school menus endure, I’ll go to my urn happy that coming generations will still begin meals meeting one another’s eyes across a table instead of staring at a screen.

QR-code menus are not really an advance. Even when everything goes just right––when everyone’s phone battery is charged, when the Wi-Fi is strong enough to connect, when the link works––they force a distraction that lingers through dessert and digestifs. “You may just be checking to see what you want your next drink to be,” Jaya Saxena observed in Eater late last year, “but from there it’s easy to start checking texts and emails.” And wasn’t it already too easy?
We went to a restaurant at a ski resort in WV that had only QR codes, no wifi and no cell signal (only tmobile worked..which we didnt have)... it was a complete CF.

After several tries the water got the menu up on his phone and showed it to us...it was ridiculous. Then they were out of what we ordered...

Pretty sure the restaurant was a small chain and the decision was made at the corporate level.
 
To your point, Torbee…nice one-time use paper menus are one thing. Being handed a sticky, crud-covered plastic abomination that maybe got a cursory wipe with a dirty rag is unappetizing as hell. Give me the digital/QR menu anytime.

Your phone is dirtier than any restaurant menu.

FACT.
 
A-freaking-men:



The QR-code menu—which you access by scanning a black-and-white square with your smartphone—has taken off ever since. It may dominate going forward. But I hope not, because I detest those digital menus. Never mind dying peacefully in my sleep; I want to go out while sitting in a restaurant on my 100th birthday, an aperitif in my left hand and a paper menu in my right. And as eager as I’ll be for heaven if I’m lucky enough to stand on its threshold, I want one last downward glance at a paramedic prying the menu from my fist. In that better future, where old-school menus endure, I’ll go to my urn happy that coming generations will still begin meals meeting one another’s eyes across a table instead of staring at a screen.

QR-code menus are not really an advance. Even when everything goes just right––when everyone’s phone battery is charged, when the Wi-Fi is strong enough to connect, when the link works––they force a distraction that lingers through dessert and digestifs. “You may just be checking to see what you want your next drink to be,” Jaya Saxena observed in Eater late last year, “but from there it’s easy to start checking texts and emails.” And wasn’t it already too easy?
Amen
 
Seems weird that people bitching about the environmental impacts of almost everything would complain about QR menus.

How much wasted paper/ink/plastic lamination is involved for constantly rotating menus at the hundreds of thousands or restaurants in the country?

Not much in the grand scheme
 
Not much in the grand scheme
Haha, wow. I'll have to remember that excuse going forward.

Let's not do something that's super easy to implement that would save a ton of paper every year. Paper receipts aren't much in the grand scheme either, except for the 1.5 billion pounds of wasted paper.
 
Haha, wow. I'll have to remember that excuse going forward.

Let's not do something that's super easy to implement that would save a ton of paper every year. Paper receipts aren't much in the grand scheme either, except for the 1.5 billion pounds of wasted paper.

You made that number up, didn't you?
 
I went to a restaurant the other day that took the digital menu a bit further to include ordering. Drinks? Just put an order through your phone on their web portal. Apps? Same thing. Once you're ready for entrees, send 'em through.

The table service was basically just food and drink runners. It was ok, some obvious plusses and minuses.

What seemed odd was that there was a mandatory 20% service fee, and then another default 20% tip that could be adjusted (or removed entirely).

I feel like if you're going to have the customer doing the ordering without the waitstaff interaction, a 20% mandatory service fee and default 40% is questionable.
We ate at a restaurant in Heathrow that was like this. It was more difficult than it should have been because we're two older technologically challenged people.
 
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I went to a restaurant the other day that took the digital menu a bit further to include ordering. Drinks? Just put an order through your phone on their web portal. Apps? Same thing. Once you're ready for entrees, send 'em through.

The table service was basically just food and drink runners. It was ok, some obvious plusses and minuses.
I like this type of place. Singlespeed in Waterloo does this. I don't believe they had the service charge though. I think it's just whatever tip you want to give when you're paying your bill.
 
I went to a restaurant the other day that took the digital menu a bit further to include ordering. Drinks? Just put an order through your phone on their web portal. Apps? Same thing. Once you're ready for entrees, send 'em through.

The table service was basically just food and drink runners. It was ok, some obvious plusses and minuses.

What seemed odd was that there was a mandatory 20% service fee, and then another default 20% tip that could be adjusted (or removed entirely).

I feel like if you're going to have the customer doing the ordering without the waitstaff interaction, a 20% mandatory service fee and default 40% is questionable.

You can't blame the waitress for getting your order wrong with that technology. That's on you, pal.
 
Does it make you feel any better if it's recycled paper?
No, besides not being a very efficient process, especially when transportation and processing is taken into account, you're still needlessly using it for a worthless reason when it could be put towards something else.

Again, people can feel free to bitch about QR menus instead of paper ones, IDGAF. I just laugh because they're in many cases the same people saying we need to get rid of paper towels in the bathroom or plastic straws.
 
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I'm the same way as torbee. Yes, I'm old.

The reason I am resistant to things such as this is quite frankly I am sick and tired of every goddam thing I buy - and everything I do for that matter - being put out there for the world to see.

The less the world knows about me (such as say a phone number, etc), the better. I mean, I fully realize that there are things I will buy, until I die, that I have to use the internet in some fashion to acquire. But if I CAN limit that, I damn sure am going to. I want - make that demand - at the very least some "privacy" in my life and I damn well am going to resist as much as humanly and electronically possible to do so.
10 likes on your statement. Feel the same way.
Big brother already knows to much about me now as far as I'm concerned.
If I was younger, I would try to live off the grid
 
No, but maybe we can agree on this?


hot-sexy.gif
DAMN!! That left tit is a Monster!!!
 
I wouldn't know how to scan something with my phone if I was put in that position. Technology can be embraced, but this just seems stupid. I would intentionally avoid places like this.
You just hold your camera up to it and a link pops up. It's incredibly simple.
 
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