Comparisoning the importance of classic menu cards and digital menus to business and their effect on customers

The purpose of existence of food and beverage businesses is to provide different, healthy, delicious services that meet their expectations. While providing this service, they become a living entity by forming their identities. With this transformation and gaining identity, their life span begins. In this life process, menu cards affect both the identity document of this business and the preference rate of the flavors it offers that serve its purpose in life. From this point of view, the importance of menu cards comes to the fore as a marketing strategy. What will be important in the creation of the menu and the menu card afterwards, the design elements, what the benefits of digital menus can be to the struggle of the business in the competitive market with technological change, and customer perceptions between a classic, traditional menu card and a digital menu card, based on all these points and concepts. The aim of the study is whether there are differences or not. Questionnaire technique, one of the qualitative research methods, was used. The study data were collected both face-to-face and online in the internet environment by survey method, taking into account social distance and other hygiene conditions during the pandemic period. Gastronomy and cookery associate, undergraduate and graduate students constitute the universe of the study. The Questionnaire Form was applied to 388 people. The analysis of the obtained data was interpreted using the statistical package program. As a result of the study, the participants agreed that the physical features of the classical and digital menus should be compatible with the business concept and the card or digital environment should be of high quality. In the visual perception section, it was determined that the visuals being lively and attractive were important in both menu types, while the readability of the texts on the classic menu card and the cleanness of the digital menu were the items they most agreed with. In the openness section, clearly stating the contents in both menu formats and the clarity of the price information were the items that they agreed with the most. It has been determined that classical menu cards do not differ significantly in content. In addition, it was observed that there were significant differences in the answers given by the participants to the questions according to gender, age and education level. It has been determined that male participants give more importance to the way the menu is placed on the screen in the digital environment. The fact that there are many food and beverage alternatives in the menu and that the contents must be specified is among the significant values that emerged as a result of the fact that men participate less than women in the inclusion of values such as allergens and calories in the menu. In age ranges, it has been determined that the participants in the 18-25 age range give less importance to size than the participants over the age of 25, as well as agree more with the business concept and quality items. At the same time, it has been determined that the view that the menu compatibility with the business concept is expected shows significant differences with the educational status of the participants.