Category Archives: food

July 25, 2014 · 8:42 am

Pretty/Useless

This Foodie Friday I have restaurant marketing on my mind. That’s the result of some close encounters with restaurant websites.

English: 0

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

From time to time I’ll check out places to eat in cities where I’m heading. Of course I use the review sites as a first source of recommendations.  Inevitably if a few places seem to be of comparable quality and hold potential I’ll go to the establishment’s website to do a deeper dive on the menu.  This is where things begin to break down in a couple of ways and there are some broader points which come out of the experience.

Many of the sites are beautiful.  Clearly, someone spent many hours creating a multimedia site complete with music that plays while you experience the site, flash movies that auto-play, and dozens of pictures of happy customers.  Unfortunately, most of these sites are painful to use and are a huge waste of money.  I’ll go even further to say that they do more harm than good.  In the case of restaurant sites, no one cares how the site looks.  Visitors want information, not to be entertained.  They’re pretty and useless.

Think about it.  Why do you visit the site?  Probably, first and foremost, to check out the menu.  Many of the sites I visit force a download (it’s easier to update one file than several pages of the site) and some of those downloads are huge.  Next, I may want to make a reservation so I need to know where the place (Google Maps link!) is and some means of doing so – a phone number or a direct link to Open Table or whatever service the place uses.  Finally, the hours they’re serving and maybe a listing of the specials would be good.  That’s it.  Designers need to focus on the business goals and not on “pretty.” The most important factor in the design of a website is that the website makes it easy for users to find what they want.

The problem isn’t restricted to restaurants.  If you’ve built a site and not had a discussion with the design and coding team about business goals for the site, target audiences, analytics you’ll be using to measure activity and success, or how you’ll be marketing (SEO implications), you’ve missed the mark.   Unlike the restaurants with crappy sites, there probably aren’t lots of review sites driving people to your business (most review sites contain a modicum of the critical information).  Maybe now is a good time to take a look at your site through a visitor’s eyes?

3 Comments

Filed under Consulting, digital media, food

Tagged as , , , , , ,

July 18, 2014 · 8:09 am

Chef Pepin And Reality TV

Foodie Friday, and this week I read an article written by Jacques Pepin, one of my culinary idols, which serves as the basis for today’s screed.

English: Photograph of chef Jacques Pépin at A...

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Writing for The Daily Meal, Chef Pepin took off after the antics commonly seen in “reality TV” kitchens.  You can read this piece by clicking through this link and it’s worth your time.  It seems as if his primary complaints were specifically addressed to “Hell’s Kitchen” and Gordon Ramsay although he never calls the latter out by name.  I think a fair amount of what he says is accurate and, for our purposes, applicable outside of the kitchen to other businesses.

His first issue is that the shows portray the restaurant kitchen in a chaotic and negative light.  Putting aside the fact that there is very little real about reality TV, it’s very difficult to show something on TV which isn’t actually happening.  The fault isn’t of the medium but of the person in charge.  The best managers with whom I’ve worked over the years will raise their voices and verbally kick someone in the butt, but generally the team runs efficiently and with minimal stress.  In every case they’ve been quite good at specifying what it is they expect in general and excellent at making the specific mission clear.  They were also superior teachers, making up for the staff’s lack of knowledge on a topic with guidance and patience.

Chef seems to love quiet in the kitchen, as he states “A real, well-run professional kitchen has dignity and order.”  I find quiet disquieting.  I like to hear the team interacting, bouncing ideas off one another and helping move the team forward.  Dignity always; order is more a controlled chaos.  After all, one needs to break a few eggs in order to create a soufflé.

This is my favorite part of the piece and something I think we all need to keep in mind in the broader business sense:

Julia Child used to say that you have to be happy when you cook for the food to be good, and you also have to be happy in the eating and sharing of the food with family and friends. Otherwise the gastric juices will not do their job and you won’t digest the food properly. I agree with her assessment. It is impossible to enjoy food when you’re angry and tense.

That’s really a key point today.  If you hate your job, whether you’re the lowest level employee or the boss, it will come out in your work.  The disorder of the kitchen or any other workplace is reflected in the final product.  If you’re running a team, maybe a little introspection is the seasoning your product needs.  If you’re a line cook and you’re that miserable, perhaps it’s time for a change.

Thoughts?

Leave a comment

Filed under food, Reality checks

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

July 11, 2014 · 8:21 am

D.O.C.G.

Foodie Friday and today it’s a fun trip into the mysteries of labels.

Organic Italian Wine from Tuscany

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

If you’ve ever gone to buy Italian wine you may have come across something on the label that says “D.O.C.”.  It’s an abbreviation of a long Italian term that means the wine is coming from a controlled area.  The grapes used to make chianti, for example, must come from that region and can’t be grown near Rome and shipped to Tuscany.

Of course, things being as they are in Italy, after a time a need arose to control the controlled label.  Although D.O.C. means the product comes from a specific area and is of a defined quality and is produced using methods specified in the regulation, the Italians added another level – D.O.C.G.  The “G” is for guaranteed which of course calls into question in my mind exactly how strictly the original high standard is followed.

You many also have seen San Marzano tomatoes at the store.  I love these and cook with them all the time.  One needs to read the label very carefully – San Marzano style is not the real thing.  You can tell the real thing by the D.O.P. certification on the label.  It’s the equivalent of D.O.C. used on other foods such as cheeses and tomatoes.  So if your tomatoes come in a jar or are pureed, chopped, diced or even organic, they aren’t real San Marzanos which are only sold peeled whole or halved.

What does this have to do with your business?  These labels are a sign for consumers that the product is real and is of the standard they expect as they hand over their cash.  The reality is that consumers find those labels in other ways even if they’re not printed on the product itself.  It starts with your marketing.  Is it authentic?  They look at the sales agent which may be a person or a web page.  Does it seem real or does something not feel right?  Smart brands know this and do what they can to offer the D.O.C. comfort.  “Intel Inside” is one example.  Verisign and TrustE certifications are another.

Is your brand giving off the assurance consumers need and want?

Leave a comment

Filed under food, Helpful Hints

Tagged as , , , ,