A Matter of Dollars & Sense

According to Cornell’s Center for Hospitality Research, you should strong consider not including the dollar sign ($) when putting prices on your menu. It looked at how customers react to various pricing strategies that were implemented at St. Andrews, the restaurant at the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, NY. What it found was that when customers ordered from menus with no prices devoid of dollar signs, they spent significantly more than those who were given menus with prices that included the dollar sign or the prices were written out in words. This was just one study in one restaurant, but what do you have to lose by getting rid of those dollar signs you have on menus. You may actually see average check sales increase.