These Are The Tricks Restaurateurs Use To Get You To Buy The Most Expensive Dish

When it comes to eating out, some restaurateurs use clever techniques to get you to order the most expensive dish on the menu... allow us to explain everything to you!

Restaurant
© Getty Images
Restaurant

Do you always leave the restaurant with an outrageously large bill? That's what restaurateurs are all about, finding little tricks to fool your brain with prices. Although these techniques are particularly simple, they are also very effective.

Discover our latest podcast

3 effective tricks on the menu

For example, on some menus, the ‘£’ is not displayed next to the prices. Indeed, its presence automatically makes us think of money, and by removing it from the menus, we will tend to think less about it and to spend without a second thought.

Second technique: providing descriptions of the dishes. In this way, the customer has the impression that they are much more elaborate, and thus go for them more easily. Instead of ‘Apple Pie,’ the menu will say ‘Grandmother's Caramelised Apple Pie with Hints of Vanilla,’ or ‘Cut of Argentine Beef à la plancha, Herbs, Fleur de sel and Grenailles Potatoes’ instead of ‘Steak.’ Enough to make one salivate!

Finally, the restaurateurs mix up the prices on the menu. By doing so, and by putting, for example, the most expensive first and then a cheaper dish second, the order is reversed. In the customer's mind, if a dish is first, it's not too expensive.

Our tips to spend less

If you don't want to leave with a large bill, you can still eat as much as you like. That is to say, you don't have to order a starter, a main course and a dessert. Why not share a starter and a dessert with your spouse? Finally, rather than buying a bottle of wine, choose wine by the glass!

You have to admit, these techniques work very well!

 Supermarkets use this trick to make you buy more: Here are some tips to cope Supermarkets use this trick to make you buy more: Here are some tips to cope