Menu engineering

[5] Most menus are presented visually (though many restaurants verbally list daily specials).

[7] Customer perception of items offered on a menu can also be affected by subtle textual manipulations.

[8] Similarly, the presence of dollar signs or other potential monetary cues may cause guests to spend less.

[9] Low food cost and high gross profit are not mutually exclusive attributes of a menu item.

A second approach called cost-margin analysis identifies items that are both low in food cost and return a higher than average gross profit.