How to Encourage Sustainable Choices Through the Language on Your Menu
As we discussed last week, restaurants and other hospitality food environments have both the power and the responsibility to serve food that is nutritionally beneficial and environmentally friendly – and tastes good, too. We believe that this is a fundamental part of what it means to be a sustainable food business – that’s why “Feed People Well” is one of 10 key pillars of our Food Made Good Standard. Our menus need to be good for both people and planet.
Building sustainable menus
Designing your menus with this in mind will not only provide nutritious food for your customers, but will also make an impact when it comes to decarbonising your establishment. Ensure that your dishes celebrate healthy, sustainable ingredients – like legumes, whole grains, seasonal fruit and veg – and that your overall menu selection is weighted towards plant-based meals. Include smaller amounts of sustainably sourced meat, fish, dairy and/or eggs if desired – a study just published by Oxford University shows that low-meat diets have half the impact of high-meat diets when it comes to greenhouse gas emissions, water pollution and land use.
Multiple studies have shown that the language used on menus has a significant effect on consumer decision-making. This means that something as simple as how you present your food on your menu can play a huge role in encouraging healthy choices – and making your dishes sound incredibly appealing.
The power of food descriptors
In 2020, the World Resources Institute (WRI) published their ‘Playbook For Guiding Diners Towards Plant-Rich Foods’, which proved that decision-making around food is not driven by logic or rational thinking, but can be influenced by a wide variety of factors in the food environment in question. These influences are often working on a subconscious level and don’t need to be prominent or explicit to have an effect. Examples include descriptive language used on menus, as well as the placement, size and pricing of the food or drink in question. Read on for some straightforward ways to make your healthy, sustainable menu options shine.
How to leverage menu language to create positive change
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Tell them why it matters
One relatively simple approach is to include a few lines of text at the top of your menu that ensure the customer bears sustainability in mind.
In 2019, a study by the WRI concluded that ‘it is possible to encourage consumers to select plant-based dishes in a foodservice setting by simply changing how dishes are described on menus’. As one component of this research, people were shown 10 different messages on their menus before ordering, some of which had dramatic effects on their food decisions.
For example, one message read: “Each of us can make a positive difference for the planet. Swapping just one meat dish for a plant-based one saves greenhouse gas emissions that are equivalent to the energy used to charge your phone for two years. Your small change can make a big difference.” Those who read this message selected a vegetarian dish 25% of the time — more than twice as often as those who were shown no sustainability-related copy. Other messages tested – such as a reminder around the need to protect the planet for future generations – also had a notable impact on consumer choices.
There’s no hard and fast rule for what this copy should say, so think of it as an opportunity to highlight the positive choices and changes your kitchen is making in order to become more sustainable. Explain how you celebrate provenance through your procurement policy, why you believe in creative vegetarian cooking, or what you’ve done to reduce food waste or carbon emissions through your menu design.
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Make meat-free the ‘norm’
Research shows that making meat-free meals the default choice makes people many times more likely to order them. This means that, even if your establishment has no intention of removing meat from the menu altogether, you can design your menu to include meat as an optional extra. You might list a black bean and lentil chilli as a main course, with a note afterwards that reads “Add beef mince for £xxx extra”. Cauliflower Buffalo wings might say “Swap for chicken wings: £xxx”. Once you begin looking at your menu from a plants-first perspective, you’ll be pleasantly surprised how it shifts your own viewpoint as well as your customers’, leading to more creative plant-based recipe ideas.
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Describe it right
Being selective in how you describe plant-based meals makes a big difference. Following extensive research, the WRI provides a recommended list of terminology to use and to avoid on menus.
When it comes down to it, people don’t want to feel like they’re being deprived – and this sentiment is strong enough to sway them in the wrong direction. To prevent this phenomenon, avoid terms that suggest that something is missing: phrases like ‘meat-free’, ‘vegan’ or ‘vegetarian’, and 'healthy restrictive' terms, like ‘low-fat’.
Instead, encourage sustainable choices by describing your dishes using words that emphasise their flavour, texture and provenance. Adjectives that evoke sensory experiences are particularly effective: rich, crunchy, melting, refreshing, crisp, creamy. Use these to describe individual dishes rather than emphasising their benefits to customer health or the environment.
Interested in the impact of descriptors like this? One clear-cut UK-based example of this comes from research carried out in Sainsbury’s, in which the vegetarian option enjoyed an enormous 76% increase in sales once its name was changed from "meat-free sausage and mash" to "Cumberland-spiced veggie sausage and mash".
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Rethink placement of plant-based dishes
In a study at the London School of Economics, researchers showed 380 participants two different versions of a menu: one with the vegetarian options displayed in a separate, defined section, and one on which they were integrated amongst the other dishes. The results showed that only 6% chose a vegetarian option when they were shown as separate from other dishes; this grew to 13% when they were included as part of the main listing. While 13% may not seem like much, the vegetarian orders more than doubled through this simple strategy, making it well worth your while to re-jig your menu if needs be. Ensure that plant-based dishes are dispersed amongst meals that include meat, rather than having them under a separate heading – or relegated to the bottom of the menu like an afterthought.
If you’re interested in learning more about how to improve your restaurant’s sustainability – and how to communicate this to your customers – consider signing up to our Food Made Good Standard, the only global sustainability accreditation designed specifically for the F&B sector.
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Jocelyn leads our Marketing & Comms team and is responsible for managing our content strategy, growing our audience and building our global reputation. Jocelyn holds a BSc in Hospitality Management and an MSc in Food Culture & Communications, and is a member of the Irish Food Writers’ Guild. Her background includes on-the-ground F&B experience; a decade of food writing, editing and publishing; content creation for some of Ireland’s biggest food brands; and developing the content marketing strategy for a suite of menu management and carbon tracking software.
Recommended reads
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