Till about five years back restaurants across the world was using the traditional paper or booklet menu and now restaurants have started giving tablets loaded with a customized app to customers to browse food in the menu and place orders. Now tablet ordering system or e-menu as it is generally known has revolutionized the hospitality industry and Restaurant tablet menu has become a part of the restaurant vocabulary. Today many restaurants around the globe have invested in designing and developing customized tablet app so that customers can place orders by themselves after browsing through the menu and entertain themselves while waiting for their food. This innovative way of food ordering has been tested and implemented in hundreds of restaurants across the world.

Some of the advantages of using Restaurant tablet menu are

• It provides detailed description of the food.

• Eliminates order-taking errors by waiters.

• The chef in the kitchen gets a clear picture as to what the customer needs.

• Customer who use tablet menu spends more time at the table and order more food.

• The visual in the tablet helps the customer to know exactly what he is going to get.

• The efficiency of the service increases.

• Cuts labor costs for the owners.

• It is high tech, futuristic and fun.

• Customers get a feeling of involvement in the process.

• Restaurants can build a good online reputation and develop a customer community through social media platforms.

• Restaurant owners can do a predictive analysis on the number of guests expected and what food items and quantity they are likely to order.

• Integration of the transactions and customer data from the tablet to the POS and CRM system to improve efficiency and time.

The bottom line is Restaurant tablet menu is a good change in the hospitality and restaurant industry. This new technology should be adopted by restaurants after considering the ROI and all the pros and cons, which this technology attracts. Restaurants owners often go for this tablet concept to reduce labor costs, fewer waiters and fewer costs. Even though it improves the efficiency of the establishments, cutting labor cost always has some risks. Sudden changeover from traditional human ordering system to automated system need through knowledge about the habits of the customers. The challenge restaurant owner’s face is to retain what is working well and improve it using new technology. The idea should be to make the waiter more productive and give the customer a new level of experience.