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What started as a menu necessity during Covid has sneakily become one of the best marketing channels available to bars and restaurants. That's right: I'm talking about QR Menus, those little black-and-white squares you saw basically nowhere in the US prior to spring/summer 2020.

Here's how Rob Austin, a bar and restaurant marketing expert in Chicago, explains the marketing opportunity offered by a robust QR Code Menu system:

• The basics: customers need to see your menu to order. If your menu is QR-based, then you basically have a captive digital audience. Take advantage of that.
• Have your QR code point to a page on your website. This is the key—getting more people to your website, where you're in control of the experience. There are 2 related reasons this is so important.
• First, you'll increase your website traffic in a meaningful way. Each month thousands of people will visit your website—and thus interact with you digitally—who otherwise wouldn't.
• Second, you can show QR Menu visitors exactly what you want to show them. For Rob & Leader Bar, he of course provides the menu when someone scans the Leader Bar QR Code. But he shows them a bunch of stuff above the menu, stuff he wants them to see: upcoming events, the fact that they do online ordering, how to book a private party, the bar's story, introduce that they have brunch, show them their social media handles, etc. And changing what's there is as simple as updating your website.
• How else are you going to get this much content in front of such an ideal audience? It's more effective, cheaper, and just plain better than doing social media advertising, and certainly more time-effective than typical social media posts.
• And once you're ready, you can take this a step further too: install a newsletter signup, where folks can input their email addresses and you can send out a weekly/monthly newsletter straight to their inbox. Now you've turned the QR Menu into an outbound marketing channel.

Check out the interview clip for more from Rob on QR Code Menus:

And if you want to hear more great marketing advice from Rob, check out this playlist on the Brave New Bar Youtube channel.

Why?

Because it helps customers order faster, which can mean better beer sales for you and a better experience for them.

Beer drinkers generally know what kind of beer they want when they walk through the door.

For example, summertime me is looking for something hoppy. There's no world where I'll get a sour, stout, or amber. But, of course, some folks avoid IPAs at all costs.

If I see a section called "Hoppy" on the menu, I go there straightaway: "awesome, no need to scan the whole menu." For those IPA haters, if they see that "Hoppy" section, they can just skip on by: "ok, great, I'll just go find the section I'm looking for."

In each case, sorting the beer by style makes it easier for customers to find the beer they want. And that's a great thing for them and for your beer sales.

How?

You can do this manually. How you'd implement it depends on what works for your team, but it could look like this:

• Create an editable menu doc in Google Docs, Word, Powerpoint, or whatever and give everyone who needs it editing access.
• Make the beer style menu sections you need: Hoppy, Crisp & Bright, Toasted & Nutty, Dark & Roasted, Fruity & Spicy, Tart & Funky.
• Copy and paste your beer (and the beer info!) into the relevant category.
• Anytime your beer selection changes, delete the beer that's gone, then add new beers to the relevant category.

It certainly takes some time, but doing this would definitely be worth it.

• With tariffs uncertain, wine importers have already stopped importing. The latest from Trump is that all European booze will be hit with a 200% tariff starting April 2. Since it takes awhile for the shipments to arrive (boats crossing an ocean and all) and because importers don't get billed by their suppliers until the shipment arrives, the huge tariffs might be active by the time the wine arrives. As a result, the US Wine Trade Alliance issued guidance in mid-March that instructed folks to just stop their imports until we know what's actually going to happen. As a reminder, a lot of the tariff threats Trump has made thus far have been just that—threats—but some appear to be real, including the auto tariffs he announced yesterday. It probably need not be said, but if these tariffs go into effect it'll lead to a gigantic shakeup of the industry.
• Speaking of wine, these states drink the most. The top-3 are CA, VT, and NH. NH is probably inflated because they don't have an alcohol sales tax so folks cross the border to buy their booze. And California is no surprise. But Vermont coming in at number 2 was surprising to me. Here's the full list.
• Parenting if you're in the industry. It's gotta be tough. I stopped bartending years before becoming a dad, and even with my 9-5 job it's the hardest thing I've done. I can't imagine the challenge of doing it while working multiple close shifts a week and not being able to count on 100% reliable pay. Vinepair just published an article about the folks who do it today.