Using Cellphones at a Restaurant for Social Media and Pictures- What’s Your Take?

Hi everyone, this week we talked about how key search terms and a business’ internet presence can dictate where the business comes up on search results. In my writing assignment, I talked about how “mobile voice searches are three times more likely to be local than text,” so it’s important to keep contact information updated to ensure being in search results, especially in a voice search.

I know it’s a stretch, but this got me thinking about restaurants especially, then about an interesting comment I heard recently about restaurant service in some cities has slowed due to patron use of cell phones. This plays into emerging media, because without cell phones, without all the platforms people feel the need to post to constantly, there wouldn’t be this challenging epidemic. This totally screams “this is the future!” to me. Did you ever think this would be a problem? I didn’t.

“After comparing footage from a dinner service in 2004 to footage from a dinner service in 2014 — on a day that had ‘roughly the same amount of customers’ — the restaurant found that a meal used to take around one hour to serve, but now it takes closer to two.” The story goes on to explain nine people sent their food back because it was cold in 2004, compared to the 45 in 2014. Also, since customers were on their phones constantly, their meal took an average of 20 minutes longer, slowing the rest of the night.

Here’s a recap of the story, although a bit biased.

I’ve seen the tables of too-loud people taking pictures of and with their food. I’ve seen the Instagram accounts people at restaurants post to. I’ve never considered how it slowed down service. What’s interesting to me, is that many restaurants encourage usage of platforms in general, whether it’s before, during, or after a meal.

Think about it, (hypothetically), to find a restaurant you use Yelp and pick one based on the high reviews and delicious pictures of food. You use OpenTable to book the reservation. You get to the restaurant, and there’s a sign on the door encouraging you to check in on Facebook or Yelp for a portion off of your meal. During the meal, you take pictures of the occasion, the food, and you post it to various platforms while tagging the restaurant name. After, you write a review on a various review site and share your experience.

Not to mention, you may choose a restaurant with a tablet as your waiter! Sure, a human delivers your food, but you placed your order on a tablet and were encouraged to play some of the games or search the web while you were waiting for your food.

As much as restaurants see phone usage being a problem, they are partly to blame since they’re on social media and sometimes encouraging the use of phones/tablets. However, this is where it gets sticky, because there’s no way a business would remove itself from social platforms for this reason, right?

In our fast-moving world, especially in this situation, how can both the customer and the restaurant “win”? How can both be kept happy, where service doesn’t slow, or maybe increases, and people are still able to gawk over their phones the whole meal? Do you have any suggestions or personal experiences?

Thanks,

Claire