The largest change in the last 20 years has been the cell phone/internet.
And the people who were born since 2000 comprise a third of the world population.
The amount of people who do all their business on a cell phone is probably well over 50%.
The way things change is based on those demographics.
When Whatsapp went down earlier this year, in India, for less than 24 hours, hundreds of millions of dollars were lost by small businesses who use whatsapp exclusively for all ordering, shipping, and billing.
Me, I grew up with dial landline phones, and writing checks and mailing them, but to do business I have had to change with the times.
Many people today know no other way, and are perfectly used to doing everything on the phone.
Even in the USA, menus online are a pretty hit or miss thing.
Especially with single location non-chain restaurants.
Here, with pretty constant inflation, the idea of putting a lot of work into a menu is a non-starter, for most places.
The QR code menu is here to stay, and it will keep growing.
Its fast, its free, and its easy to change.
And many restaurants dont want to get pinned down with prices online, because when they change, as they do, frequently, then you have to argue with customers who saw the lower price online.
The demographic of people who wont visit because of this is small, and shrinking.
When I am in restaurants, I see argentines of all ages whipping out their phones and QRing the menu.
It is true that the pandemic changed the amount of stuff that has transfered from real to online.
I have noticed this with the governments, both in the USA and in Argentina- almost everything I need to do is now done online- I voted in the USA, and changed the name on my Edesur account recently, both 100% online.
My personal website is probably 3 years out of date now, and it would end up costing me at least $500- $1000 just to do the minimum updates. I see this happening more and more.
Its not a matter of not understanding the internet- its a matter of business seeing what works profitably in todays digital environment.
The dropping of phone answering by restaurants in the USA is being led by the most expensive, most popular, most successful restaurants. But McDonalds doesnt answer the phone either.
