As a child I remember choosing where we ate dinner was always determined by how much money we had, if we got a coupon in the mail or if the place was highly recommended by a friend. We were less likely to try something new unless we had reassurance that it was kid friendly and didn’t cost “an arm n’ a leg”. In other words, we typically stuck with a few favorites and never branched away from them. Now, thanks to the computer age, trying new restaurants is my specialty.  In fact, my decision is solely based on good reviews from Yelp! and the restaurant’s website. Restaurant websites can be dealmakers or breakers. Consciously the user is looking for prices, a menu and for directions or hours. Unconsciously, the user is looking for style, atmosphere and organization. A poorly made website for a restaurant push me away without missing any of my requirements. To exemplify this, I decided to compare and contrast the websites of two local restaurants, Bravo Franco Ristorante and Six Penn Kitchen.

I began with Bravo Franco Ristorante, a little Italian restaurant located on Penn Avenue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The homepage was given a scrapbook look and there were large photographs of Italian dishes. The design elements gave a warm, up-scale family vibe. The primary navigation led me to the pages they had described and it was easy to navigate, but they broke a few web design rules. They used too much “happy talk”. Happy talk, as described by Stephen Krug in Don’t Make Me Think, is wordy self-congratulatory talk that basically fills space. The problem with this is that it’s all talk and no show. If Bravo Franco Ristorante really was the best, they could show it in photographs to prove it not fancy words. Secondly, there was no evidence as to my location on the website. As Steve Krug states in his book, navigation should be so obvious that it’s obnoxious. I found that there was no indication as to which tab I was apart of.

Six Penn Kitchen, also located on Penn Avenue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania was the restaurant that earned my patronage. Just based on the site alone, I found Six Penn seemed sophisticated and modern. They did not use a lot of “happy talk” and showed a ton of images. In fact, they had an entire gallery with pictures of food, staff, events and venue. What I enjoyed most about the site was their use of current content. Krug states that using current, or live content can keep a relatively stationary site. All in all a good restaurant should have a good website.