E.T. Tea Drink and Food Menu

Project Details

Time Frame September 1st 2022 - September 20th 2022

Method and Skill Chat with owner to update their original menu with updated items and to make their menu more eye catching to customers

Tool(s) Notebook Sketches | Canva | Adobe Express | Google Drive

Deliverable(s) 1st Round Iterations | Final printed and laminated 36" x 48" poster, 24" x 36" poster and 8" x 11" menus

Me with one of the printed menus and a green milk tea!

My Role

Menu designer, where responsibilities included unifying font types, creating a fun and easy to follow menu reading flow, integrating in new menu items and removing items no longer needed, removing backgrounds and touching up raw photos provided of new menu items, finding and adding in all social media profiles and handles to generate more social media engagement and having excellent back and forth conversation with store owner to align with their shop's brand identity and integrate any changes requested! Final deliverables were printed and laminated posters and table top menus that have been posted around the store!

Identifying Problem

I frequently visit E.T. Tea with my family usually on a weekly basis and we usually talk with the main store employee. She made us one of the new items that was going to be on the menu soon, but also mentioned that the person who was going to make the menu for them was too busy at the moment and that they did not have the time of skill to make a new menu. I then asked if I would be able to try to make a menu as I am trying to utilize my design skills I have been learning about and she said that is fine as they wanted a new menu ASAP to sell the new drinks created. We then discussed some common ordering issues found with the old menu such as drink groupings, font being too small and removal of no longer sold items as well as what they wanted on the new menu, which mainly included a section to showcase the new drinks and to highlight their specials as well as to make the menu more aligned with their theme of aliens and space. With these notes in hand, I decided to utilize Canva as this seemed to be the most viable design tool that could be readily shared and discussed with the store owners. I then set out to identify the most common demographics to base my design for the menu and then went about creating content blocks to illustrate the layout and flow of the menu.

Aggregate Demographics:

Ages - 2 through 85

Types of Customers - Regulars, First Timers, Food Bloggers, Milk Tea Connoisseurs, Chicken Only Customers, "Customizers"

Goals:

Easily find and order drinks and chicken

Take social media worthy pictures of drinks, menu and décor of shop, be unique in the market of drinks

Have a comfortable and appealing space to enjoy goods

Frustrations:

Menu is missing new items, have to personally know and order any new item that is not on the menu

Some items are no longer on the menu but customers may not know unless they try to order it
Original font size and type may be hard to read for some customers

Brainstorming of Layout

I first started by taking the initial layout of the old menu and blocking out main points of interest in Canva to get the general user flow and groupings of where items were situated. Below is what the old menu used to look like and how I blocked it out in Canva.

Old ET Tea Menu

I then created a proposed format using content blocks that were similar to the flow of the old menu as customers find it best to recognize a flowing pattern that they already know, while also injecting a new section that easily integrates and has cohesion with the rest of the sections.

Proposed New Menu Format Content Blocking

1st Iterations

Mock Images and New Items

Using my new blocking of content, I then added in old menu items as well as creating a section for new items in top middle with N numbering to distinguish it from old items. I received some feedback and they liked the N numbering as it designated a new item in their Point of Sales system and it can be swapped out when future new items arrive. The New Items section was lacking in eye catching appeal so I decided to make some changes.

Proposed menu with mock images and old menu format

Proposed menu with Spaceship font and placeholder images

Spaceship font and New Items

I then added the first spaceship for the New Items block but then changed the section name to New Arrivals, although this was requested to be changed back to E.T. Specials to encapsulate all the best seller items. The Spaceship font used was also hard to read to so it was changed back to Open Sans for best readability. They did love the alien spaceship so the beam from the ship was then requested to be expanded to the entirety of the E.T. Specials section which now spanned all new items as well as the previous E.T. Specials. It was also requested to add a QR code to route users to Yelp to leave store reviews and for digital users to be able to scan and find quick reviews of store as well.

Actual Content and Old Logo

After getting the approvals for the the spaceship and reverting content block fonts to Open Sans, real pictures were added for each item. This process also involved using Adobe Express to remove backgrounds and to touch up the photos so they looked appealing and bright! It was also requested to add more space themed graphics, so I tried to add at least 1 to 2 graphics per content block with larger graphics having transition colors from one section to the next as seen in the spaceship between Smoothies and Snacks. This is when I was informed I used the old E.T. Logo, so I was sent the most recent asset and added that in as well as adding the QR code and moving around some of the graphics after getting final images.

Proposed menu with mock images and old menu format

Final Product!

After the final touches were added such as the QR code finalization, swapping of the old logo to the new logo, adding a watermark to the background and finalizing menu numbering and item placement, and discovering and fixing a scaling issue for the first print, the design was approved and sent off to printing where it is now displayed in the store! Overall, I have heard that customers, greatly enjoy more of the space related graphics and tie into the shop's theme of aliens and outer space. There has also been an increase in sales for the new drinks, as designated by the N numbers as the spaceship and beam are eye catching!