(WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- A pandemic innovation is fading into history.
As restaurants reopened to indoor dining during the pandemic year of 2020, they came up with contact-free methods for ordering and payment.
That included menus that popped up after you scanned a QR code on your phone.
Now, restaurants are returning to paper menus.
R.J. Hottovy of the foot traffic analysis firm Placer.ai told the WBBM Noon Business Hour that it's all about customer demand.
"In a lot of cases they're just inconvenient,” he says of the smart-phone alternative. “It's not easy to find things on the menu. It also depends on your wi-fi signal or your cell phone signal.”
He added that the Darden Restaurant Group -- owner of numerous national chains -- ditched the QR-code menus.
"Their consumer surveys – I think 90 percent of them -- said they preferred a paper copy to look off of," Hottovy said.
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