Whether you’re looking at restaurant menu paper or wedding menu paper, there’s an art and a science to finding the perfect menu cardstock for the job.
What’s the right size? Should you get regular printer-sized paper or 8.5 x 14 cardstock? What about the finish? What on earth is paper weight?
If that all sounds like Greek to you, no worries. Here’s everything you need to know to select the perfect menu cardstock, whether you’re opening the restaurant of your dreams or celebrating one of the most important days of your life.
Before You Get Started
Before you begin looking into menu paper, there are a few factors you have to consider. This will make it considerably easier to narrow down on the paper you want, rather than choosing wildly different papers and not ending up with the menu that you wanted.
Start with Your Menu Theme
The best place to start is by considering your restaurant menu theme, which will tie directly to your overall restaurant theme.
Are you an Alice in Wonderland-style teahouse? Are you a steakhouse straight from the Texas desert? Are you a French restaurant fit for the Provence countryside?
As soon as you read those descriptions, it conjured up a unique restaurant completely distinct from the one before it. Your restaurant menu style would be similarly distinct. Think about it–you wouldn’t see a classic New York diner menu at an English pub. That would look completely incongruous and disjointed.
If you’re still figuring out your restaurant theme, here are a few factors to think about:
- Casual or formal?
- What’s your cuisine style?
- Is it traditional or modern cuisine?
- Is it a regional cuisine style or a blend?
- Who are your patrons? What are they looking for in a restaurant?
All of these questions are about discovering your restaurant’s personality, which will be reflected in your restaurant menu style.
Consider Your Restaurant Ambiance
This is related to your restaurant’s ambiance, which is a mood or feeling associated with a place.
In a restaurant, the ambiance is a deliberate play on the customer’s first impressions. It sets the stage for food to take the spotlight, while your guests become the audience.
Several factors create ambiance. For example, the size of the restaurant will impact your choice of seating and music. In a small space, music can be overpowering, so you may choose to let the natural soundtrack of conversation and clinking cutlery set the tone.
Your menu continues this stage setting and mood when guests arrive. The look of the menu lets them know what they’re in for as much as the food, so look at your design elements and reflect them in the menu.
Choosing the Perfect Restaurant Menu Paper
With that in mind, you’re ready to start looking at restaurant menu paper options.
Remember, while menu paper designs are fun to create, they’re reliant on a good backdrop. The type of cardstock provides a textural stage setting for the contents of the menu, which sends subtle cues to guests about what kind of meal they can expect.
The Perfect Menu Cardstock
Let’s start with the perfect menu cardstock.
Technically, you can use any paper as menu card paper. You could use regular printer paper. But you shouldn’t–good cardstock can subtly cue that this is an elegant restaurant, or a cool hipster establishment, or a laid-back family restaurant, or anything in between.
There are several different kinds of menus you have to consider, including:
- Dining room menus
- Menu covers
- Table tents
- Specials
- Door hangers
- Outdoor menus
- Tri-fold menus
- Folded takeout menus (including tri-fold and gate-fold menus)
For our purposes, we’ll keep it simple and talk about dining room menus.
Generally, the best menu size paper is around 8.5 x 14, like our menu size cardstock. This will give you enough space to comfortably fit all your options (appetizers, entrees, dessert, and drinks) without feeling crowded.
As for the right menu paper stock, that depends on your restaurant. Glossy paper, for example, is often perceived as more polished than matte, but matte can appear more understated if you want a clean look. You’ll also have to consider the paper texture, which lends a different personality to the paper.
A few common paper finishes include:
- Gloss
- Matte
- Linen
- Parchment
- Embossed
- Silk
- Smooth
We offer linen, parchment, and glossy cardstock finishes.
The Best Menu Paper Weight
A related consideration is the menu paper weight, which is related to the menu paper type.
When we talk about paper weight, we’re actually talking about the thickness of the paper. In U.S. basis weight, this is shown based on the weight (in pounds) of a ream of paper, or 500 sheets.
Your first choice is between cardstock and text paper, which are commonly used as menu paper. Text paper is similar to copy paper–it’s thinner and would require additional measures to ensure you aren’t constantly reprinting menus. Cardstock is thicker and stands up well to folding, though thicker cardstock may require scoring to fold.
We typically recommend using a heavier cardstock as menu printing paper because it’s more durable, though this may require special printing since most consumer printers can only handle between 80 to 100 lbs paper weight. This chart will help clarify paper weights to look for by type.
Finally, when choosing the paper weight, don’t forget to account for the restaurant menu paper size. Heavier cardstock used for a larger menu is durable, but it will be more expensive to print.
The Perfect Menu Color
Now comes the fun part: choosing your menu color!
This involves two considerations: your restaurant’s color and color psychology.
If you’ve already chosen your restaurant’s color scheme, this should be pretty easy. Look for colors that complement the design of the room, making the whole space appear harmonious.
If you haven’t chosen your color scheme yet, go back to your restaurant’s theme. If you’re opening a casual Mexican restaurant, for example, vibrant colors like red and turquoise are great options.
That said, make sure to account for how color affects your impressions and interpretations. For example, blue is considered a calm, serene color, but it’s also an appetite suppressant since humans eat very few blue foods.
As a rule, if you want a high-energy establishment, go for warm colors. If you want a calmer, more laid-back feel, go for cool colors.
Other Types of Menus
We’ve talked a lot about restaurant menus, but they’re not the only kind of menus out there. Most people create their own menus when hosting parties, but the biggest event that would require an average person to make a menu is a wedding.
Wedding Menu Paper
The fun (and stressful) part of planning a wedding is that you have several menus for several different events. These include:
- Engagement party
- Bridal shower
- Bachelor/bachelorette parties
- Bridesmaids and groomsmen luncheons
- Welcome party
- Rehearsal dinner
- Wedding reception
- After-party
- Day-after brunch
You should start thinking about the wedding dinner menu (and as a consequence the wedding menu design) around the same time you think about your invitations. This will help the menus look cohesive with the whole wedding.
Since your wedding food menu varies depending on the event, you may want different designs for each event. That said, keeping the same or similar cardstock can help with a cohesive theme.
Either way, you’re still looking for a menu that can hold up under pressure and look good doing it. A thicker cardstock is the ideal choice, as it’s both elegant and sturdy.
The big hitter is the wedding reception food menu, which is where you really want your wedding theme to shine through. The best way to do this is by keeping your wedding color scheme and subtle touches to show off your style. A winter wedding, for example, can use jewel tones with a small evergreen detail.
Menu Cards
A wedding menu card is a great option because it packs a lot of punch in a small surface area. This also means that you have to get a lot of mileage in a small space.
This can get tricky if you’re using wedding meal choice cards, for example, but don’t worry. You just have to be strategic.
It helps to think of wedding reception menu cards as mini menus. In other words, you have to consolidate down to the essential information and let your personality show through in the small flourishes, like color and cardstock choices. A textured linen finish can give you an old-timey elegance, while glossy paper looks more high fashion.
Regardless, you’re going to want a thicker, sturdier cardstock that won’t crumple or stain easily, which means a higher basis weight.
That said, if you’re doing DIY wedding menu cards, be wary of choosing thicker cardstock, as most at home consumer printers can only handle 80-100 lbs basis weight paper.
The Right Cardstock for Any Menu
When the ramping up to the big day, the last thing you’re thinking about at your bridal brunch is the bridal shower menu. But all these small details will add up to a day you’ll never forget. The same can be said of a restaurant opening.
We’re here to make all those small details a little easier, with cardstock designed to suit your style. Click here to check out our selection of menu cardstock today.
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| White Cardstock | Parchment Cardstock | Pastel Cardstock | Bright Color Cardstock | Pastel Assortment |