IN DEPTH: Why U.S. health law could herald McScreens
When U.S. President Barack Obama signed his healthcare-reform measures into law on 23 March, burgers and fried chicken may not have been his main concerns.
But the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will not only radically overhaul healthcare funding in the world’s largest medical market – a little-known proviso in the legislation also directs fast-food restaurants to be more transparent about the nutritional merits of their menus. And that could herald much wider adoption of digital signage in the nation’s pizza parlours and taco bars.
While numerous individual fast-food outlets – or quick-service restaurants (QSRs), as their owners prefer to call them – have installed digital signage, whether menu boards aimed at those waiting to be served or screens delivering entertainment and promotions to seated diners, chain-wide rollouts have been notable by their absence, perhaps because of the complexities of the franchised QSR model or because of the sheer scale of the businesses. Subway has around 23,000 outlets in the U.S., McDonald’s more than 13,000.
However, the new law could change that. It requires any chain with 20 or more locations to display on its menu boards, whether inside or outside the restaurants, the calories associated with each item, the suggested daily intake, and the availability of further information on nutritional concerns such as saturated fat, sodium and carbohydrate content. (A few menu items, like specials not regularly on offer, are exempt.)
The rules – which interpret the concept of a chain broadly, so that venues with the same name and the same menu are treated as part of the same group even if they are technically under different ownership thanks to franchising – are expected to affect 200,000-plus restaurants; they also apply to operators of more than 20 vending machines, and over-ride existing local laws.
Drooling in anticipation
Digital-signage software supplier Wireless Ronin, whose clients include KFC, sees the new regulations as a problem waiting to be solved by screens. And it is unlikely to be the only vendor hoping for a bite at this potentially lucrative market.
On its own, the labelling law might not be enough to prompt hefty investment in digital signage by QSR operators. But add the fact that it will force them to make some kind of signage upgrade anyway, whether or not it is screen-based, to the commercial allure of capabilities like head-office updating and day-parting, and it could tip the balance in favour of digital menu boards.
“The ability to instantly push data to consumers in-store with a push of a button is now mission-critical for restaurants,” says VP and chief marketing officer Linda Hofflander in a white paper. “In response, many are turning their attention to evaluating technology solutions as a method of delivering the information now required by law.
“An intelligent menu-labelling system shares nutritional information based on the menu items currently offered,” adds Hofflander. “This allows valuable menu signage real estate to focus on revenue-generating food items.” In other words, a nutritional information system using day-parted digital signage won’t waste screen space telling customers about the calories in breakfast products when they’re not for sale in the evening.
Besides the fact that controlling nutritional information from head office means it stands a better chance of actually being correct (how many burger flippers know what a calorie is?), the benefits, according to Hofflander, include consistency across multiple outlets and integration with a central database, so that changes to suppliers’ products can quickly be reflected on screens around the country.
The government’s Food and Drug Administration is expected to take up to a year to issue its orders on details like positioning and text formatting of the nutritional data – so don’t expect to find out how (un)healthy that salad is just yet. But in the longer term, President Obama’s healthcare reforms could make some digital-signage suppliers a lot fatter.
www.wirelessronin.com
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