Allergen information and digital menus: getting it right

A digital menu board can show allergen information, and done properly it's a good place for it. It has to meet the same rules as any other menu, though, and it works best as one part of how you tell customers about allergens, alongside written information at the counter and staff who know to check. Keep the allergy details with each dish in one place, put a fixed allergy notice on every menu screen, and update the screen the same day a recipe changes.

The rules, briefly

This is only an outline, and the rules do get updated, so read the Food Standards Agency's allergen guidance for food businesses for what applies to you. That guidance covers England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

UK food law names 14 allergens that businesses have to tell customers about when they're in food or drink: celery, cereals containing gluten (such as wheat, rye, barley and oats), crustaceans, eggs, fish, lupin, milk, molluscs, mustard, peanuts, sesame, soya, sulphur dioxide and sulphites (above a set level), and tree nuts.

If you serve food that isn't prepacked, such as meals in a cafe, restaurant or pub, you must give allergen information for every item that contains any of them. The FSA's guidance says you can do that in writing (on a menu, a chalkboard or in an information pack) or verbally, as long as a written notice in a clearly visible place tells customers how to get the information. Its advice is that written information backed up by a conversation works best for customers.

Food you make and wrap on the premises before it's ordered, like a sandwich in the chiller, counts as prepacked for direct sale. That needs a label with the full ingredients list and the allergens emphasised, and no screen replaces the label.

The FSA also says food businesses must train staff on allergens. In Scotland, the regulator is Food Standards Scotland, which publishes its own guidance.

What a screen does well

Casty's menu boards keep each dish as a record: its name, price and description, plus an Allergy Information field on the Details tab. On the layout, the Menu Board: Products widget has an Allergy info element that you place next to each dish, the same way you place the price.

That gives you one place to keep it. Change the allergy details on the dish and every screen showing that menu follows, so you're not hunting through slides for every mention of the brownie.

It also lets you write allergens out clearly. A printed menu often squeezes them into tiny codes in a footnote. On a screen you can put them in words under each dish ("Contains: milk, egg, wheat") at a size people can read from the queue. If you do use codes or icons, put the key on the same screen.

Then there's the notice. Give every menu layout a permanent line, in a part of the screen that never changes or rotates away, asking customers with an allergy or intolerance to speak to staff before they order. The FSA publishes a free allergy and intolerance sign you can use as it is or adapt, and the same wording works on screen.

Where a screen falls short

Rotation is the big one. If a dish's allergens are on a slide that shows for ten seconds in every minute, someone with a nut allergy may stand there for most of a minute waiting for it to come round. Keep allergen details on the same slide as the dish, and keep menu slides still.

Space is next. A full breakfast menu with every allergen written out can get crowded. If it won't fit at a readable size, show the allergens on screen in short form and keep the full detail in a written matrix at the counter (the FSA has an allergen matrix template you can download and print).

A screen also can't answer questions. Someone with a serious allergy will want to know about shared fryers and what's in the sauce. The FSA gives the example of gluten-free chips, which can't be cooked in oil that's been used for battered fish. Only your staff can answer that kind of question, so the screen should send people to them.

Some customers won't be able to read a screen easily, because of their eyesight or where they're standing. That's one more reason to keep the written information and the conversation going alongside it. There's more on this in making screen content accessible.

Keeping it accurate

The biggest risk with any menu, screen or paper, is that it drifts out of step with the kitchen. A supplier swaps a product, the chef tweaks a recipe, and the allergen line on the board is wrong from that moment. The FSA's guidance says to keep allergen information recorded and up to date, and to think about the impact whenever a recipe changes.

A routine that holds up:

• Whoever changes a recipe, or accepts a substitute from a supplier, updates the kitchen's allergen records and the dish on the menu board the same day.
• One named person checks the screen after any allergen change. If you're not on site, you can request a screenshot from the Displays page.
• When a special comes back with a different recipe, edit its allergy details. Don't assume last time's still apply.
• New dishes don't go on the screen until their allergy information is filled in.

Be careful with claims, too. The FSA says a free-from claim such as "gluten free" needs strict controls over ingredients, handling and preparation, because it's a guarantee that the food is suitable for people with that allergy or intolerance. Don't put it on the board unless your kitchen can back it up. It also points out that customers sometimes assume vegan dishes are free from milk or egg, when traces can get in through cross-contamination, so be clear about that risk wherever you label a dish as vegan.

Setting it up

The menu board guide in our help pages covers the Details tab and placing the Allergy info element. On the design side, set the allergen line a size or two smaller than the dish name but still readable from where people order, in a colour that stands out clearly against the background. The post on digital menu boards covers the rest of the board, and designing for screens has more on text size and contrast.