I chose Bugatory and Franktuary for the two websites to review. I should mention that I have been to both and love their food and atmosphere. I think they both demonstrate a sense of strong and well thought out design. Franktuary’s website is straightforward and simplistic. It has a nice sense of balance and unity making it easy to navigate and gage the sense of brand the restaurant is putting out. The strong photography and graphics also help build the branding and compliment each other nicely. As far as emphasis goes, the photography and the graphics of “franks” “poutine” “liberations” take strong precedent. There is an easy to use the navigation bar at the top that compliments the design of the site. It leads you to discover, ordering, catering, blog, menu, locations, and more. It does a good job at making the site easy to use with its use of the navigation bar and titles. You know where you are and how to get back to where you need to go. They don’t have a way to search, which I’m not so sure they really need a search bar on their website only consists of less than 20 pages (if not under 10 pages). The only thing I wish they had is a page describing how the food truck/restaurant came about, maybe a history of the name of the place, what their goal is as a company, and how they are different from others. Als0, more photography of what their food truck looks like so people know what to look for.
Now switching over to Burgatory, they also have a strong sense of design and branding attached to their restaurant. The unique graphic/logo and the bold photography give it a different and interesting feel. The balance of the website is heavily based on the graphic design of the menus and photography. The navigation is the same as Frankuary, but more content is involved. They have a navigation bar and with drop-down navigation, making it easy to find what you’re looking for. They have a large menu overall so the drop-down makes it more convenient for the user to find what they’re looking for. They have more options to pick from and are very interested in the customer to business dynamic. They have a social media page, encouraging customers to post and tag them. As well as merchandise, where people can add items to the cart and check out. The website emphasis is also based on the graphic design and friendly interface. There is also a description of their company and their mission statement, which is nice. Burgatory, demonstrates a more complex, yet simple and easy to use design overall.
I think that both websites have their own positives. You also have to keep in mind the way a company is coming up with branding. Frankuary is a newer and smaller company, so their site is going to be different than a company that is bigger and has been around for longer. I think Burgatory is more effective at grabbing my attention because they are so customer-focused, and their branding is stronger with the pun behind their name. That doesn’t mean I think that Franktuary is weak, they just need to develop their website a bit more, or expand their company.