How to Display Your Bar Menu on a TV Screen
Turn any Smart TV into a live digital menu board for your bar. No hardware, no USB sticks — just open a browser. Step-by-step guide.
Why digital menu boards beat printed posters
Walk into any modern bar and you'll see screens — behind the bar, near the entrance, in the lounge area. But most of them show a static image or a looping slideshow that someone made in PowerPoint months ago.
A real digital menu board is different. It's connected to your actual menu data, so when you change a price, add a new cocktail, or mark something as sold out, the screen updates automatically. No USB sticks, no emailing files to your staff, no forgetting to update the TV after you update the menu.
For bars, this is especially valuable during busy nights: you can push a "Happy Hour" promotion to all screens in seconds, or highlight tonight's DJ event without printing a single poster.
What you need (hint: just a Smart TV)
Traditional digital signage solutions require expensive hardware — media players, HDMI sticks, proprietary software licenses. That made sense for airports and shopping malls, but it's overkill for a bar.
With a web-based platform like Hesvon, all you need is:
- 1.A Smart TV with a browser — Samsung, LG, Android TV, or any TV with a built-in web browser
- 2.Wi-Fi connection — the TV needs internet access
- 3.Your Hesvon slides URL — open it in the TV browser, tap "Go Full Screen"
That's it. No cables, no apps to install, no monthly hardware fees. The TV pulls your live menu data and displays it as beautiful, branded slides that update whenever you make changes in the admin panel.
Step-by-step: setting up TV signage
Here's how to get your bar's menu on a TV screen in under 10 minutes:
Step 1: Add your menu items — Log into your Hesvon admin panel and add your drinks, food, and categories. Upload photos or let AI generate them.
Step 2: Create slides — Go to the Slides section. Hesvon automatically generates slide content from your menu items, events, and promotions. You can customize which items appear and in what order.
Step 3: Open on your TV — On your Smart TV, open the web browser and navigate to your slides URL (e.g., hesvon.com/yourbar/slides). Tap the fullscreen button.
Step 4: Set and forget — The slides auto-rotate and pull fresh data from your dashboard. Update a price on your phone during service, and the TV updates within minutes.
Pro tip: Use the "Event Slides" feature to automatically show upcoming events between menu slides. Guests waiting at the bar will see what's happening this week.
TV signage vs. dedicated digital signage players
Solutions like Yodeck, Kitcast, or Screenly are powerful — but they're built for corporate environments with dozens of screens across multiple buildings. For a bar with 1-3 TVs, they introduce unnecessary complexity and cost.
Here's the comparison:
| Feature | Dedicated signage | Hesvon TV Signage |
|---|---|---|
| Hardware needed | Media player per TV | None (browser-based) |
| Monthly cost | €15-30/screen | Included in subscription |
| Menu sync | Manual upload | Automatic from dashboard |
| Event integration | Separate system | Built-in |
| Setup time | 30-60 minutes | Under 10 minutes |
If you're a bar, pub, or restaurant with a few screens, web-based signage is the smart choice. Save the enterprise tools for the enterprise.