A surgical instrument includes a body, a shaft, and an end effector that is operable to compress, staple, and cut tissue. The end effector includes a pair of jaws. One of the jaws has a greater thickness than the other. On the thicker jaw is a placement tip that is elastically deformable from a biased curved position when the tip is subject to a force, such as the force exerted when tissue is clamped between the jaws. The placement tip extends distally from the distal end of the jaw to which it is attached. The placement tip can have a variety of shapes. The placement tip is made of a material having a lower stiffness than the material of the jaw from which the placement tip extends.
