The McDonald's Thread: All things McDonald's

[MFS62]

Here's a price comparison for the same meal at three fast food chains -McDonald's, Burger King and Wendy's. (native yahoo, no pass-throughs to other sites)
https://www.yahoo.com/news/ordered-same ... 52657.html

Later

[Double Switch]

I'm a Wendy's guy myself, never go to Mickie D's and haven't seen a Burger King in my town for years. There was one a couple miles away that was demolished when a new grocery store/apartment complex went in. Just give me a Baconator with fries and charge it. Don't care what it costs, it's worth it.

Personal preference is I never click on links taking me to either AOL or Yahoo. Just like I don't use Bing.

[Lefty Specialist]

I'm a DuckDuckGo person myself.

I'm fast-food agnostic. We have a BK, McDonald's and a Wendy's within a few hundred feet of each other near me. I prefer a Whopper to a Quarter Pounder. McD's has better breakfast items. Wendy's salads are the best, McD's the worst. And I'm with you on the Baconator. Mmm.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Probably. Food costs are on the way up, labor inflation, need profits to make up for the last year, consumers have stimulus $$.

McDonald's Menu Prices Are Rising for This Reason
The massive fast-food chain has all but abandoned the once famed Dollar Menu.

Excerpt:

If you feel like prices have been creeping up at your local McDonald's in the past few years, you're right. They have.

According to Restaurant Business Online, franchisees across the nation have been increasing prices on many popular premium items such as the classic Big Mac. But why are stores raising prices on many items? Simply put, because they have realized they can for two reasons: customer reliability and the demise of the value menu… or, in McDonald's case, the Dollar Menu.

[***]

With the Dollar Menu effectively gone, franchisees can now raise prices on other beloved menu items without customers having much recourse (other than leaving without making a purchase). And based on reported 3.6% year-over-year increases in same-store sales in the three years since the Dollar Menu was slashed, the new approach is working, at least from a business viewpoint.

https://www.eatthis.com/news-mcdonalds-raising-prices/

[Johnny Lunchbucket]

That's my colleague's work cited there

[Frayed Knot]

And this is all prior to [when/if] universal $15/hr minimum wage kicks in.

[kcmets]

I got McDonald's sticker shock earlier this week. Got a bad Quarter Pounder with
Cheese that seemed like 2 days old. Went back in with two bites taken and complained
and got a lo siento and a crisp five dollar bill.

Done with them until fall and maybe I'll revisit.

[batmagadanleadoff]

McDonald's succumbs to public pressure, shuts down all of its Russian located McD's restaurants.

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/03/08/mcdonal ... raine.html

[Edgy MD]

What's interesting to me about McDonald's is not just how shutting down operations denies Russians their gross food, but what it does on the back end. I assume the Russian outlets source largely from within Russia. If so, that's a lot of Russian beef and potatoes and sugar! shuga! suge! purchasing lost.

I assume Coke in Russia is also made from Russian corn sugar or the like. The cool thing about running Coke is that your raw materials are mostly sugar and water so you can almost always bottle the shit locally.

[Johnny Lunchbucket]

yeah the supply situation is probably as much aboutthe shutdown as the bad PR

[batmagadanleadoff]

McDonald’s is getting rid of self-serve soda machines

https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/12/business ... index.html

Bummer. That's my favorite part of the franchise. So much so, that I avoid the McDonald's that is closest to me because it doesn't have a self-serve drink system.

[MFS62]

McDonald’s is getting rid of self-serve soda machines

https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/12/business ... index.html

Bummer. That's my favorite part of the franchise. So much so, that I avoid the McDonald's that is closest to me because it doesn't have a self-serve drink system.

Since I drink coffee when I go to MacDonalds, I never noticed self serve soda machines in their Connecticut locations, but have noticed them in Arby's and Burger King.
Now I'll have to look harder.

Later

[Benjamin Grimm]

Those "free refills" that they're looking to eliminate probably cost them about a nickel each.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Those "free refills" that they're looking to eliminate probably cost them about a nickel each.

I always thought even less than that. I'd bet that the cup they give you costs them more than the soda in one large-sized cup.

[kcmets]

Seems like a dumb idea after all these years. I drink very little soda.
Free refills of rum and coke would likely propel sales a lot.

I was happy to see the thread bumped. I had two Quarter Pounders
with Cheese and some seriously over-salted fries late last week.

Crapped like a viking for two days, win-win.

[whippoorwill]

I like more ice…less soda.

When I go for refills I get ice.

[Edgy MD]

You might figure that self-serv and the odd free refill is a good business model. Maybe every tenth customer or so abuses the privilege, but how much money can it really cost them when you factor in the labor it saves?

But then you realize that the Hamburglar is out there.

[Johnny Lunchbucket]

I think it's a subtle way to discourage lingering. MCD would prefer you took your meals to go.

[MFS62]

I checked in on the one closest to me today. It had recently been remodeled.
No self-serve soda machine.
But I had a McDouble to make sure it still tasted like the old days.
It did.

Later

[batmagadanleadoff]

McDonald's is going bigger than a Big Mac
The burger giant is pilot testing the 'Big Arch' in select markets

The “Big Arch” includes two beef patties, layered melted cheese, “crispy” toppings, and a slab of McDonald’s tangy sauce, the chain’s CEO Chris Kempczinski told investors during an earnings call on Monday.

https://qz.com/mcdonalds-q2-2024-new-bu ... wtab-en-us

It is two patties, three layers of white cheddar melted cheese, a new special, “tangy” sauce, crispy onions, slivered onions, lettuce and pickles on a brioche bun with multi-colored seeds.

https://nypost.com/2024/07/29/lifestyle ... e-for-now/

_________

We'll see. Almost all of their new big burger rollouts fail. The McDLT. The Arch Deluxe. The bigger Big Mac. In the 50 or so years since Tom Seaver and Nolan Ryan were last Mets teammates, the only McD big sandwiches remain the Big Mac and the Quarter Pounder.

[metirish]

I honestly can't remember the last time I had McDonald's, Popeyes though.....

[whippoorwill]

McDonald's is going bigger than a Big Mac
The burger giant is pilot testing the 'Big Arch' in select markets

The “Big Arch” includes two beef patties, layered melted cheese, “crispy” toppings, and a slab of McDonald’s tangy sauce, the chain’s CEO Chris Kempczinski told investors during an earnings call on Monday.

https://qz.com/mcdonalds-q2-2024-new-bu ... wtab-en-us

It is two patties, three layers of white cheddar melted cheese, a new special, “tangy” sauce, crispy onions, slivered onions, lettuce and pickles on a brioche bun with multi-colored seeds.

https://nypost.com/2024/07/29/lifestyle ... e-for-now/

_________

We'll see. Almost all of their new big burger rollouts fail. The McDLT. The Arch Deluxe. The bigger Big Mac. In the 50 or so years since Tom Seaver and Nolan Ryan were last Mets teammates, the only McD big sandwiches remain the Big Mac and the Quarter Pounder.

Lolol as if it’ll look like that in real life

[batmagadanleadoff]

Had lunch at McDonald's this past weekend. The experience was so bad, I might never go back again. Really. First of all, my favorite McDonald's was totally re-designed. They took out the self-serve unlimited soda refill station, which was my favorite part of the whole deal, and the only reason I even go to this particular McDonald's, which is not the closest one to me. But it has the soda refill station and I like that. To be fair, I knew that was coming. I'd read a few months ago that the self-serve unlimited soda refill stations were being phased out. Still, they're gone. Next -- there are no more cashiers. The only way to place your order is through those automated computerized "kiosk" thingies. That wasn't so hot. You'd figure that an outfit like McDonald's, a multi billion dollar a year company, with all of its decades of experience, and all of the resources available to it, could design a reasonably logical ordering system. But they didn't. The system was flawed, and somewhat illogical. I'm certain that it took me about three times as many clicks to submit my order as it should have. Some items were unreasonably hard to find and the program logic just didn't make any sense to me. Also, how the hell am I supposed to tell the person filling up my soda not to fill it all the way up with ice? A little, little bit of ice is all I want. There was no option for that at the stupid kiosk.

Then the fun really started. I checked my order after I finally got it and saw that my large fries box was half empty. When I finally got somebody's attention to ask them sarcastically --"This is large fries?" the cashier person said "Yes, that's large fries.", with a whole lot of attitude and hostility. I told her that it wasn't large fries, and I'd never, ever seen a picture of large fries advertised where the box was so stuffed that the fries weren't hanging over the top of the box . Like on the stupid ordering kiosk that I just used to place this order, for example.



She finally took my fries box, and very grudgingly, put some more fries in there. But not to the top. The box was now only about 80% full. I let it go. Next I noticed that I didn't get any ketchups. The old soda refill station also had ketchup buckets from where you could pump out as much ketchup as you like. Those were gone with the soda refills. Truth be told, I prefer the ketchup packets. I like that I can make the ketchup come out in a really thin line with the packets, instead of those thicker lines of ketchup that are like ropes that come out of the ketchup pump buckets. Ropes of ketchup that drown my skinny delicate McDonald's french fries. With the ketchup packets, I can maintain the right ratio of fries to ketchup. So I asked for ketchups. Seven ketchups, to be precise. I know how many ketchups I'm gonna need for what I ordered and it was seven. So she gave me four ketchups. Four. Not seven. So then I asked for six more. When I asked for six more, she reminded me that I asked for seven the first time and she'd already given me some. So I asked her why if she knew that I asked for seven ketchups the first time around, why did she give me only four? She was stymied and so grabbed a handful of more ketchups and gave them to me. It was more than the six I asked for the second time around. Now I had about a dozen ketchups. What happened was that she got so annoyed that she just ending up grabbing a handful of ketchups without even counting just to get on with it. You'd think they do an inventory head-count of all of the ketchup packets at the end of the day, matching it all to the surveillance video and then divide the missing ketchups by the number of Big Macs sold to see if anybody gave out more ketchups than they're supposed to give out. Ketchup misers. It took me more than five minutes to get a seat because the place was kind of packed. When I opened my bag to eat my meal, I noticed for the first time that they didn't give me any napkins. Not one. I wasn't going back because who knows how long it'd take me to find a seat again. No way was I gonna try and hold my table by leaving my food on there, unattended. So I ate my meal without any napkins and wiped my hands on the table.

[whippoorwill]

You crack me up.

One of our local McDonald’s employs Amish kids and they are truly rude and stare at you

[metirish]

I haven't been to a McDonald's in several years ,and after reading that I won't want to go , rude staff is the worst, replacing them with machines sucks too