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Jesus how cheap could they be? Fountain drinks are far and away their highest profit margin item on the menu.
The thing that pisses me off, is while I don't eat McDonald's so it doesn't directly affect me, I just know that other restaurants will see that it's making them more money and will follow suit.
In many rural areas, they have run out the mom & pop stores, plus people will pay for convenience, so I expect that they expect to totally get away with this.
I was explaining something about this to my daughter. Starbucks came in to a lot of smaller towns and drove out the local coffee shop because it had the advantage most of those coffee shops didn't: A drive-through.
The good news is that now, local places have figured out that's all they have to do to get customers to opt for them instead of shitty Starbucks coffee. And they can get away with charging less.
People traveling between cities will opt for the comfortable, safe, familiar places. And sheeple that go to McDonald's just do what they're told. I imagine the CEO would not risk their shares unless they thought they'd get away with doing this to their poor customers.
A lot of businesses do this, purposefully aggravating their customer base, and then say - it's Biden, he made me do it. So for a Magat, going to McDonald's might even be a source of pride!? (Except delicious Chick-fil-A already occupies that niche!?)
no niches filled on sunday*
Let's hope it forces then to fail faster. I like frappes when I'm on the road but I always fill up on soda before I leave. If they stop soda I'll just go to another place that offers me a drink for my extended trips. They are already in decline to burger King and dominos apparently.
That is soooo much sugar you are consuming. Even a small frappe is 10-15 sugar cubes. Add in a soda and you are looking at another 10-15. Maybe refill with water.
I Like coffee with my cream and sugar
I kind of view this as a good thing, honestly. People do not need another 20 oz of sugar water. A medium Coke has 12-15 sugar cubes worth of sugar. The US is pretty much the only place where free refills are common.
How does removing drink fountains make anything more consistent? I'd be shocked if they got rid of them in the back and switched to cans or bottles. Seems like a blatant grab to get more money from consumers for something that is by far the cheapest cost thing on the menu.
How does removing drink fountains make anything more consistent?
Consistent between company owned stores and franchise stores, so that neither will have self serve drinks. In other words, they're lowering all stores to equally bad experience.
Guess if you don't eat in-store anyway it doesn't matter. Wonder what the ratio is of eat-in vs take-out is.
Cans/bottles take up too much space compared to a plastic bag of concentrated stuff hooked up to a fountain.
they can water your drink down with ice if they control the dispenser.
On top of all this, they’re trying really damn hard to close the dine-in and force customers to order either online or via their kiosks. I’ve been to multiple locations that have removed their dining rooms, removed their drink fountains or have disabled their cash registers.
All that and their prices are through the roof.
F ‘em. I’m done with McDonalds. Let ‘em go the way of Red Lobster.
red lobster didn't make dumb choices that made them go bankrupt. they were devoured by a private equity firm against their will.
but yeah, fuck em.
where I am, we lost all our self-serve drink machines in covid/2020 and they never came back. for everywhere.
red lobster didn’t make dumb choices that made them go bankrupt. they were devoured by a private equity firm against their will.
Agreed. Both are headed in the same direction in my opinion.
A large coke from McDonald's has 290 calories of sugar.
Maybe this will unintentionally help a bit with America's obesity problem.
And 80 grams of sugar. That is 16-20 sugar cubes.
Yea holy shit, the recommended daily sugar intake is around 110 calories / 28g
Hmm. I'd think that that'd make sense if people were just lingering and sipping sodas and they were trying to decongest the restaurant, but the article says that the opposite is true:
Still, the company announced earlier this year that foot traffic to its restaurants had slowed as inflation increased.
EDIT: Hmm. This recent article says that apparently Burger King is running off with their value customers:
As it loses customers to rivals, McDonald's shifts its focus to value
The fast-food giant appears to be losing the battle for customers looking for lower prices to Burger King and Domino’s. McDonald’s wants a national value offer to change that.
By Jonathan Maze on Apr. 30, 2024
McDonald’s appears to be losing some customers to rivals like Burger King and Domino’s as inflation-weary consumers cut back on their dining and focus more on value offers.
That has the Chicago-based fast-food giant working to develop a national value offer that will resonate more with customers than its current batch of local and digital deals.
“It’s a street fight,” CFO Ian Borden told analysts on Tuesday. “Everybody is fighting for fewer consumers. We have to make sure we have that street fighting capability.”
The company is working to develop a national value platform that will be “net neutral” to franchisee profitability.
But executives also said that store profits have returned to pre-pandemic levels, which should give the company the ability to offer that kind of value.
“We’re in a strong position,” CEO Chris Kempczinski said. “Franchisee cash flow is at the second highest levels ever.”
McDonald’s has been signaling a more concerted value focus for months, particularly since February when Kempczinski suggested the brand was losing lower-income customers to grocery stores.
Maybe they're trying to figure out what they can do to cut prices to bring back customers, and they're looking at shaving off perks or services that presently exist to see what they can do to get their prices down.
Still, the company announced earlier this year that foot traffic to its restaurants had slowed as inflation increased.
It's not just foot traffic I'm sure. That's what happens when a business sees a temporary 9% inflation bump as a good time to increase all prices 30%+ across the board. McDonald's is nearly as expensive as Five Guys in my area now. They forgot what market niche they were filling when they got greedy. What used to be a $3 meal off the dollar menu is now $8 for the same items, and the "deals" all suck unless you want those specific 3 options or a discount equivalent to the sales tax.
For my $, Wendy's is winning the value competition. Their value deals are cheap and decent, their reward system is better, their online deals are better. Subjectively, I like the taste better, so that's nice too.
BK and McD offer better deals at volume than for a single person meal, but even then it's not better than Wendy's. Single person it's just not even a contest.
Hmm. So, setting aside the business discussion, I personally prefer Wendy's too, but there are also a fair bit more McDonald's locations out there than there are Wendy's locations (not even to mention the European Union situation, where Wendy's isn't present at all due to a trademark dispute with some Dutch restaurant). So it's not always an option to do Wendy's.
This has 6,029 Wendy's locations in the US.
McDonalds doesn't appear to say, but it looks like these guys run a count:
https://www.scrapehero.com/location-reports/McDonalds-USA/
They have 13,529 McDonald's locations in the US.
not even to mention the European Union situation, where Wendy's isn't present at all due to a trademark dispute with some Dutch restaurant
I'm pretty sure that's not the actual reason. Nothing is stopping them from operating in the EU under a different name.
They could, but that's at a significant disadvantage, since a lot of a franchise is its brand.
https://www.gourmandize.com/article-8303-why-are-there-no-wendy-s-in-europe.htm
Why are there no Wendy's in Europe?
According to its website, Wendy's currently has locations in 30 countries around the world, in the following regions: Asia Pacific, Caribbean, Europe, Middle East, Africa, Latin America and of course, North America. There's just one region that shouldn't be on that list: Europe. There are still no European Wendy's locations, and the reason might surprise you.
So what's the deal? Well, there used to be a Wendy's in Europe. Back in 1979, the first European location opened in Munich, Germany. Following this, several more locations opened up in the Benelux region (Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg) and elsewhere, but they didn't remain open past the late '80's.
In 1988, a man named Raymond Warrens decided to open a restaurant in Goes, Netherlands and named it—you guessed it—Wendy's, after his youngest daughter. As the American Wendy's activity dwindled in Europe, Warrens decided to register a trademark for the name in 1995. He got it, and American Wendy's was prohibited from opening any future locations in the Benelux region.
Since the year 2000, Wendy's has been embroiled in a legal war with the Dutch Wendy's, attempting over and over to acquire a European trademark. Dutch courts, however, continuously side with Dutch Wendy's because if American Wendy's did win the rights to a trademark, countries from the Benelux region would be included as they are part of Europe, and that would infringe on Dutch Wendy's rights.
So there you have it. That's why there are no delicious old fashioned hamburgers, spicy chicken sandwiches, Frosty's or the famous baked potato with sour cream and chives in Europe. Well you might find all of these at other fast food places; they just won't be descended from Dave Thomas's legacy.
That's a silly reason not to bring their formula to Europe under a different name, say call it Bendy's, with similar design aesthetic to the US franchises.
In the race between BK, McD, and Wendy’s, Chipotle is winning the value competition
Fuck Chipotle and their diarrhea burritos.
BK has been offering 2 sandwiches for the price of 1 deals since the pandemic, and also printing bargain coupon sheets in the weekly coupon flyers, along with KFC, Taco Bell, and Subway.
BK has been working hard to capture the value fast food market, while McDs has been... installing self serve kiosks?
Come to think of it, I don't think I've ever seen self-serve soft drinks at a McDs around here.
LOL that's a sure way to increase foot traffic /s
I'm pretty sure they could get their prices down by not being such greedy fucks.
I have not been in a mcdonalds since I managed to convince my kids that there were better options. This happened about 30ish years ago.
Some westerners may be surprised that here in Eastern Europe this is the standard. I've only seen free refills in IKEA.
Burger King opened and started offering free refills. It was awesome. And then they stopped doing it and started charging for every drink. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
It used to be the standard in the U.S. too. When I was a kid, it was not self-serve at McDonald's and there were not free refills.
It is the standard damn near everywhere except the US.
It's good to know the U.S. leads the world in something worthwhile.
That's honestly odd. A refill costs nothing as compared to the initial cost of the cup/lid/straw.