McDonalds thinks adding gourmet items will help slow sales,

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JediTricks
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McDonalds thinks adding gourmet items will help slow sales,

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CNN Money had this article: "McDonald's CEO promises better food"
http://money.cnn.com/2015/05/04/investi ... index.html

In reading the article, it seems McDonald's CEO thinks their problem is that they're not competitive in the upper-end products, and adding more fancy items will save them. Does anybody else think that's right?

I for one think he's off his nut, and hasn't eaten at McDonalds lately. Their problem is at the foundation: the quality of their ingredients isn't very good on their base-level burgers and chicken. If you go to McDonalds and spend a couple bucks, you will get food that has an off texture, is greasy, and has a bitter flavor. Compare that to everybody else's food at that price and nobody else makes you question your choices quite like McDonalds.

McD's has worked so hard to become efficient and cheap that they've lost sight of quality at their basic level. Try a basic hamburger without toppings and it's like eating greasy cardboard. I may loathe Burger King these days for their cost-cutting, but at least their meat isn't this horrible. The chicken nuggets and cheaper chicken offerings are a similar problem, tough and off-tasting, focusing heavily on breading and sauces to cover up the actual food flavor.

But that's just my opinion, what do you think?
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Re: McDonalds thinks adding gourmet items will help slow sal

Post by andersonh1 »

Yeah, better quality food would solve McDonald's problems, if the perception of their food as poor isn't too set in stone to turn around at this point. I used to enjoy McDonald's years ago, but you're right, the quality just isn't there any more.
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Re: McDonalds thinks adding gourmet items will help slow sal

Post by Dominic »

I ate at McDonalds yesterday because I was hanging around with two people who happily eat crap and there were no better options available. (The last thing I have eaten was a chicken pattie that I got at a train statin about 5 hours earlier.) Not something I plan to do again.


As time passes, the best move for McDonalds would probably be to forget the up-market and focus on people stupid/desperate enough to buy their food.
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Re: McDonalds thinks adding gourmet items will help slow sal

Post by Almighty Unicron »

In college I took a side-gig called mystery shopping where I got paid to go to stores and restaurants, pretend to be a regular customer and secretly time and evaluate the store. Doing mcdonalds mystery shops was kind of the entry level thing and I still grab them if I know I'll be downtown near one and want a free lunch, so I eat there somewhat frequently.

Thing is, McDonalds isn't that cheap. Here in New York a regular combo meal costs you $9 for a big mac, medium fries and soda. McDonalds' food quality is absolute shit, and I should be getting better or more for $9. I also get paid to eat at chipotle, and I can get an asbsolutely massive burrito with fresh ingredients for $9.

Thing is, no one will go to mcdonald's for good quality food. That's never gonna happen. McDonalds needs to go back to being cheap food because that's what people remember it as.
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Re: McDonalds thinks adding gourmet items will help slow sal

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andersonh1 wrote:Yeah, better quality food would solve McDonald's problems, if the perception of their food as poor isn't too set in stone to turn around at this point. I used to enjoy McDonald's years ago, but you're right, the quality just isn't there any more.
Exactly right, it may be too late for them to step up their foundational quality perception problem. People see them as both unhealthy AND low-quality, and it's costing them a lot of market share, yet they already promote that their burgers are "100% beef" so how does that message change with the public? Adding a $7 burger won't fix the fact that the $1-$4 burgers still taste like wet cardboard.



DAAAAANG! NYC is expensive, that same meal is $5.50 here in LA, and it's NOT a bargain.
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Re: McDonalds thinks adding gourmet items will help slow sal

Post by Almighty Unicron »

JediTricks wrote:DAAAAANG! NYC is expensive, that same meal is $5.50 here in LA, and it's NOT a bargain.
When I do those mystery shops I have to scan them my receipts so they know what to reimburse me. I've actually had to argue with them that, no, I didn't doctor the receipts and yeah, with tax it comes out to just under $9.
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Re: McDonalds thinks adding gourmet items will help slow sal

Post by Dominic »

How does McDonalds (or by extension Burger King or Wendy's) survive in NYC? Who would bother with those places if there are comparably priced (and better quality) alternatives?

(I only ate at McDonalds this past weekend under duress. And, I have no plans to go back there.)
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Re: McDonalds thinks adding gourmet items will help slow sal

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Almighty Unicron wrote:
JediTricks wrote:DAAAAANG! NYC is expensive, that same meal is $5.50 here in LA, and it's NOT a bargain.
When I do those mystery shops I have to scan them my receipts so they know what to reimburse me. I've actually had to argue with them that, no, I didn't doctor the receipts and yeah, with tax it comes out to just under $9.
I'm sure, that's got to be totally bonkers to them. I like the Big Mac (although it's a pure ripoff of the Big Boy sandwich from Bob's Big Boy) but if it were in that price range I would never even think about it. Do you have to take photos of the menu board to prove accuracy?

Dominic wrote:How does McDonalds (or by extension Burger King or Wendy's) survive in NYC? Who would bother with those places if there are comparably priced (and better quality) alternatives?

(I only ate at McDonalds this past weekend under duress. And, I have no plans to go back there.)
How does ANYONE survive in Manhattan & Brooklyn? I kinda doubt prices in Staten Island, Queens, and the Bronx
are as high but that'd be even worse. Basically, those businesses survive because there's an expected high cost to living in urban New York, everything involved with living costs more. I think due partly to infrastructural issues of getting raw materials into the city, but mainly due to the high demand of housing rising those costs astronomically and raising the waterline for most other things.

I would guess that the prices of alternative food there is equally-priced so that McDonalds and their ilk remain slightly cheaper than the alternatives you mentioned.
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Re: McDonalds thinks adding gourmet items will help slow sal

Post by Almighty Unicron »

Pretty much yeah. $9 is cheap for a meal in Manhattan.
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Re: McDonalds thinks adding gourmet items will help slow sal

Post by Shockwave »

Eh McDonald's taste alright to me. In fact, that's what I had for dinner tonight.

Thing is though, it's not high class food. We all know it isn't. That's not why you eat there. Sure, McDonald's and Applebee's both sell burgers. But, they're not really comparable. Applebee's isn't a fast food restaurant, you don't go there for something quick when you're on the run, you go there for the experience of actually sitting down and eating slowly with other humans. That's not McDonald's. McDonald's is just something to eat when you don't really have time for anything else. And the same is true of all fast food places. You're not gonna get sit down food at a fast food place. No, it's not as good, but the reason for that is because of the processing it all has to go through to satiate our ready-on-a-moments-notice lifestyle. It's precooked and reheated which is why it's often dry and not as flavorful as actual restaurant burgers. I do like their fries though. Especially compared to other fries in the fast food industry. Anyway, my point is, complaining that McDonald's sucks is like complaining that the sky is blue and should be some other color. There really isn't anything we can do about it and as long as your food doesn't have something gross in it(like spit or dirt or something), what's the problem?
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