McTrouble

Scott Hardie | March 22, 2015
McDonald's is in trouble. Sales are all trending downward and the long-term prognosis is bleak. The company has lots of ideas, but it's generally agreed that fast-casual restaurants like Five Guys and Chipotle are the future, and that McDonald's has to be like them in order to survive. That's what I keep seeing in the news, anyway.

Personally, I don't fully buy it. There's a fast-casual bubble underway now in which upstarts like Shake Shack are ridiculously overvalued. They're inconvenient and slow and overpriced. There are a lot of consumers for whom these are big problems, from poor workers needing a quick meal between shifts at two jobs, to busy families who don't have time to go inside between shuffling the kids to appointments, to seniors looking for an inexpensive meal out on a fixed income. I believe that when their novelty wears off, fast-casual's improved quality over fast-food chains won't be enough to keep people flocking to them the way that they do today, especially when the economy takes another downturn. They'll continue to exist in the marketplace, but they won't always be so hot.

That said, the new McDonald's CEO quoted in one of those articles is right on they money when he says that for too long, the company has allowed other people to define it. Its prominence among fast-food restaurants makes it a scapegoat and martyr, suffering all of the criticisms against the industry even when they're untrue in McDonald's case. For example, people have long accused McDonald's of being unhealthy, even though it has undertaken major efforts to improve the nutritional quality of its menu for years now, especially compared to its competitors. These days, the reporting trend is that the company is in trouble and will be rendered obsolete by fast-casual chains, but they have 36,000 locations around the planet, so I don't think they're going anywhere soon. Has the Internet era and its idea of "disruption" made it impossible for reporters and investors to perceive shifts in the marketplace as anything but fatal for the old guard and insanely profitable for the new guard?

What do you think?

Samir Mehta | March 22, 2015
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Scott Hardie | March 22, 2015
Yeah, they really don't offer much to vegetarians. Their menu has salads and fries, but I bet those contain some kind of meat byproducts, because they outright say that nothing on their menu is vegetarian. It's a sign of their market dominance that they don't feel like they have to cater to that large demographic whatsoever.

If you don't mind me asking, I'm curious what you as a vegetarian think of America's obsession with hamburgers. When Kelly and I go on road trips and start looking for a place to stop and eat, it seems like every billboard shows just another giant burger. The new upstarts like Five Guys, Shake Shack, Smashburger, Wayback Burgers -- does this country really need another damn burger chain? What's the saturation point? And what do any of them really do that's substantially better or different than the others? I've eaten thousands of burgers in my life, and maybe five of them were really good. I do not understand why this particular sandwich is so overwhelmingly popular. Maybe a vegetarian is exactly the opposite of who I should be asking. :-)

Scott Hardie | April 11, 2015
Breakfast all day isn't going to end their troubles, but it's a welcome and overdue change.

Samir Mehta | April 11, 2015
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Scott Hardie | February 27, 2016
Congrats, vegetarians: Arby's wants your business for one day every four years. I'm tempted to say that the veggie toppings and condiments and cheese that they will use in place of the meat cannot be very good, but I suppose the Arby's meat isn't very good either.

Steve West | February 27, 2016
I don't know what that meat is but it's not roast beef. It may be something that approximates roast beef - and it might even be some kind of beef - but please, stop insulting us all by continuing to call it roast beef. I haven't eaten there in years.

Scott Hardie | February 27, 2016
I think of Jon Stewart whenever I drive by an Arby's.

Samir Mehta | February 27, 2016
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Denise Sawicki | March 9, 2016
My programmer coworkers all seem to love Arby's. I like it all right. I have a theory that only computer programmers like Arby's... others at my work have mentioned not liking it.

Scott Hardie | March 10, 2016
I can't seem to get any support for Arby's when I suggest it for lunch with my fellow programmers, but I like it fine. There's one right by our house so they wind up being a more frequent meal for us (once every 4-5 months maybe) than they would otherwise. Their higher price than other fast food is a bit of a turnoff, but I like the "roast beef" sandwiches if they're loaded with cheese and/or sauce. Dang, now I want some and they're closed. :-)

Denise Sawicki | March 10, 2016
Well so much for my "programmers like Arby's" theory I guess :). I like their Reuben.

Scott Hardie | March 10, 2016
Meh, my fellow programmers frequently turn down anything that isn't Panera, Publix, Chinese, or the food truck with good chicken wings. We are surrounded by great takeout restaurants but I really have to twist their arms to get them out of their rut. It's not a problem specific to Arby's. :-)

Erik Bates | March 10, 2016
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Samir Mehta | March 10, 2016
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