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And for some reason America loves them, keeps giving them power, and defends them tooth and nail, hell they don’t even do anything to force Congress to remove corporate money from politics, they celebrate it
Case in point, earlier this year a recording of a Campbells exec deriding his company's customer base while saying he would never eat Campbells products.
Martin Bally, a Vice President and CISO in Campbell’s IT and information security department was recorded by an employee describing Campbell’s products as "shit for fucking poor people" and claiming the food contained bioengineered or 3D-printed chicken.
People complain when employers expect us to be loyal to them, but criticizing this guy because he doesn't like the product his employer makes kind of seems like the same thing. Just because he has a high level position with the company doesn't mean he should like the product. And it's not like he's even a part of the tower involved in developing the product.
Literally what that Campbell’s exec got caught saying on a teams call. That their customers don’t care about 3d printed meat Becuase they are so poor. Didn’t really eat Campbell’s before but now I never will.
Not to defend these guys, but it’s sadly something normal.
I worked in some companies where my fellow engineers called our customers idiots- simply because they knew all the hacks and dirty laundry of the company, they think only an idiot can still use its products- of course, they forget that the customers don’t have the same insights.
Just imagine how much… uncomfortable knowledge about these “products” this guy possesses. It clearly shows during the video
It’s because he’s using shareholder speak with the average Joe. Even that usually isn’t so bad except this is McDonalds and the average McDonald’s eater is going to roll their eyes with derision at that kind of crap.
Most business leaders are not good spokespersons for their products, and they are unsuited to acting in an advertisement. Compared to professional actors they have painfully stiff delivery, awkward pacing, and speak over-scripted lines. They often make the ad feel like a shallow, uninspired cash grab.
You'll love our product in your face's designated* hinged nutritional intake port.
*TheProduct and it's subsidiaries McDonald's and Big Joe Mac who deals the good crack inc: shall take no legal or financial responsibility for any NPC's not using the appropriate and DESIGNATED FACIAL NUTRITIONAL INTAKE PORT!
Yes McDonald's and fast food in general is extremely overpriced and people should stop buying it, but these numbers are a lie. A NY strip at Texas Roadhouse is like 30 bucks even in low cost areas
$25.99 for a NY Strip here in Iowa, and $17.49 for a Double McD meal. Though personally, I am a fan of the Iowa chops, and a double chop meal is $18.49, which is ABSOLUTELY better than a McD meal... so the question, "how is anyone eating fast food anymore" is still a valid question.
edit: so my math is off because with tax the Double with bacon is around $14... however, it also does not account for the fact you're getting less food at fast food than most traditional places.
In NJ the 8 oz sirloin meal is $18.49, which would be the equivalent amount of meat to a double quarter pounder, but that’s the pre cooked patty weight, and obviously steak is better / pricier than ground beef. The 2 sides it comes with could be compared as one of them vs the fries and the other vs ‘rest of the burger’ that a steak won’t come with.
Now give us the price from the McDonalds app and not the DoorDash price. There is nowhere in the continental United States where a Double Quarter Pounder meal is over $17. Double quarter pounder meal in Huxley, Iowa is $9.88 right now on the McD app.
In my area, the double quarter pounder meal is $10.39 and the Texas Roadhouse 12 oz strip is $27.99 (or $30.98 if you get it smothered in mushrooms like the image has).
It's almost 3x the price and doesn't include a beverage.
Probably if they're door dashing it. People that complain about the price of food while they're using door dash or Uber eats are a special kind of moron.
I can't imagine how bad that strip steak tastes from a bad restaurant and shipped to you in a plastic container. Steak is a pretty specific type of food where you should be eating it in the 5-15 minute window after it came off the grill.
There are better examples of this too. Take Chilis for example. That 3-for-me deal blows any McDonalds meal out of the water for less or about the same.
Yeah, but that same place is not going to charge $18 for a double quarter pounder meal at McDonalds. Those McD’s prices are like NYC or airport prices.
It takes a little bit of a stretch but it's not impossible.
I live in San Diego. I am referring specifically to the McDonald's location on Park Blvd near City College.
I am also choosing a large combo on purpose because I am actively trying to hit the number from the post.
It is $17.29 plus tax
There are affluent neighborhoods here where it could probably exceed $18.
Shit, not too long ago one of the kids wanted chicken strips from Popeye's and they were $17. I drove straight on through and the kids did not get chicken strips.
At the same time, I fully expect the price for a 12 oz New York strip at a nearby Texas Roadhouse to be much higher than $19.
EDIT: If it is any indication of anything, I looked up the prices for the Texas Roadhouse in El Cajon and, according to prices on a menu shared on Yelp, the 8 oz New York strip (that comes with two sides) is $19.99. I didn't see a 12 oz New York strip, but a 12 oz ribeye (and two sides) is $24.49. These meals do not include a drink nor the tip.
I have been cooking and eating more at home. That’s the only good thing that’s come out of Trump destroying the economy. My health is all the better for it
I cook every meal at home expect for pizza Friday night and we go out to eat Sundays. Other than that we don't eat fast food. We eat good too. Cooking your own meals is superior in every way. Just wish inflation would calm down at the grocery store
My partner and I are mostly living off beans and lentils we bought in bulk when things were slightly cheaper. We only really need to buy eggs, milk, tofu, and fresh veggies (with some meat thrown in when it’s on sale). It’s saved us a buttload, and we’ve never pooped so good in all our lives 😂
I can’t believe McDonalds is spending like a billion dollars or something to try and figure out how to bring their customers back… like dude, the answer is obvious - lower the prices.
I’m just glad they’re dying off. It’s not food. It’s processed paste and people are far better off not having it at all. Same goes for BK and Wendy’s tbh
Yeah, it’s $9 for me. The roadhouse price is higher, too, and I’d tip. So, at best, roadhouse is triple the price, and I have to sit in a Texas Roadhouse for any amount of time.
McDonald’s is experiencing a major U.S. sales and traffic decline driven by soaring menu prices, deal fatigue, and the loss of low-income customers.
Key Causes of the Decline
Price Inflation: Average menu prices jumped by roughly 40% between 2019 and 2024, far outpacing general U.S. food-price inflation and turning a traditional budget meal into a luxury for many households. [1, 2]
Low-Income Customer Drop-Off: Spending by households earning under $40,000–$50,000 annually has fallen sharply, resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars in lost quarterly revenue as these diners skip fast food or cook at home. [1, 2]
As a “higher earning demographic” (not a flex just according to their own brackets….. I’m never gonna go to McDonalds…. I go to innout (better and somehow cheaper) or a local burger spot (better, locally owned if maybe 10% more)
These fast food companies have lost the plot on why they exist.
Car makers are having a similar thing where they all are trying to “go upmarket”. Yah bro you are Mitsubishi…… it’s not happening.
Yeah I have a feeling this is going to blow up in their face. Just because higher demographics have more money doesn't mean they are okay spending more on something like fast food.
Is that gross profit adjusted for inflation? If 1 dollar of real intrinsic value 5 years ago is now 2 dollars then they could pull in the exact same amount of money as before but actually only earn half the value. The number go up, but the true value doesn't.
Sounds about right! Went grocery shopping 4 years ago. I noticed for the same $25 at McDonalds for my lady and I. If I go grocery shopping. With that same 25. I could buy bread, meat, cheese, chips, and a 12 pack of soda. Could have 4 sandwiches for the same price.
My partner and I would still be hungry also after McDonald's about 1 hour later. I sware they changed something to make you feel full but really arent
I just rewatched the old Bedazzled movie from 2000 with Brendan Fraser and Elizabeth Hurley the other day. There’s a pretty blatant product placement near the beginning where they place their order in San Francisco (which is even more bonkers when you hear the next part) for a Big Mac and a Large Coke.
The total? $3.47. Today that’d be over $12.
McDonald’s used to be so cheap that they made enough money to blatantly advertise in big budget Hollywood movies about how cheap their food is and ingrain themselves into the culture.
Guess they thought that that nostalgia and cultural appeal would carry them when they raised their prices - too bad their already crap food got to be utterly inedible at the same time
I mean, it's always cheaper to buy ingredients and make things yourself.
But yea, highly processed, carb and fat heavy foods will make you hungry not long after you eat. You initially feel full because your stomach is full, but the hormonal response to what you've eaten triggers you to want to eat more. It's basically an evolutionary adaptation to let you gorge on all the carbs and fat you need when it's present, because food used to be much more scarce.
I can't believe a household that brings in less than 50k doesn't like spending 40 bucks for mid food that is no longer served fast. Truly a shocking development. Anyway...... let's keep cutting costs and charging more to increase our margin.
That’s the main problem. No one likes less profit but they need to start considering keeping the ship afloat and taking less. The damage may have already been done and they’ve lost customers for life.
This is what being a public company incentivizes you to do (i.e., deliver earnings growth). That's what attracts investment and lines the pockets of both execs and shareholders. So, it's clear why execs do this.
What's especially distasteful here, is that those corporate execs will make out just fine, but the franchisees, managers, and employee's won't. Corporate gets to extract the value and move on, while everyone at the restaurant level eats the pain - even though they have limited power to change the policies that put McD in this mess.
Exactly the term is fiduciary responsibility. I'd argue it's not true free market capitalism because corporations can't truly have times that they reinvest into the company like privately owned ones do. The CEO of the privately owned company I worked for in 2008 took a yearly salary of 1 dollar while the economy was bad. That's something you don't see in publicly traded companies. The thing is that was his dad's and granddad's company and he cared deeply about keeping it afloat. He was living historically instead of just worrying about lining his pocketbook.
MBAs convinced the entire western business world that consistent profits are bad and only steadily increasing profits are good. And to manage this every large corporation has cannibalized the world to do so.
"Mid" is a charitable way to refer to McDonald's food. It's pretty much the lowest of the low. There are a couple of awful failing food court franchises that are worse, but every other restaurant is better.
In our rural town you have the expensive fast food & even more expensive restaurants. We unfortunately do not have chain restaurants, as our city council owns the fast food & other restaurants & effectively blocks anyone even remotely trying to bring in a chain restaurant. So it’s triple the fast food cost to eat at a restaurant, at the very least you’ll pay double here.
This is so infuriating that just a city council has this much power and is actively making their own community suffer so they get richer. Do you mind sharing what state youre in, if not, maybe the region? Like midwest or south?
I’m on the west side of the country. Not coast, but close. :)
Yes, it sucks. A friend of mine used all her savings to open a store (makeup originally, but did have a adult shop in another part of the business), the city council used laws (which if you knew our town & other stuff nearby, it would absolutely floor you) because of a church & school, to make her move her business. With a strip club & worse within blocks of her locations. Which unfortunately put her out of business, with all costs, loss of customers that did not know she had moved, etc.. She lost everything, she had worked so hard for over 10 years to save. It was fucking disgusting & sad.
It’s sad, just how they are with this trying to bring in new stuff & continues to make the same few families richer & richer.
A friend of mine was a minority owner of a brewery in a reasonably large city. 18 months into COVID, the municipal authority that was operating as their landlord doubled their rent. They had survived the worst of COVID, and were operating successfully, but the city was desperate for funds, so they doubled the rent. The brewery couldn't afford the rent increase.
From a rural county with a city of 19k population. Nothing has fucked that city over more than city counsel. Bullying new businesses, counsel owning large portions of property, corruption, kickbacks, etc etc. The big thing now is rehab centers. They’re putting rehabs in shitty homes and charging a fortune and counsel members are owning the property and getting the paperwork necessary to have a rehab, and are making hundreds of thousands of dollars a month in an area where the average income is less than $30k a year.
The FBI did an investigation into drugs and prostitution in the area, and they were quoted as saying if they arrested everyone involved there would be no one to run the city or work for it. Everyone. Judges, attorneys, first responders, city counsel, mayor, city manager and auditor and engineer, even a lot of large business owners, literally everyone. They get new blood in these positions and they still turn out like this. Thank God I left when I did
Learning to cook and survive with any ingredients is a blessing, also if your home soil is able to grow anything get seeds and have fun doing it. It’s rewarding. Fast food is all processed. I’m no saint, but it does help the wallet when eating vegetables grains and beans
Dude probably door dashed one and went to the actual restaurant for the other. Also depending on where you live prices change drastically. But I also agree these kind of posts are just dumb.
It is a lazy tax. My kid is working part time while going to college, and paid the tax once a week. In my mind it is a silly waste of money, but for them it is luxury.
And you’re expected to tip 20% so add an additional $5. Now you have a $31 steak without a drink compared to a $12 McDonalds meal. You’re also getting your McDs in 5 minutes instead of 90 minute dining experience in a restaurant.
Make a decision on what is the better option for you. Complain about the cost of fast food if you like. But I’m tired of all the bad faith arguments.
Any location charging that wouldn't be charging $19 for a steak dinner. Location DOES matter, but in this case, he's lying. Double QP meal is $10 here, and the NYstrip at Texas roadhouse is $26.
While I don't disagree that fast food prices are high, in DFW a dbl quarter pounder meal is about $11. Also around here a 12 oz New York strip with two sides at Texas Roadhouse is $26.
IDK where these particular locations are at...but the meal here in SATX is about 12/13 bucks iirc. I just had TX Roadhouse yesterday and remember that the 12oz was about 25 bucks...so you could get 2 full large double quarter pound meals for the price of that one steak with two sides. I get what they are trying to say, but the examples are way off base.
I had a Double quarter pounder combo last week for $11. And I love me some Texas Roadhouse but you're not gonna get 12 oz strip for $19 after the drink and tip.
I’m not saying prices aren’t terrible. But if you’re in a place where a quarter pounder meal is $18, then Texas Road House is not going to be only $19 for all of that. I literally just went to Roadhouse website in Tampa and that meal is $28 before tax
Gonna make me play Devil's Advocate today, huh Reddit?
I just looked this up in my area. A McDonald's Double Quarter Pounder with Medium Fries and fountain drink is $14.70. A 12oz New York Strip at Texas Roadhouse with 2 sides and drink costs $27.98 (Drink is $1.99, steak and sides are $25.99). 8oz with no drink is $19.99.
I hate McDonald's and would dine at a sit-down restaurant dumpster before choosing McDonald's, but McDonald's is still cheaper than a sit-down if someone was really that price conscious.
Yep, Ive found a little hibachi place nearby, nice full plates for $9.50. A chinese buffet for $12 (was $10 until recently sigh) and get this, an all you can eat sushi place for $15. I dont ever go to fast food any more.
Texas Roadhouse processes their own beef in house and buy in bulk when volatility is lowest. Every restaurant has butchers and thus saves a lot of overhead.
Don’t worry. We just have to pay Shaquille O’Neal 50 or so million dollars to be in one of our commercials. It’ll go viral and everyone will want a Shaqburger. Putting us back on top next quarter.
After quickly checking the website, the 12 oz strip is $24.99 PLUS extra upcharge for things like mushrooms, certain sides, etc. And where in the fuck is this McDonald's charging $18 for a quarter pounder meal? Notably that information wasn't included either.
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