Will some fast food chains become the next Blockbuster?

[Rome's rightful successor]

I miss the older interior design. Now they've gone "corporate hipster" like seemingly all other fast food chains.

Back in the day, fast food restaurants had unique looks. Now, they pretty much look the same: like office spaces.

Not even like office spaces but more like cold sterile apple store interiors.

 

[PhoBingas]

I don't think we'll see any big corpo places go under. MAYBE smaller chains like Long John Silver's, but what we're more likely to see is more of the smaller, independent places go under because they don't have corporate backing.

 

[Agent Abe Caprine]

Arby's. Their roast beef sandwich actually taste like vomit.

The buffalo chicken sandwich is surprisingly decent. I like to get that and jalapeno poppers when I'm there. I'll be sad when I can't get this abomination of an order.

 

[POWER IN MISERY]

I stopped going to Subway when they stopped accepting coupons I would get in the mail. Their stores are suffering so bad they can't even afford $2 off a sandwich.

is that a subway thing or a subway ran by evil indians thing? i've had times where they try to not take my coupon but then accept it anyway after telling them that if that's the case i'm not paying for the food

 

[Scarlett Johansson]

McDonald's no
Burger King no
Wendy's no
Arby's no

The rest? Probably. I'm surprised Subway wasn't murdered after the Jared shit happened.

 

[pyrogon]

McDonald's no
Burger King no
Wendy's no
Arby's no

The rest? Probably. I'm surprised Subway wasn't murdered after the Jared shit happened.

It survived because the 5 dollar foot long was a good deal. However now I don't see the point when an 11 inch sub costs 11 dollars and a full 13 inch publix sub costs 8 dollars. Subway is the most expensive sandwich shop anywhere now and what you get is undercooked bread made of nothing but sugar and the saddest, thinnest slices of meat they can physically cut.

 

[Scarlett Johansson]

I still remember how fun the Phantom Menace marketing was. KFC, Taco Bell, and Pizza Hut really hit the mark. Now they don't do these things anymore and it kind of sad. I even remember the different Pepsi cans with different characters on them.

 

[Mrs. Sai Moon]

McDonalds. It's supposed to be cheap slop but here in aus it's expensive slop. I'd rather buy Hungry Jacks because the burgers are better at Hungry Jacks.

 

[Xarpho's Return]

I rad about the current issue with a lot of big food chains and it reminds me of a famous diagram relating to Blockbuster, which goes basically like:
Sales go down -> Management cuts back on quality and appearance -> Customers don't want to go because lower quality and looks -> Sales go down.

Which happened to Blockbuster and now the chain is basically dead besides few location working off nostalgia. It probably won't happen to McDonalds but can very well happen to the other chains that didn't spread globally.

Nah. The one thing that everyone forgets about Blockbuster is that from 1994 to 2004, basically the peak of the company, is that it was owned by Viacom and when it was spun out, Blockbuster had to shoulder the debt to pay off Viacom shareholders, which was a billion dollars. There wasn't a way for them to really the grow the business after that.

The only similarity between Blockbuster and fast foods is that many of them were franchised, which is how the Bend, Oregon store escaped closure, as do a number of other fast food and similar franchises do. Almost every major fast food chain (and a few minor ones too) from the 1970s and 1980s have at least one operational restaurant out there (notably with the exception of Burger Chef, with Imasco working hard to eliminate the chain), and most of the franchisee failures had less to do with bad food and more the parent company completely screwing them over.

They'll keep this trajectory up for another few years and they'll go bankrupt.

They still have 20k locations. At that rate it will take decades for them to start becoming really rare.

What does mcdicks offer? Food is meh. Options are limited. Dining in experience is shit, prices aren't much cheaper than elsewhere. All it really has is drive-throughs and decent parking, only convenience and location, That really doesn't matter in a world with delivery apps, now everywhere is just as convenient.

Like I said I dunno how it is in the US but anywhere large enough to have a mcdicks here will probably also have 40-50 independent places offering delivery.

McDonald's Corporation is absolutely globohomo but they're safe corporate-wise because of the vast land they own underneath the stores. They could fuck over everybody as they cash in on the land value and run off.

That's because they're a money laundering operation for a major marijuana operation called the Cornbread Mafia.

Maybe. This is an article from 20 years ago.

 

[Rudy Coleman]

Nigga is you gonna give it back?

 

[31 Black]

is that a subway thing or a subway ran by evil indians thing? i've had times where they try to not take my coupon but then accept it anyway after telling them that if that's the case i'm not paying for the food

I think it was just the area I lived in because the cost of living was so high (thanks forced minimum wage increases!). There were signs in the door saying "Sorry, we can't take your coupons due to increased costs get fucked faggots lel" in multiple towns within a 15-20 mile radius of where I lived, and not every town was full of pajeets and pakis.

 

[Ravier Xavenblood]

So $5 foot-longs are a thing of the past? Lame.

They went away before Covid too. And with that, so did Subways main selling point. Sure they got the meatball sub, but so does Firehouse and theirs is better.

 

[POWER IN MISERY]

I think it was just the area I lived in because the cost of living was so high (thanks forced minimum wage increases!). There were signs in the door saying "Sorry, we can't take your coupons due to increased costs get fucked faggots lel" in multiple towns within a 15-20 mile radius of where I lived, and not every town was full of pajeets and pakis.

it's been over five years since i've actually been in a subway but i've never been to one that wasn't ran by marginally hostile third world gypsies. subway being one of the cheapest franchises to open might have something to do with it. i hope with all my heart that every shit ass fast food spot made for welfare retards go extinct. there's no other way for the healing to start.

 

[Xarpho's Return]

They went away before Covid too. And with that, so did Subways main selling point. Sure they got the meatball sub, but so does Firehouse and theirs is better.

The franchisees complained about the $5 foot longs, partly because it was an unsustainable idea. With discounted items, you try to steer people to the more profitable items and upsells. Chipotle does this with things like guacamole, but at Subway they never had that outside of a few occasional promotional runs. So there was no way to increase profit with smearing your sandwich with guacamole for an additional dollar.

The unique thing about Subway among other modern fast food restaurants is that they were 100% franchised. I honestly think that corporate has no real idea how to run a restaurant or what consumers want.

I think it was just before the fiasco with Jared that they changed their ham to have no artificial flavors/colors (General Mills was experimenting with the same sort of thing with the bad Trix, etc.); the new ham slices were noticeably smaller. My Subway experience is tainted by the fact that I worked there and know of the franchise first-hand; I've briefly described some of the stuff here.

They stopped opening stores a decade ago and at least one closed due to COVID but if that particular franchise imploded I could finally die happy.

 

[Enig]

Rax is one of them now, if my info digging’s right the pandemic caused every one of the final five but the IL place to shut down leaving it the last Rax in existence.

 

[PrimeRadiant]

McDonald's Corporation is absolutely globohomo but they're safe corporate-wise because of the vast land they own underneath the stores. They could fuck over everybody as they cash in on the land value and run off.

Their real business is indeed real estate

 

[Xarpho's Return]

Their real business is indeed real estate

The irony is Harry (((Sonneborn))) ended up having a major falling out with Ray Kroc in the 1960s and sold his shares instead of accumulating value.

 

[Sugriva]

Also, want to know how to win an easy lawsuit with Subway?
Their tuna is 99% pork + beef, there's no fish in it.
Get a tuna sandwich, then sue them because you are Muslim and they gave you pork while pretending it's fish.

I call bullshit. Beef and pork is more expensive than shitty tuna.

 

[There She Glows]

I asked somebody why they eat McDonald's at current prices and they said they have "the app" which cuts the pricing down to more normal levels. So my theory is that McDonald's is making a decent supplemental profit selling the user data of neighbor cattle who use the app. Probably true of other fast food chains as well but I wouldn't know.

 

[Xarpho's Return]

Also, want to know how to win an easy lawsuit with Subway?
Their tuna is 99% pork + beef, there's no fish in it.
Get a tuna sandwich, then sue them because you are Muslim and they gave you pork while pretending it's fish.

There is no way Subway tuna is pork, partly because pork and beef cost a lot more than tuna. The tuna is mixed with an excessive amount of mayonnaise sure, and the quality is marginally better than cat food, but come on.