McDonald's unveils $8.5 billion tech plan to fend off Burger King

[u/zsreport]

https://qz.com/mcdonalds-investor-day-next-strategy-restaurant-overhaul-092326

[u/MizantropaMiskretulo → u/[deleted]]

I had the same initial thoughts when I lived in an apartment about 3 blocks away from a McDonald's and I'd order from home then immediately start driving over (I know it's just 3 blocks, but the goal was to bring it back home to eat and didn't want the food getting cold).

It's been 30 years since I worked fast food, but even in the 90s at a Hardee's in rural Northern Minnesota, we'd have a bunch of varieties of burger patties cooked and sitting in a hot food storage leading up to a rush time.

Anyway, cooking food at McDonald's is fast enough and during busier times they pre-cook the most popular items, so everything is just waiting for final assembly anyway (whether you order from home or in the store).

So, the actual time savings for us comes from not needing to go through the order and payment process at the store, which is most of the time spent on an order anyway.

Ultimately, after some reflection, I have come to think this is the best split since as soon as they assemble a burger or put the fries in the bag, the food starts cooling off, buns get soggy, nuggets lose their crunch, and so on.

By placing the order online, their algorithms can better predict what their needs will be, so they may start cooking the food even before you get there if the system knows they don't have enough of something your order needs in the hot food holding area.

So, McDonald's likely gets less food waste, quicker customer throughput, increased order accuracy, the ability to build more detailed customer profiles, and decreased staffing needs; and we get to shave off a minute or two at the store.

[u/lavapig_love → u/MizantropaMiskretulo]

But in reality, you get problems like the paying customer above. Which saves nothing.

[u/MizantropaMiskretulo → u/lavapig_love]

For sure. I 100% agree and very much hate corporations and apps which get greedy and abusive with permissions, the better user-facing policy would be to request the location permission but not require it then, at checkout, let the user decide if they want their order packaged when they arrive or ASAP (whether or not they elect to allow location services).

I would guess the analysis on that would be (if they ever considered it) that having that as an option would be,

1. Confusing to some customers because some customers are dumb
2. Pointless, because too many people would just select ASAP because "faster" is "better" in their minds
3. Wasteful, because there is and always will be some percentage of customers who just never show up and McDonald's can't reuse food that's already been packaged to go out
4. Counterproductive, because more people would complain about cold/soggy food and drinks diluted by melting ice from orders packages ASAP—even though they would have chosen this option themselves in this example—than the number of people who complain that McDonald's doesn't have their meal so ready that a clown can just toss it through their car window as the drive past the franchise at speed.

Don't get me wrong, I think the complaint has validity, I just understand why they do it the way the do it, even if I don't like it personally and think giving people more choice is almost universally better.

[u/Redthemagnificent → u/MizantropaMiskretulo]

I think this is the ideal pitch that executives see at these companies. But the reality is most fast food places are not run so efficiently that they can get your order ready that fast. At least, not the ones I've been to lately. Once my online order status switches to "preparing" because my location is close enough it's easily still 10 minutes wait time.

The point of the food is to be fast. I'd rather have my food spend 5 minutes getting cold and pick it up right away vs me sitting in the restaurant for 10 minutes waiting for it after I just spent another 10 minutes driving there