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Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

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Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#41

Post by skeeter2020 »

maerF0x0 wrote: post #2

I cant think of anything more definitionally anti-competitive than keeping mcflurry machines available so you can crush any DQ that pops up in your vicinity by fixing it ("oh whoops... it was unplugged!"), and then also crushing a business that aims to solve your problem to help serve customers better. Let's get the FTC on this, afaik it's illegal to advertise a product you have no intention of actually serving. eg:…

THis "theory" doesn't make any sense. It's the Franchisee who doesn't get the sales AND pays the huge cost for an official repair rep to come out and basically restart the cleaning cycle. This doesn't jive with crushing an upstart DQ; they're only really competitors in that they both sell "fast food". Ice cream @ a McD is a loss-leader (soft serve) or minor line item (McFlurrys) while it is the core product of DQ, despite their hot food offerrings.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#42

Post by JohnWhigham »

Kwastie wrote: post #10

This great (mini) YouTube documentary gives some background what lead up to the lawsuit. ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrDEtSlqJC4 )

Despite how fucking shitty YouTube has gotten, it's content like this that could never be available anywhere else on the Internet today for free.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#43

Post by mandelbrotwurst »

jaywalk wrote: post #11
maerF0x0 wrote: post #2

I cant think of anything more definitionally anti-competitive than keeping mcflurry machines available so you can crush any DQ that pops up in your vicinity by fixing it ("oh whoops... it was unplugged!"), and then also crushing a business that aims to solve your problem to help serve customers better. Let's get the FTC on this, afaik it's illegal to advertise a product you have no intention of actually serving. eg:…

And now that car dealer ads have to specify the exact car they're referring to (by VIN or stock number), that one car will often be the only one the amazing deal applies to and once it's gone, so is the deal. At least somebody can actually get that deal now, so it's better I guess.

It's additionally better because you now have the option to call and ask "Is the car from the ad still available and will you hold it for me until I arrive?"

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#44

Post by maerF0x0 »

cactus2093 wrote: post #19
bena wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The gist I'm getting is that McDonald's doesn't want to be in the ice cream/soft serve business. But it also doesn't want more competition than it already has. So every McDonald's has an ice cream machine as a more sort of "break glass in case of emergency" situation. Or in this case "in case of DQ". But if there is no DQ in the area, why operate the machine? Just have it be "broken". It's not like people have an opt…

> But if there is no DQ in the area, why operate the machine? Why operate the grill or fryer? To sell food and make money. Instead of selling someone a meal for $7 McDonalds can sell them a meal + a mcflurry for $10. Why wouldn't they want to do this? It doesn't make any sense that a bunch of franchise owners are all in together on some kind of ice cream conspiracy. Surely the truth is less interesting, it's most lik…

> a meal for $7 McDonalds can sell them a meal + a mcflurry for $10. Why wouldn't they want to do this?

you're assuming the consumer has a marginal $3 to spend and wouldnt instead spend $7 on a (burger + mcflurry) vs (Burger, fries, soft drink). I would guess that the latter has a much higher margin. So for the same $7 spend you can make more profit if your icecream machine is down.

But, if DQ can do the deal for $7 then foot traffic may move to DQ, meaning McD's loses _both_ profitable options. So, the game is to dissuade the market from the preferred package (burger + icecream) towards the more profitable package (burger , fries, softdrink) .

I'd also add that they probably know that the marginal cost of driving to 2 locations means they're just gonna get what they can at 1 stop. That is few people would buy the burger at mcdonald's and then drive to DQ for the mcBlizzard.

Kinda feels like playing roller coaster tycoon all over again.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#45

Post by bena »

cactus2093 wrote: post #19
bena wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The gist I'm getting is that McDonald's doesn't want to be in the ice cream/soft serve business. But it also doesn't want more competition than it already has. So every McDonald's has an ice cream machine as a more sort of "break glass in case of emergency" situation. Or in this case "in case of DQ". But if there is no DQ in the area, why operate the machine? Just have it be "broken". It's not like people have an opt…

> But if there is no DQ in the area, why operate the machine? Why operate the grill or fryer? To sell food and make money. Instead of selling someone a meal for $7 McDonalds can sell them a meal + a mcflurry for $10. Why wouldn't they want to do this? It doesn't make any sense that a bunch of franchise owners are all in together on some kind of ice cream conspiracy. Surely the truth is less interesting, it's most lik…

I'm not saying it is or isn't the real cause, I'm saying that's what I feel the OP was trying to convey. That's what I read in his comment.

And I agree with you, it's likely got a way more pedestrian and human answer. The machines require some amount of maintenance or repair that is simply annoying. And eventually, people prefer to not be annoyed. So maybe one day, you just let the ice cream machine be broken instead of doing the annoying thing. Even if the store sells ice cream like gangbusters. The guy slinging cones for minimum wage isn't seeing a single cent difference if he sells 1 or 1000.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#46

Post by dahart »

billbrown wrote: post #40
dahart wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pivot to what? Their product is focused on a specific niche market with a specific niche problem, and the entire market is being closed. Why not take a moon-shot stab at fighting for it, when the sentiment for people stuck with these machines seems to be wildly in their favor? From my armchair it seems plausible there could be a legal outcome in Kytch’s favor because the sale and lack of adequate maintenance of these…

The chances of winning are slim, appeals will take a very long time with considerable expense, and they'll have wasted time and energy that they could've spent on an _actual_ pivot. (I don't know if you've been through protracted litigation as a principal trying to recover damages but it is a long, expensive, and painful slog.) An actual pivot would be finding a different niche market for the device or tweaking the d…

Completely agree this could be high effort on Kytch’s part. I mean launching a successful business is super high effort too, so there’s already evidence they’re up for a high effort long term play.

I guess it’s not up to us to define what an “actual” pivot can look like. Certainly switching to a legal strategy is in fact a pivot from product development and traction metrics.

This new strategy doesn’t seem crazy to me, having tried to launch a business myself. I agree it’s a moon-shot, but again, it’s plausible that they do have a leg to stand on here due to the history of problems these machines have.

* edit BTW, I’d speculate wildly that there’s a very good chance Kytch was fully aware of the legal dangers of their plan, and went into the product development phase with eyes wide open in the first place. In addition to their plausible chances for success here, it’s also plausible that this legal fight was the expected outcome of their plan, and part of its design, long before it happened.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#47

Post by bena »

hammock wrote: post #28
penjelly wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

parents point is that operating the machines regularly is of no interest to mcdonalds (likely bad margins) and its only interested in ensuring other niche fast food restos dont start to take up market share instead. ie: if i want icecream i can get it at macdonalds, instead if DQ, unless the machines are broken. if DQ gains significant market share they "fix" the machines and DQ loses its market share. not saying thi…

Where is the evidence of such a strategy though, besides the fact that machines are always broken? Even the franchisees would rather have a working machine.

There is none, but "broken McDonald's ice cream machine" is a whole category of meme.

So people start wondering my McDonald's is so plagued by machines that seem to only work on the third Thursday following the fifth month after the Lunar eclipse.

But it's likely a combination of disinterested staff and machines that require more involved maintenance.

Not to mention, there's several points of failure. Not only can various parts of the machine break; the drum that spins the mix, the compressor to keep the mix cold, leaks in various hoses and lines, but you can simply run out of mix.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#48

Post by [deleted] »

ipaddr wrote: post #27
cactus2093 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But if there is no DQ in the area, why operate the machine? Why operate the grill or fryer? To sell food and make money. Instead of selling someone a meal for $7 McDonalds can sell them a meal + a mcflurry for $10. Why wouldn't they want to do this? It doesn't make any sense that a bunch of franchise owners are all in together on some kind of ice cream conspiracy. Surely the truth is less interesting, it's most lik…

The core point is it's not profitable or as profitable as other items. So ice cream is offered as a loss leader in areas with a DQ and turned off in areas without on but advertised nationally.

[deleted]

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#49

Post by notreallyserio »

skeeter2020 wrote: post #41
maerF0x0 wrote: post #2

I cant think of anything more definitionally anti-competitive than keeping mcflurry machines available so you can crush any DQ that pops up in your vicinity by fixing it ("oh whoops... it was unplugged!"), and then also crushing a business that aims to solve your problem to help serve customers better. Let's get the FTC on this, afaik it's illegal to advertise a product you have no intention of actually serving. eg:…

THis "theory" doesn't make any sense. It's the Franchisee who doesn't get the sales AND pays the huge cost for an official repair rep to come out and basically restart the cleaning cycle. This doesn't jive with crushing an upstart DQ; they're only really competitors in that they both sell "fast food". Ice cream @ a McD is a loss-leader (soft serve) or minor line item (McFlurrys) while it is the core product of DQ, de…

> Ice cream @ a McD is a loss-leader (soft serve) or minor line item (McFlurrys) while it is the core product of DQ, despite their hot food offerrings.

IMO this is actually the point being made. There's no need to run a loss leader if the competition doesn't exist.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#50

Post by runnerup »

tfvlrue wrote: post #26

I've been following this story for a while. When people say the soft serve machine is "broken", they really mean "unavailable to serve ice cream to customers". That could mean something as innocuous as performing a pasteurization cycle during the day (because it failed to run at night for some reason, perhaps the machine's clock is set wrong). It could also mean there is a physical problem with some part of the machi…

Also it can mean that the first half of the lunch rush used up all the frozen ice cream and it can’t freeze new ice cream instantly. So the later part of a rush period will often have unacceptable soft ice cream.

When I ran frozen daiquiri machines it took a lot of finesse to make it through a busy night. Have to constantly manage the temperatures and levels to a nearly absurd precision while doing the rest of your job as well. But the only parameters you can manipulate are material input and material output, there’s no “freeze it faster” button or “store it colder” dial.

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