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McDonald's is losing its low-income customers

latimes.com

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Re: McDonald's is losing its low-income customers

#501

Post by quickthrowman »

f1shy wrote: post #72
FerretFred wrote: post #21

I can only speak for the UK but for quite a while now, McD's has become an uninviting experience, with miserable staff, menu screens that visibly tell you to hurry the f*k up and choose the product. Not to mention customers vying with delivery drivers for orders. I think the problem applies to all-income customers.

My experience is that quality in McD is rapidly declining. We may agree was never a Michelin star restaurant. But I remember being more or leas enjoying the food. Now I just can’t. Maybe I’m getting older. But I would swear the quality is much worse now than say 5 or 10 years ago.

McDonalds tastes the same as it always has. Food consistency is what they excel at, along with owning valuable real estate.

Also, the quality of a fast food restaurant (cleanliness and service) is directly correlated to the median income of the area it is in. Wealthy suburbs will have much cleaner restaurants than inner city restaurants from the same chain.

Re: McDonald's is losing its low-income customers

#502

Post by [deleted] »

heavyset_go wrote: post #452
silisili wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's pretty hilarious because your comment is exactly their goal. McDonald's is laser focused on low income customers. They do not want to compete in the middle income space, as they don't visit as often and there's ton more(and better) competition. Their CEO has been blunt about this recently, and trying to find ways to get low-income customers back. Dire straits ahead for them, they've priced themselves into a plac…

> McDonald's is laser focused on low income customers. Like some other fast food restaurants, they're desperately trying to be thought of as being Starbucks tier, with Starbucks prices, trappings, etc. It's like Taco Bell desperately trying to be thought of as Chipotle tier, with Chipotle level prices and trappings. Like McDonald's, they significantly raised their prices without any quality improvements to justify it…

[deleted]

Re: McDonald's is losing its low-income customers

#503

Post by kelipso »

_heimdall wrote: post #438
ac29 wrote: post #423

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didnt vote one way or another but its odd to compare the cost of meat to the cost of produce. Far different calorie density and nutritional profile. Maybe your point is that you spend about as much on meat as you do on produce, but that depends on your specific diet since they are not equivalent food groups.

The prior comments were discussing the cost of healthy meals. Calories aren't a good measure of anything beyond burning your food. Unless your body works similar to a steam engine, it really doesn't matter how much energy you can put into water by setting your food on fire. My point was simply that I spend roughly the cost of quality meat in my area is on par with or cheaper than quality produce given what I need to…

Also, no offense to anyone, but hearing that you should eat lentils and beans as the main for a healthy meal is as appealing as hearing you should eat only cardboard for a healthy meal.

Re: McDonald's is losing its low-income customers

#504

Post by quickthrowman »

stego-tech wrote: post #44

These articles deliberately skew reality to fit an anti-worker narrative. All the focus is on costs of labor and materials, with not one single sentence devoted to McDonald’s own financials - like the growth of their margins, the share buybacks performed, the executive compensation, or the franchising model itself. When I was rallying for a higher minimum wage and was challenged on it driving up costs, I made it abun…

McDonalds is just a real estate investment trust that happens to sell hamburgers. The business model is ‘rent high value land for a profit while racking up unrealized gains on the land and ensure a steady stream of rents by selling franchisees supplies that they can sell to make sure they can pay their rent.’ Take a look at the sorts of parcels McDonalds acquires, usually multiple acres in busy commercial areas.

In an ideal world, they’d be a restaurant company, but it’s just a real estate company with extra steps.

I agree that minimum wage should be higher!

Re: McDonald's is losing its low-income customers

#505

Post by phendrenad2 »

stego-tech wrote: post #44

These articles deliberately skew reality to fit an anti-worker narrative. All the focus is on costs of labor and materials, with not one single sentence devoted to McDonald’s own financials - like the growth of their margins, the share buybacks performed, the executive compensation, or the franchising model itself. When I was rallying for a higher minimum wage and was challenged on it driving up costs, I made it abun…

> growth of their margins

Are you going to mention what these margins go to?

Re: McDonald's is losing its low-income customers

#506

Post by jaybrendansmith »

GOD_Over_Djinn wrote: post #350
jaybrendansmith wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand why people still blame the lockdowns. When the lockdowns started, it was unknown how dangerous Covid actually was. It could have killed 20%, or reduced lifespan by 30%, or something. Nobody knew. It takes 20/20 hindsight to blame lockdowns for what was a generational catastrophe. It's like blaming shelter in place requirements instead of the bombing of the reich.

Some, including myself, were against lockdowns from day 1, and were viciously attacked for it.

But you must admit it was a gamble at the time. My mother got Covid early, before lockdowns. She spent a week in the hospital and almost died. She then had a stroke, she can no longer walk. She also got cancer, and now can barely talk. Please don't tell me it was not deadly dangerous to older folks. If the bird flu comes, and with it a mortality rate of 50%, and there is a vaccine, everybody will be locked down and forced to take the vaccine. It wont matter what anybody's opinions are about the possible harmful effects of lockdowns or vaccines.

Re: McDonald's is losing its low-income customers

#507

Post by intalentive »

bragh wrote: post #229
whiplash451 wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Genuine question: do you think that the lockdowns had such long-lasting effect on people as to explain the problems described above? Why would a few months of a “bad idea” induce decade-long changes?

It wasn't a few months, it was a few years of back-and-forth political and corporate shenanigans with a new narrative every few months that the $CURRENT_THING crowd happily ran along with. January 2020: there is nothing to afraid of, the new disease is mostly harmless and affects only the elderly and immunocompromised. Closing down borders is xenophobic. March 2020: do not go outside unless critically necessary and i…

You summed it up nicely. Suggests that the people in power are really just flying by the seat of their pants.

Re: McDonald's is losing its low-income customers

#508

Post by BeFlatXIII »

diogenescynic wrote: post #381
rootusrootus wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I certainly got tired of the people who decided the answer was to become antisocial and not even try to mitigate the risks, and then shame anyone who did. Lost a bit of my faith in humanity. Well, more than a bit, I think.

>I certainly got tired of the people who decided the answer was to become antisocial and not even try to mitigate the risks, and then shame anyone who did. Lost a bit of my faith in humanity. Well, more than a bit, I think. The masks didn't do shit and neither did vaccinations. It was all scaremongering. Don't you get it? Israel had nearly 100% vaccination rate but didn't do any better than Gaza which had none. Masks…

Citation needed.

Re: McDonald's is losing its low-income customers

#509

Post by [deleted] »

hackable_sand wrote: post #480
johnisgood wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are such restaurants around here in Europe but they are super expensive, so you are better off doing it on your own at home. Cooking a stew of lentils or any other legumes is very easy and does not consume that much time either, and you can cook for 3 days easily. Why are people not doing this?

People are doing this. Where did you get the impression that people stopped cooking homemade meals?

[deleted]

Re: McDonald's is losing its low-income customers

#510

Post by nawgz »

jameslk wrote: post #332
skinnymuch wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then why are profit margins bigger? Supply and demand as the reason for profit percentage increasing margin makes no sense. I’d be interested in how you’d debate that.

> Supply and demand as the reason for profit percentage increasing margin makes no sense. I’d be interested in how you’d debate that. That was never my argument. The commenter I responded to edited his comment to add those points after I replied. This was his comment before: > Companies cannot set prices arbitrarily [Source required]

That is pretty obvious from where it says “Edit:”, what isn’t obvious is how Supply and Demand prevents companies from setting prices arbitrarily. Which is and always was what your comment said.
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