So, I never visit McDonald’s. Oddly, I have managed to visit them twice this year. Once a month ago while traveling and it just worked out that it made the most sense when we stopped for fuel while traveling.
And second last night. We were at the lake late and coming home just before 9pm. Most non chain places were closing, and the only local spot open was McDonald’s. Had the whole family including my visiting parents.
The experience was pretty awful. First, they had 3 employees in the building, and the expectation was that you use the Kiosk. I didn’t have ‘strong’ opinions of having to use it vs. speaking to a human. However after ordering 4 meals on it, it is quite the nightmare for the casual visitor. Probably took 4x as long to order our food.
My parents took their order on a second Kiosk and were not even able to complete their order (Parents are in their mid 70s). Not sure what happened, I wasn’t watching them. My dad was quite irritated at this point.
After asking one of the humans multiple times for help, he took their order at the register.
<insert 30 minute wait for food>
Our food was placed in their pickup area in bags with napkins (store napkin holder empty). Nearly every burger was overcooked and quite dry. Both my buns were hard. The fry’s were luke warm and not very fresh. The meal for 2 adults and 2 14yos was $40 bux.
I saw a story on Lemmy last week about how McDonald’s profits were down and the general consensus was that it was the over priced food. While I’m sure that has an impact I believe the Kiosk, slow ‘fast food’ and overall experience has to be a huge negative.
My parents were PISSED, and they are historically huge McD Patrons. At least in their case, the price will not be why they do not return. Its the awful experience.
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We are a long time away from the hamburger rap by Tai Mai Shu
Skill issue.
I like the kiosks and haven’t really received lukewarm fries, but the food IS overpriced, isn’t as fast as fast food should be, and quite often they mess up the order too.
I’m sure if you used the kiosk often you could learn it. I struggled to just order a 1/4 pounder meal. It wasn’t showing me combos.
But i don’t have any desire to learn it or visit McDonald’s :)
I hate the kiosks. But, they are money makers.
As much as I agree that they create shitty experience, they generate so much more dollars per order than having a human take the order that they are never going to leave.
Not that I was there to begin with, but they 100% will push my parents out of there as they do not want to deal with them. I would think their primary long term customers were boomers, and they’re gonna reject Kiosks.
The kiosks are basically what keeps them afloat. All other fast food places are following suit due to their overwhelming financial success.
McDonald’s has been on a really steep decline for the last few years, it seems. They used to be tolerable; they weren’t the best fast food around, but they also weren’t the worst, and were generally a pretty good deal for your money. The last few times I’ve gone, the prices have been higher than the time before, and the quality lower than before.
The last time I went was nearly a year ago; my food was cold and my shake was melted, and it was nearly $20 for just one person. There’s just no reason to go back.
All fast food has been racing each other to total enshitification. I used to each so much taco bell, it was never good, but decent enough for the price. I had one of the large brown bags almost completely full of fire sauce. I haven’t gone in probably a year because their food got blander and more expensive. It feels like everything is just made from nutrient paste but made to look like foods that existed in the old world.
Honestly, it’s 9pm so unless the store is 24 hours (and even if it is) then they’ll be trying to close down a clean up and get things ready for the morning shift which starts early.
When I worked at McDs years ago a few big orders deciding to sit in the restaurant around 9pm could mean the difference between getting to go home at 12:30 and getting an OK nights sleep vs getting to go home at 2:30 and getting a terrible nights sleep before they might have to come in at 10am the next day.
You could argue that if they didn’t want customers at that time then they shouldn’t be open - which I would agree with - but obviously the low level grunts making your food don’t get to make those decisions.
It appears they close at midnight, and we got there just before 9pm
Too late then, I’m afraid you got the crew who were more concerned about getting home at a slightly more healthy hour than giving you fresh food.
Never go in to any restaurant past 9pm unless it’s in a busy metro area and there are other people about or you are getting food that caters to drunk and high people that can be taken away.
What? 3 hours before they close is late?
Nearly every burger was overcooked and quite dry.
I get stuck eating at McD once every month or two because of food deserts, and I would say it’s a borderline miracle if any of your burgers weren’t over cooked. They’re cooked from frozen on, basically, a giant panini press. And no one checks them, they just cook to until the machine dings… if there’s someone available to do anything about the ding, that is.
They’re cooked from frozen on, basically,
They are literally taken right out of the freezer and put onto the grill.
McDonalds doesn’t even use auto-lifters on the deep-fryer baskets either right?
The little bit of past kitchen work I’ve done (in a different restaurant), there were rails/actuators that would lift the baskets out of the oil when the timer went off; but I’ve never seen them in a McDs before. Much easier to overcook stuff.
It’s been a while since I’ve done kitchen work but I’ve never had an automatic lifter. We just had someone being paid to cook food and watch the fryer. The issues start piling up in places that make the cashier handle front, drive-thru, fryer, whatever else all at once rather than pay an extra $150 in labor for the day.
As of a few years ago at least, still no auto-lifters in the McD kitchens in my area.
While I’ve almost always read bad online reviews for McDonalds in the US, I think the experience might differ a lot in other places around the world, for context on what I’m about to write and why I think many people think the price is the worst offender.
Believe it or not, I’ve always had a good experience at any McDonalds I went to service wise. Over on this side of the pond they’re seen much more positively in general, I think. Their food is pretty good by fast food standards, and it’s way more consistent quality wise than pretty much every other fast food place. In the last few years they’ve also turned most of their restaurants from the typical fast food restaurant decor to cozier and actually comfortable places to hang out in, which is pretty cool.
BUT, the prices just don’t make much sense anymore. The price for a basic menu is currently near the price point of an actual restaurant meal. At shopping centers over here there’s usually always a couple of “somewhat fast” local food restaurants - I don’t know what to call them, kind of an in between between what you would call fast food and what you would expect from a “slow” fancier restaurant - and it’s actually become cheaper to get a normal menu there than at McDonalds. The one big attractive of McDonalds and fast food in general used to be price - but if it’s currently cheaper to get a full plate of great much better food, why would I ever go to McDonalds unless I’m really in a hurry? They seem to be counting on people still going there out of habit, but I think there’s not nearly as much of a fast food culture here, so I’ve started noticing that McDonalds around me have much fewer attendance than they used to.
McDonalds in developed nations such as East Asia or Western Europe will generally taste much better for the same relative cost.
This is because the US has much, much weaker food regulations than other developed countries and allows all kinds of additives, treatments, and substitutions that are straight up banned in other nations.
This is why Americans tend to rave about the food whenever they travel internationally. Like, no sweetie, your country just allows businesses to feed you carcinogenic slop for luxury prices.
You know, that’s a good point.
I spent a couple years living in Australia: The McDonalds’ over there uses local Australian grass fed beef for all of its burgers and they were honestly delicious.
Moved back to Canada though and the McDs over here is just abysmal. I’d feel bad giving it to a stray dog…
It definitely varies region to region.
Had McDonald’s chicken nuggets in Canada a while back. They were made of real chicken. I’m jealous that Canada gets real food.
Well, in all fairness all food prices have gone up, and 4 of us cannot eat for $40 at a non fast food joint.
I am not surprised the service outside the US is better where labor laws are likely also better.
I don’t know what to call them, kind of an in between between what you would call fast food and what you would expect from a “slow” fancier restaurant
Fast casual? Typical chains considered to be “fast casual” are Chipotle and Five Guys. A local taco/burrito/burger/sandwich place would probably fall in that category.
The icecream and salad are fine at McD, but the rest of their so called food has always been awful to my taste. The fries taste like cardboard and the buns taste like Styrofoam. The feeling in my stomach told me, that this cannot be called food.
Drive through is always prioritized way over orders inside
McDonald’s has been on the decline since I worked there 13 years ago. What you’re reporting as dry and overcooked is actually food that has been hot held long past the time it should have been thrown out. You can’t even get a burger patty that has been cooked within the past two hours most of the time unless you’re there during peak times.
As an ex McDicks employee the mistake is going into mcdonalds at the end of the night. Past 7pm things slow down and employees start heading home. And drive thru ordering is always prioritized over in store orders.
If you want good McDonalds show up in the lunch/dinner rush, all other times they’re running low on staff, and the food has sat in their warmers for eons. It’s also kind luck of the draw on if you get the employees that have 3 brain cells. Sometimes you’ll show up late when the non nose pickers are there and actually get good food. Other times you’ll get there and spend 10 minutes staring at a guy picking his nose looking at his phone instead of grabbing the food and putting it into the bag.
If you want good McDonalds show up in the lunch/dinner rush
Imagine this being said 10-20 years ago…
WTF is happening if America can’t even put out cheap AND consistent goy slop for the peasants?
That was my experience 10 years ago. Nothing has really changed other than prices going up. They’ve made some changes to improve the quality of their items a little. But it’s still McDonals which pays minimum wage which means minimum effort.
I just looked to confirm. They close at midnight and it was just before 9pm.
I don’t like the kiosks at all and it seems like the service is slower when you use them. It’s like no employee feels responsible for your order. The food can be good, the biggest variation I usually see is in the fries, sometimes they are hot and fresh and other times you can tell they’ve sat for a while.
Remember when everyone was so upset about losing Brazilian rain forest? Turns out we’d all rather have Big Macs.
I didn’t but everyone else thought it made sense. I’d have rather gone home and eaten a sandwich
The McDonalds in my area is pretty amazing (Silverthorne CO). There’s always like 10 employees and it just hums in there. I only ever order from the app; I get a large fries no salt and a large unsweetened iced tea for $2. The fries are always fresh (no salt is key) and they are ready within a minute of me walking in the door.
As a fry jockey. Fuck you. I make all fries fresh to order but all you assholes online just tell people to order no salt fries to be “fresh” it might work at McDonald’s but lemme tell you where I work a no salt fry is made at my convenience and set aside because making a no salt fry means WIPING DOWN EVERYTHING COVERED IN SALT It is not a “hack” eveywhere.
Every other goddamn online order is “no salt” but also extra cheese, double bacon, extra pickle. It slows things down so much I’m actually trying to get no salts for online orders banned.
Hey friend, sorry about that, but there’s just way too much on them otherwise. I end up wiping them down with a napkin and giving up after a handful if they have the typical amount of salt on them—I don’t know how people do it
If you just want less salt I forgive you. If you are trying a fast food hack to get fresh fries when you would have gotten fresh fries anyway then that’s what makes my blood boil
Appreciate the comment! That said, I’m not looking to find ways to better my McDonald’s experience here :)
I just need to build that time since I was at McDonald’s back up. I wanted to vent after seeing the story about price likely causing their 1/4 results. I think there’s more to it.
It has to cost them more than $2 in materials and time for my order; I’m slowly putting them out of business ;p
