No, it’s because they increased prices dramatically while both quality and food quantity were drastically reduced. Then gaslighted us again for noticing.
this post was submitted on 08 Aug 2025
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But also people can’t afford fast food.
Not at those prices, especially for what little value they offer.
For the price of their shitty 2 cheeseburger meal, I can get a really good burger and onion rings from Freddie's.
Freddie's is a lot more expensive than McDonald's in my area, though also much higher quality
$7 still gets you a large pepperoni at Little Caesars.
It sucks, true, but so does the Mcburnt ass you were about to eat. Twice the trash, half the cost.
$7 is a whole meal of rice, bean, beef stew and tortillas, cooked daily and fresh at most Hispanic supermarkets.
Laziness makes you eat shit. There are better options than fast food.
Always, but no one buying fast food is looking for better options. Addicted to slop.
I'd rather buy a frozen pizza, but anymore those are even getting more expensive than little Caesars. Even Red Baron is up to $4.50is depending where you go. I used to buy 5 of those fuckers for $10.
Not even going to beat around the bush on this, but the line must be made in the sand. Red Baron is based, decent humble pie. It does not suck. I frequently buy their brick oven crust supreme when I'm just not feelin cooking.
Same, red Baron has the single best pepperoni I've ever had. I have to be careful about snagging a frozen one, or two off before it goes in. Cause I've gone overboard before and left myself with like 4 'ronis for a whole pizza.
If i can go to a local bar and get a fresh made burger and fries with a regional beer for less than a big mac meal, shit is fucked up yo.
I wish this was true where I live.
Big Mac combo - $10.49 (sometimes 8.99 when they have coupons)
Any local pub ~ $14-$20 for burger and fries, $6-$8 for pint of beer, plus tip of course, which is never do at McDonald’s.
Low end uses mostly happy hour and special prices, high end is just normal prices
Let’s keep in context the size of their new Undersized "Big" Mac…
Also McDonalds thinks the pinnacle of the restaurant experience is signing up at a kiosk and coming to the window when they call your number. Uh yeah, I want my overpriced shit food to come to me the same way I get service at the DMV. Sign me the fuck up!
I’m of the opinion they intentionally made the kiosks shitty to encourage people to order in app. It’s a much better experience for the user, minus the data harvesting.
I refuse to install any fast food or restaurant apps.
Absolutely valid
The experience is made more shitty indeed to actually increase sales. It’s intentional design
No, it's because a Big Mac meal is the same price as an entrée at a better local restaurant.
Exactly. I can afford to eat at McDonald's, which now also means I can afford to eat somewhere with good food. So I do that.
To be fair, fast food prices have gone up so much, McDonald's now costs as much as most sit-down restaurants in my area. Why pay that much for shittier food?
No, the prices are just nuts. For like 5 dollars more, I could go to a decent sit-down restaurant with service and better/healthier food - while supporting locally-owned business. So I'll do that or cook for myself
There's that old adage about getting work done by a contractor: fast, cheap, good - pick any 2.
Fast food took off because it was fast and cheap. I could walk in, get a burger and fries for a couple bucks, and walk out five minutes later. It wasn't necessarily great food, but it was filling and vaguely nutritious.
A couple years ago I was on a road trip and decided to hit up a Burger King drive through. Ordered a whopper with cheese and (small or medium? I can't remember) fries. I was kinda expecting it to be about $12-15, and it was like $22. And then it took over half an hour for me to get my food.
Fast food is no longer fast, it's no longer cheap, and it never was very good. I can get a better experience and better food, faster and cheaper, from a local restaurant. Why would I ever do fast food again?
Sounds like McDonald’s problem to me.
I'm addicted to fast food, and McDonald's was a weekly thing, if not more often. But prices now are just crazy, and the quality is just slop. I've not had a McDonald's for over a month and I'm better off for it.
Okay this is a real question. I'm a huge fan of McDonald's's barbecue sauce. Does anyone know what style it is and what to get from a store that tastes like it? I don't like other fast food joints' barbeque sauce nearly as much, and there are so so many styles and flavors of it. Everybody says "original" and mean something different lol. So any guidance from McDonald's fans who also happen to be barbeque sauce aficionados is appreciated.
Look for “Kansas City” style sauce. It’s a tomato-molasses base with lots of vinegar. You can always add some apple cider vinegar to another style of BBQ sauce to increase the tang.
I was under the impression KC was sweeter and what most """normal""" BBQ sauce is, but if it's more vinegar then I'll check it out. Thanks!
Even with the app the prices are insane. Remember the dollar menu? Ancient history
39 cent tacos!!!
I stopped going when they doubled the price on everything. The food was never good but it was affordable.
Good. Fast. Cheap. Pick two.
That's the golden rule for a lot of industries, and fast food is no exception. For my entire life, it's been well known that this is not good food -- in the sense that most people realize it's unhealthy, processed, junk. So, these places basically have to deliver on the fast and cheap part.
Now, they've pretty much all given up on being cheap. Most of them are as expensive, or nearly as expensive, as a sit down restaurant with a server who comes to your table.
And based on nearly every fast food experience I've had in the past 5 or so years (which honestly isn't much), I don't even think they're really delivering on the promise of fast, compared to a typical sit down place of similar caliber food.
So, then when the working class, the bread and butter of the fast food industry, is getting economically squeezed to the brink, I suppose this isn't exactly all that surprising of an outcome. Fast food was for those nights when people were too busy working all day to prepare a meal for dinner, for a bite to each on your lunch hour when you forgot to pack something, or a quick stop while you're on a road trip. But think about how many people are out of work now (don't let the official unemployment numbers fool you). They aren't traveling, away from home during lunch, and they have way more time and much less money so dinner prep at home it is. And people who are gainfully employed with money to spare, they're going to non-fast food places because the food is better quality, about the same price, and usually just as fast or faster.
So where's that leave "fast" food? It's time to return to the core tenants (cheap & fast) or these places will likely continue to see declines.
Beans and rice cook really easy and are awesome foods.
Cause their shit is so expensive. I recognize I'm privileged enough that I don't need to always think about the specifics of food prices, but seriously, the price difference between fast food and sit down food is getting smaller and smaller, it's crazy.
Not only expensive but it’s just aweful.
Wasn’t nearly as bad when I was kid
Bad food and overpriced. Why would anyone choose that? Get bent, McDonald's. I hope you have to start closing locations.
McDonalds is more expensive than higher quality fast food. They're surviving on realestate locations and name recognition. Inn n out, sonic, chick-fil-a, Arby's, Taco Bueno. Even Wendys and Burger King.
Also their stuff is about nutritious as a cardboard Soufflé.
Time to bring back automats
Food that used to cost ten bucks at restaurants, like a year ago, now costs 20 bucks. I'm not eating out at all because fuck that.
Fucking fries are $5 for a large where I live. It is probably ten cents of product and thirty cents for labor, equipment, and oil. Their markup is absolutely insane.
They're overcharging, but the problem is that with labor costs increasing, they would still be overpriced if they cut back to a really low (>1%) margin. COVID killed going out. Being able to go back to the grocery store after the lockdowns killed ordering in.
The whole hospitality industry needs to be replaced. It's funny to watch it as it dies, though.
When they killed off the dollar menu is when they killed their business. Sheer momentum is all that's kept them going. Loudly supporting genocide didnt help.
For $15 I'm get a burger and fries literally anywhere else.