An $18 Big Mac meal sparked a revolt against high prices. Companies are finally listening
Many people believe it’s an astounding $18 after a post on X of McDonald’s menu prices at a rest stop in Connecticut went viral and made national headlines. (Narrator voice: It’s not.)
Now, almost a year after the post, a top McDonald’s executive wants to set the record straight. In a recent letter, Joe Erlinger, president of McDonald’s USA, said $18 for a Big Mac combo was the “exception” and not the norm across all 13,700 restaurants in the country.
The average price of a Big Mac in the US was $4.39 in 2019,” Erlinger said in his recent letter. “Despite a global pandemic and historic rises in supply chain costs, wages and other inflationary pressures in the years that followed, the average cost is now $5.29. That’s an increase of 21% (not 100%),” he added.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/25/business/outrage-usd18-big-mac-consumer-revolt/index.htmlOpen linkView original on lemmy.world
Until these assholes stop taking in record profits each year & their ceos get more money than some countries generate they can fuck off on saying wages are a problem. The working poor deserve every penny they can get.
Agree. None of these CEOs have any groundbreaking ideas either. It's all the same strategies for short term profits rather than longer sustainable growth.
They’re paid in stock, so line must go up because MONEY.
That’s just it, as a business owner, some years may be good, and some years may be bad.
So some years your profit should be less.
That doesn’t mean you’re going under. Less profit is still profit. That means everyone (including yourself) has been paid and you have money left over.
But because CEOs are paid mostly in stock, the profits have to rise every year, for no necessary reason besides “I like money”
And eventually that’ll break, and it’ll happen all at once.
Did anyone else feel like this article just reads like an ad for their new value menu?
Yes. There should probably be some sort of disclaimer about how much Rotten Rons paid for this incredibly in-depth reporting.
They're scared. Continue to avoid McDonald's and they'll keep lowering prices. We have the power because we have the money they want and can choose where to spend it.
With the way things are going for the lower and middle classes, that’s a bold statement..
I see what you're saying but the fact is any money we have is the money these types of companies are after, they're not expecting rich people to keep McDonald's afloat. They're relying on commuters in a hurry, busy moms with whiny toddlers, people too tired after a day of work to cook for themselves etc. Voting with those dollars, however limited they may be, is the most powerful form of influence the lower class has.
I've been doing my part for over 15 years now.
I've only had to go 2 or 3 times on roadtrips when they were literally the only option, always late at night.
Excellent! I used to go there a lot until I got tired of overpaying
I would admit I used to get McDonald's quite a bit for lunch because it was pretty cheap. But, where I live a Big Mac meal is on average about $16 right now and I can get a burrito bowl from Chipotle with a drink for $13.
I'm not saying Chipotle is high quality food but I don't think anyone's going to argue it's not better quality than McDonald's, so why on earth would I pay more for McDonald's?
They overreached on their price gouging and now they're just trying to backpedal because they're losing money.
Started eating at Culver's recently. Same price as McDonald's but tastes like actual good quality hamburgers.
Plus Culver’s always has ice cream
Chiptle is real food... Mcshit ain't.
I don't got to chiptle because customer service is shite tho
Pretty sure Chipotle is owned by McDonalds.
Invest in real food. It is the foundation of your body.
It is not. McDonald's was an early investor but hasn't been for a long long time (almost 20 years now), but the idea has stuck around.
Chipotle is a publicly traded company.
I dunno.... sugar is sugar, carbs are carbs, protein is protein, your body is not prejudiced as to where those components comes from
Sugar is carbs
The 3 macros are carb fat protein.
Wait, who got more money dumping into their savings?
I got 2 stimulus checks for $1200. I didn't even have to ask, they just showed up. Did you not get those?
That's not a lot in this context of savings, just about 2 months' rent or less for a lot of people.
Many people don't have anywhere near 2 months rent in savings.
Um, everyone...1500 per kid and then like 3k on top of that then another 6500 check later
Out of curiosity: How much do you make and what are your monthly expenses?
Assuming you didn't lose your job
No kids here... Didn't see a penny. But I'm happy those that needed it got it. 😊
Lowered prices to $5 and still making profit.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/heres-how-much-profit-mcdonalds-makes-on-its-new-5-meal-e2bbbd2c
"Available for a limited time." How magnanimous of them.
A Mac is worth $3.00. The ingredients cost them $1.60.
Love how they compared the $18 combo to the average price of just the sandwich, it’s just insane to me.
Thank you. This should have been a top comment as it needs more direct attention.
Went on a trip recently and we always stop by a McDonald's for breakfast and holy crap, a freaking hash brown was almost three bucks.
I get having to pay workers more but that's just some bullshit price gouging there because there's no way in hell what workers are still there are getting paid that much better in order to justify a the dollar hash brown.
They gauged a little too much and boasted about record profits a little too loudly, and now have to deal with backlash. Too bad, so sad. 🙄
No they aren’t.
Imagine working for two hours to be able to afford a single fucking Big Mac meal!
Now imagine working for two hours and then having to eat a Big Mac.
But a $15 minimum wage will cause prices to skyrocket! …. Prices have skyrocketed, wages remain stagnant.
It's not that we can't afford to pay you $15 an hour, or even $30 an hour, but if we did that then we couldn't give that money to the shareholders. You see, they've purchased a certificate which entitles them to the wealth created by your labor. We assure you we can imagine it must be somewhat uncomfortable to live in constant grinding poverty, but you can understand how our hands are tied here. They have a certificate. What are we supposed to do, ask a rich person to be a teeny tiny bit less rich? That's just crazy talk.
Fiduciary duty is one of the dirtiest phrases on the planet…
We promised those shareholders that we’d pay you as little as we can….. you wouldn’t want to make us liars, would you?
I can make a hamburger and fries in like ten minutes active cooking time for £3, and it'll have proper beef and be perfect.
What is even happening at Burger King?
Imagine not buying overpriced, unhealthy junk food.
That's crazy, i can't comprehend. Americans told me that junk food is cheaper than actual food, so obviously i believe that.
Ya can get away with a lot of shit but mess with peoples food and you will end up lashed to a cross. Ya dont fuck with the hierarchy of needs.
No one needs Micky Ds.
My point is people get pissed when you mess with available food options, its the principle of the matter. Since food is so important any amount of fucking with food will anger folks due to instinctual reinforcement.
Playing fast and loose with what constitutes food.
You are focusing way too much on the fact that its McDonald's. The point im making is largely seperate from the quality of said food, and is moreso focused on the fact that people dont generally like being cut off from different sources of food. We all catalog that shit either actively or passively, but if youre hungry and nothing else is available ya aint gonna care about quality.
Also I have eaten the fucking egg MRE, McDonald's is certainly closer to food than that abomination.
Fucking this. I once went on a week long "survivalist" camping trip. Your options for dinner were catching something yourself, or an MRE. Between the 5 of us that went, we caught exactly one rabbit the whole week.
We got a mountain of McDoubles(this was back when they were $1) on the way home and it was heavenly in comparison to that shite.
Oh you dont know the half of it. The egg MRE is one of the ones taken out of military rotation cause of how bad it is, for context Steve1989MRE gagged while eating one this is a man who ate Boar war proto ration and civil war hard tack.
I would rather eat a live rat than the egg MRE, no wonder the surplus place I got it from had a fucken warning on it and the dude at the counter made sure I wanted it three times.
I wouldn't wanna call that food. I don't feel bad for people who eat there.
Some people have it as their only choice due to living in a food desert. Imagine how fucked up is that.
If I recall correctly, food deserts tend to be located in areas where poor and/or minorities are located.
In either case, it's a self-fulfilling prophecy, since only the poor would remain in a food desert, if you have money, you have options.
I would say it's more a of self-fulfilling curse.
Peasants are not buying our over priced trash!
Why would they do such a thing?
No way to know, out some PR on it!
For me, the most egregious example was huggies diapers increasing prices while production costs went down.
username checks out