Annals of Countercyclosity
NYT reports on McDonalds’ success:
As of November, the latest data available, the company had delivered 55 consecutive months of increases in global same-store sales. During a year when the stock market lost a third of its value — its worst performance since the Great Depression — shares of McDonald’s gained nearly 6 percent, making the company one of only two in the Dow Jones industrial average whose share price rose in 2008. (The other was Wal-Mart.)
I really enjoy the Sausage McMuffin, albeit only rarely since I’m sure it’s the least healthy thing on the planet, and have never understood why they stop serving their breakfast options so early in the day. Among other things, I think I could eat that kind of thing with less guilt if it was going in the “lunch” ledger rather than the “breakfast” file.
30 Responses to “Annals of Countercyclosity”
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January 11th, 2009 at 11:57 am
Many years ago I participated in some outdoor radar tests at a site that limited the times that testers could come and go– so, once you got there, you were stuck there for the rest of the day. Sausage McMuffins were the breakfast of choice for me, since they would just sit in my stomach all day long– wouldn’t feel hungry at all for the rest of the day.
January 11th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Sausage, tsk, tsk. How unkosher of Mr. Yglesias.
January 11th, 2009 at 12:19 pm
This scene is the first thing to come to mind. I don’t think I’d go to such extremes, but I’ll put my vote in for all-day breakfast.
January 11th, 2009 at 12:28 pm
Hmm, I dunno, I think the McGriddle is unhealthier…
January 11th, 2009 at 1:02 pm
Do you realize how crazy it is to think that eating something really unhealthy at lunch makes up for its really unhealthy quality. Yes it means you can’t have something else really unhealthy for lunch, but you could have a McMuffin and then have really healthy food for lunch and supper.
January 11th, 2009 at 1:05 pm
Don’t feel bad, breakfast is supposed to have more calories than lunch anyway
January 11th, 2009 at 1:29 pm
There is limited square footage in the kitchen prep area and I don’t think the operations model of a McDonald’s restaurant allows you to prepare both breakfast and lunch simultaneously with the service and through-puts that McDonald’s needs to make money. I’m sure they have reams of data on people who want a cheeseburger at 10:35 AM so they cater to them. I think most McDonald’s breakfast cutoffs allow tradespeople who start work at 7AM or earlier to catch breakfast at their first break from work. How many other kinds of people are out and about and regular McDonald’s customers who want breakfast at 11AM?
January 11th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
joejoejoe beat me to it. At a McDonald’s, you only have the resources to make breakfast, or lunch. And since lunch is their big money maker, they drop the breakfast after people have had a chance to pick it up on their way to work and start the lunch hour instead for early lunchers.
This is only really a problem for people who don’t get up to work office hours. Like me, when I was a student (after my Freshman year, I made sure not to have a class before 11am, or 1pm, if I could help it).
January 11th, 2009 at 1:40 pm
Sausage muffin with egg and with bacon added on is what’s ftw!
January 11th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
When I last visited Hong Kong in 1996, the McDonald’s in Tsim Sha Tsui was a) open 24 hours daily and b) served breakfast 24 hours daily. Nothing like having a Sausage McMuffin with Egg for dinner, except having two.
January 11th, 2009 at 3:12 pm
Actually according to the McDonald’s website, it’s not all that bad – 370 calories, 22g fat, 850 mg sodium. Lots of worse things out there.
January 11th, 2009 at 3:32 pm
How about a “Late Breakfast on Weekends” promotion. It would have less impact on early shift workers on weekdays, and they could make a whole thing out of it … play up the luxury of having an Egg McMuffin at Noon. An extra hour or two of breakfast availability on Saturdays and Sundays would make a big, big difference to those of us who care about this issue.
January 11th, 2009 at 4:03 pm
My favorite part about Sausage McMuffins is the way that, after eating like, one and a half, you feel like you’re having a heart attack.
January 11th, 2009 at 5:09 pm
Eggs and burgers don’t mix on a grill. We expanded breakfast hours at our joint only after putting in a second grill. No way you can flip an over-easy egg cleanly once you’ve put down a burger — which take up twice the space as sausage patties.
January 11th, 2009 at 5:24 pm
It’s funny because Mark Adams thinks we’re talking about real eggs.
January 11th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
Jack in the Boxes serve the breakfast menu anytime; so it’s technically feasible in a fast food environment (otoh, j in b’s do seem a bit slower overall)
Also, while it is true that McD’s (and similarly Walmart) are getting a little boost from being the downscale choice in a tough economy, the other side of is that McD’s was at a nadir about 2-3 years ago because it had let its standards slip so much. I forget if they brought in new people, but whoever it was did a decent job a reinvigorating the brand independent of macro economic conditions (They were in a similar situation to Starbucks, which was in a bit of trouble even before the total meltdown in Sept).
January 11th, 2009 at 5:52 pm
A long time has passed since I started my working life at McDonald’s, but back in those days we did use real eggs. Not sure if that is still true now. My manager always saved the breakfast mess (the pancake batter bowl, the bowl for beating the eggs, all the spatulas and the little round rings used to cook the eggs for Egg McMuffins, etc) for me to wash as my first order of business when I started my shift. Nothing like working in fast food to focus you on getting into college!
January 11th, 2009 at 7:55 pm
It is definitely a real egg. I say this as someone who has both cooked and consumed many of said breakfast sandwiches. This is something that distinguishes McD’s breakfast offerings from those of its competitors.
January 11th, 2009 at 8:56 pm
I believe that McDonald’s makes a higher margin on its breakfast menu than its lunch menu. So that would indicate it should let the breakfast menu linger.
January 11th, 2009 at 9:33 pm
For what it’s worth (admittedly, not much) McDonalds in Hong Kong does sell Sausage McMuffins all day long. Perhaps they fear the wrath of Michael Douglas. Forget about the nice airport. This is the kind of thing Tom Friedman should have noted in his op-ed.
January 12th, 2009 at 1:40 am
The best deal in fast food breakfast sandwiches is the sausage egg & cheese sandwich from White Castle. The White Castles near me charge $1.29 for them, and they are a lot tastier than the McDonald’s version, partly because White Castle makes each one fresh on the spot (the downside of this is that you have to wait a few minutes for one). Available until 10:30am around here.
Starbucks, btw, serves breakfast sandwiches all day (or until they run out), but theirs aren’t fresh — just reheated.
January 12th, 2009 at 2:53 am
Is the plural of that restaurant ‘Jack in the Boxes’ or ‘Jacks in the Box’?
January 12th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
joejoejoe:
I think it would have to be jacks in the boxes.
jacks in the box would imply numerous jacks in a single box, while jack in the boxes would imply a single jack hiding amongst multiple boxes.
March 14th, 2009 at 9:58 am
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April 8th, 2009 at 4:24 am
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