https://www.newsnationnow.com/entertainment-news/food/mcdonalds-french-fries-production/
I am having a hard time wrapping my head around why affordable fast food options mean reduced demand for fries?
Wouldn’t the inverse be true?
In: Economics
>“Many of these promotional meal deals have **consumers trading down from a medium fry to a small fry**,” Werner said on an earnings call on Oct. 2. “So while we benefit from improving traffic trends, consumers **trading down in serving size** acts as a partial headwinds for our volumes.”
>Werner also said **demand has been sluggish** at a time when Lamb Weston is oversupplied. The company announced net sales declined 1% and net income declined 46% from the prior year quarter.
>“**Restaurant traffic and frozen potato demand, relative to supply, continue to be sof**t, and we believe it will remain soft through the remainder of fiscal 2025,” Werner said in a statement in the news release
McDonalds has gotten expensive. The new $5 meal deal is cheap so a lot of people are buying it. The $5 Meal Deal has a small fries, a typical meal has a medium. This shows that the people buying the $5 Meal Deal were mostly McDonalds customers anyway, rather than new customers.
More people are opting for the $5 meal deal, which means more people are getting smalls which is less total fries.
Practically. I can only eat so much. If I can afford the big burger (it was cheaper) then I’d have less room for fries. Conversely, if the big one is expensive, and I want the same fill, I can order more fries. Fries are typically cheaper for the same full.
Your instinct boils down to an erroneous assumption.
Fake numbers but real point – you’re assuming the new meal has *half* as many fries but generates *twice* as many sales. In that math, the overall amount of fry demand is the same. If the new meals have half as many fries but generate *three* times as many sales, then yes net fry sales have gone up. I think this is your gut instinct that lower prices have increased sales at a rate that overpowers the fewer-fries-per-sale reduction.
The reality is more like the new meal has half as many fries but sales are flat. Thus the amount of fries being sold has been cut in half as well.
They’re not cheap, it’s the “get you in the door” price. They expect you to get an additional meal when you come in for the cheap stuff. The portion sizes are also abysmal,a small fry is like 6 fries. I remember last year when they shrank all their burgers by a solid 30% and started charging an extra dollar for them.
People are buying the cheaper meal all around, and the average fastfood meal is right around 10-15 now,so I actually look for the deals…. That usually means small/regular drink and small of whatever the side is
Stopped eating there at all when they shrinkflated and quality downgraded their food the last year or so. Literally, most BK’s are better (which isn’t saying much) in the DFW Metroplex.
Latest Answers