My brother went through several weeks of on site training to become a Wendy’s manager. But this was back in the 1980s and was provided by one of the Wendy’s “super franchisees” with over 250 restaurants. Not by Wendy’s itself.
There was a time the food seemed pretty good to me at least. I used to work at the airport about twenty years ago and would occasionally grab lunch there. They had a simple lunch menu of soup and sandwiches, which I considered above average for fast food at the time.
It was around for a long time as just another coffee and donut dump before it started to get the attention. Not sure when the bullshit Canadian insecurity national icon crap started.
A lot of people that don’t actually like coffee got into the hot coffee-flavoured-milkshake that is a double double. Maybe people liked the donuts too? I don’t care for donuts - I wouldn’t know a good one.
Maybe that was the deal with my ex-GF too.
I remember she had these course materials to study in binders and everything, it was like going to a real school.
Out of morbid curiosity I looked up TH’s “craveable” chicken sandwich online. Something looking that unimpressive in publicity shots is bound to be pretty bad, and one reviewer made that point as well.
“If, when you look at the picture of this sandwich, you think to yourself, “That looks like something I could buy from the freezer section at Costco,” you are correct. It tastes like something you could buy from the freezer section at Costco. If, on the other hand, you look at that picture and think, “That looks pretty good,” you are wrong. Get better eyeballs.”…
“As for the chicken itself, it’s processed chicken slurry formed into a sandwich shape, rather than an actual piece of chicken breast. It’s dry and slightly spongy, with only the vaguest chicken flavour. Mostly, it just tastes of the aforementioned generic, processed saltiness.”
Yum!
I was incredibly offended by that review, I’ve eaten some halfway decent food at cafeterias in the past, including hospital cafeterias. That sandwich seems worse than what I’d expect from even a cafeteria.
I find a lot of the food at Tim’s pretty marginal. The baked goods and breakfast sandwiches are more dependable, and their coffee is better than no coffee if you are in the mood for coffee. There was a time when they would heat up potato chips to serve with meals, which is in no way a substitute for freshly made ones.
Tim’s was successful as a de facto small town meeting place back when they were freshly baked each morning, there were few alternatives, and exotic spices included salt and pepper (with nothing more in the cabinet). A few Tim’s things are okay, but all of them are very bland. However, they are often accessible (e.g. with kiosks in hospitals, etc.)
Now there are often better alternatives. If you are driving hundreds of miles, it should not take much for food to taste amazing, as it does one when goes camping. (Hunger is the best sauce).
This is something that has always amazed and astonished me. I was flying through Halifax once and my gate happened to be opposite the Tim’s and there was this absurdly long line for it. At one point some woman came semi-skipping out with her coffee saying in a sing-song voice “it took me 40 minutes but it was worth it”.
We also had neighbours who planned a vacation (driving from Ottawa to Cold Lake) around Tim’s stops.
Somebody could do a really interesting study on the effectiveness of Tim Horton’s brainwashing.
I believe the cold weather here has caused collective permanent damage to our Canadian psyche.
You missed my favourite part:
Tastes like sadness.
The thing is, the thing I was sold looked NOTHING LIKE THAT. That chicken appears to be a reasonably sized, single chicken patty, perhaps three ounces of chicken. The vile disk I was given didn’t have chicken that looked anything at all like that.
Also, that picture has a slice of tomato in it. No tomato was to be found in my sandwich.
One can improve Tim’s fare by making specific requests. Try to substitute whatever bread for a cheese tea biscuit, ask them to butter and add a slice of onion where this makes sense. Sometimes mayonnaise may help.
Their cheaper, eggless breakfast sandwiches can be on the dry side and benefit from all of the above.
The best way to deal with lackluster Timmie’s fare is to go somewhere else.
Although I usually do this, Tim’s has its place. A carafe of coffee and box of pastry is eagerly welcomed at most workplaces. It can be a welcome sight on long road trips and has some breakfast options. I would never really choose it for lunch and dinner given alternatives. But at 6 am or in a rush alternatives are not always practical.
Tim Horton’s is bypassing other states and trying to expand here in the Houston area with stores set to open soon.
But I’m trying to figure out what they think they’ll be doing. Texans like their local brands, and Shipley’s (which itself is expanding to nearby states) still bakes fresh and serves hot donuts and kolaches (which, to be fair, aren’t all that great compared to dedicated kolache places).
Shipley’s coffee is mediocre at best but how are you supposed to compete against fresh, hot donuts with whatever frozen, reheated stuff you’re peddling? Brand recognition alone? A thousand miles from the homeland?
Tim’s has had mixed success in the US, which tends to have far more competitive markets than Canada. Tim’s have found a niche in some northern states. Their American stores are slightly different from the Canuck ones. As for how they succeed in the south, no idea.
So you’re saying that you should only patronize it in desperation.
Not exactly. Good for breakfast, fairly good for snacks, good for a work pick-me-up (twenty bucks buys coffee and donuts for ten people, or used to. Maybe eight these days?).
Is it my first choice for lunch or dinner? No. They had a recent commercial showing their chef. They didn’t quite say the chef’s name was Alan Smithee. But I wouldn’t be taking credit for that. I also think Tim’s got off really easy for covertly tracking customer location in their app. It didn’t affect me, but it did annoy me.
I have met many visitors and people in other countries surprised by the popularity of Tim’s with average Canadians. The morning line-ups at the drive thrus are still sometimes amazingly long.
How about Country Style? I haven’t been to one in years, how do they compete with Tims? Granted they don’t have as many locations but I have no idea what the current quality is like.
Well, they liked the Tim Horton pulled pork sandwich better. But not by much.
Pros: It isn’t gross. The pork could be worse. Good quality bun.
Cons: Sauce tastes off. Overwhelming bun. Useless onions.
That’s pretty much it. Up until at least the late 90s, they still did all their baking in-store, and they’ve gradually switched over to using centralized facilities that deliver frozen donuts to each store. Quality has obviously suffered.
But, they came to dominate the market (at least around here) just before they started to slide in quality. Used to be there were 4 or 5 different brands of donut shops around here, but now, it’s almost all Tim’s, with a few “gourmet” donut shops mixed in, in higher class neighborhoods. So now we’re stuck with them, as no one else wants to try to enter the market now.