Randomly ran across this website (which apparently is from a Reddit chatroom):
“Get a McDouble without ketchup and mustard. Instead, ask for lettuce and big mac sauce on it. You have an almost-Big Mac for $1.39,” an employee writes.
For some reason I was unaware that McDonalds had a customized ordering system. In fact, I thought their lack of flexibility is what gave BK their old slogan “Have it your way.” I have no problem customizing at an In-N-Out, for example, but for some reason I thought McDonalds had some kind of orthodoxy in ordering.
Anybody customize their orders to this extent at McDonalds? Or is this a good way to ensure that the fast food workers hock a loogie in your food? Any former (or current) fast food workers have a take on this?
I never worked with fast food. Trust me, it was better for the public that way. So I’m rather clueless about this stuff.
The original MacDonald’s system was speedy (indeed, IIRC, a cartoon character named Speedee was on the very first billboards) because they had a limited menu and high throughput, so they made standard food in advance. They always had customer ordering available, but it required the customer to wait and screwed up their assembly line, so they never promoted it. In contrast, Burger King didn’t make sandwiches in advance, so “have it your way” was pretty easy for them.
But now that MacDonald’s has such a large menu, they can’t make stuff in advance anyway, so we’re back to all orders on demand.
I say the time is ripe for someone to start a business that serves only hamburgers, cheeseburgers, fries, sodas and shakes. Think of the volume!
Pretty much any fast food place will remove or leave things off with no problems (no tomatoes or lettuce on my burgers, please). Adding things can be hit or miss; some won’t at all, some complain, some charge.
Yeah, they always have allowed that, at least since like 1997 when I worked there. A lot of people do it.
I always got a cheeseburger with no condiments or meat and with lettuce and tomato (so, a sandwich with cheese, lettuce, tomato, and onion). A lot of times they would give me meat anyway because apparently that’s an incomprehensible thing to want to eat.
You probably won’t irritate anyone if you ask for no pickles or mayo instead of ketchup. But if your list of exception ends up being an order of magnitude longer than the ‘normal’ part of the order, you’re probably going to piss someone off. Especially, if as in the OP, you’re trying to build something almost like an existing menu item, but for much cheaper.
That being said, you’ve been able to custom order at McD’s since I was a kid. Whether or not the minimum wage drones there would get it right is another matter entirely, and if there was a huge line you’re probably annoying the people behind you.
Of course, some used to advocate a minor custom order to make sure you got fresh food instead of something that had been under the heatlamp for hours, especially if you came in at an odd time. So people would ask for a burger with no ketchup and fries with no salt, so they would have to be special made, and then add the ketchup and salt themselves. Which, I have heard from friends in food service, also annoyed the employees, because you could just ask for fresh and they’d make it. An exception was more work for them because they could no longer rely on the muscle memory they’d built up making 10,000 burgers the same way before.
TL;DR: Sure you can custom order, as long as you aren’t a jerk about it.
We have a chain of a few restaurants called Dick’s that doesn’t have much more than that on their menu. You stay outside and just walk up to the window to order and there’s no seating or anything. It’s really popular, we love Dick’s here.
The 1% is actually usually a bad burger. In the town I live, there’s a place called Rhea’s, that makes burgers and is actually popular enough to have 3 locations. They’re locally famous for the standoffish attitude of the owner; he actually puts up signs that say “If you want it your way, Burger King is down the street” and the employees all have to wear shirts that say “If you don’t like my food - there’s the door”.
Thing is, I ate there, and the food was really bad. Like, a 5 year old kid’s version of a fast food burger made with stuff he found in mom’s kitchen bad. And the onion rings were the cheapest, nastiest shit out of a bag of frozen crap you could find. I did find it half-amusing that I completely agreed with his slogan: I didn’t like his food, and I was out the door.
[QUOTE=Hippy Hollow;16865602"]
Get a McDouble without ketchup and mustard. Instead, ask for lettuce and big mac sauce on it. You have an almost-Big Mac for $1.39," an employee writes.
[/QUOTE]
Been doing it for years. Saves like $3, plus IMO it’s a better sandwich. The “regular” McDonald’s patties are so tiny, that extra bottom bun is just too much bread. And now that they have the “Bacon McDouble,” you can get bacon on it for just an extra 61 cents!
Heh, I worked at a McDonald’s back in 1996! Represent!
Strangest order I ever got - some dude wanted a regular old cheeseburger, “hold the cheese.” I was a bit perplexed and asked, “so, just a regular hamburger?” “No! Cheeseburger, hold the cheese!”
Never figured that one out though I did dutifully put in the order and it got filled correctly. The cooks didn’t even blink. Proper yellow/orange wrapper rather than the white/brown for a regular hamburger.
At the time the cashier screen would have looked something like:
CHEESBRGR
-CHEESE
Maybe he was just trying to fuck with me? I was just a kid, after all. Maybe a corporate spy trying to judge our customer service? Whatever. Dude got his cheese-less cheeseburger, no complaints.
Most fast food places will do whatever you want without even questioning it. I did have a request at Taco Bell a couple of months ago that the cashier had to get the manager to ask about. I ordered a Double Decker with a Fire Taco Shell.
I had a customer that did this regularly, too (1993/1994). This was her way of getting it made fresh, rather than just pulling a pre-made hamburger out of the sleeve. It wasn’t a big deal.
I never worked at McDonalds, but at the Arby’s I was at, we’d customize as long as it didn’t create an existing menu item. If someone ordered a regular roast beef on an onion bun with cheese sauce, fine. If someone ordered a regular roast beef on an onion bun with cheese sauce and red ranch sauce, we rang it up as a beef and cheddar, because that’s what it was.
What is needed is more Harvey’s. A Canadian fast-food chain that, quite literally, does it your way. Their business model has, for years, emphasized that every burger and every meal is unique, according to the customer.
One patty? Sure. Two patties? No problem. Cheese? No, okay. Fries, rings…? Fries, gotcha. Drink? Coke; no problem, it’s coming.
Here we go. What would you like on it? Okay, I hear you: tomatoes, pickles, mustard, relish. Is that it? Okay, some onions. Want more? No, okay, and some ketchup. Is that enough? All done? Oh, extra pickle, sorry. Great, here you go. Enjoy!
A burger made exactly how you like it; and all in the time (or less) it takes McDonald’s to serve up a lukewarm, standard Big Mac meal. I like Harvey’s!
I tried once to get Big Mac sauce on a burger. The cashier was fine with it and entered our order. 2 minutes later the manager came out and said we couldn’t do that. Apparently you can have as much sauce as you want if you actually order a Big Mac, but can’t get any on the side otherwise.
