I cook Sunday through Thursday night. Friday and Saturday night its pizza, fast food, Chinese or Mexican takeout. Friday we decided on Mexican from a nearby restaurant and here was our order:
- Steak Fajitas
- Maria’s special (never really understood what this one was but my husband loved it)
- Fish tacos
I was quoted 15 minutes and when I got there on the 15th minute, my order was ready, including the complimentary bag of chips and salsa. Despite a slight language barrier, each meal was exactly on point including my requested modifications to my fajitas. So what’s my point in telling you all this?
My point is this: how do I walk into my local Mexican or Chinese restaurant, sometimes ordering enough food to feed a village and it’s always right, ready and completed in under 15 minutes? Then I walk into a McDonald’s or God forbid, Burger King and it’s so horribly slow and wrong? Here are some of my favorite examples of what I’m talking about:
- I ordered a chicken snack wrap once from McDonald’s. They forgot the chicken.
- Once I ordered a latte from a Starbucks in a Piggly Wiggly. They forgot the espresso.
- I ordered 2 plain hamburgers with ketchup from Burger King for my son. What I received were 2 cheeseburgers with ketchup and mustard.
I Just Don’t Understand Fast Food
I DON’T UNDERSTAND! I could order 7 meals from the Chinese restaurant across the street and they would quote me 10 minutes and it would really be ready in 10 minutes. At McDonald’s, I can order a small fry and a 4 piece chicken nugget and be given an iced coffee.
The only thing I can come up with is that the Mexican and Chinese restaurants just care more. I feel like they’re more vested as opposed to some of the job-hoppers in fast food. What do you guys think? I guess this post was me thinking out loud. At the end of the day, all I want is what I ordered, in a timely manner and accurate. God forbid I ask this of some of the most recognized companies in the world.
Am I the only one who thinks this way with fast food? How have your experiences been? I want to hear in the comments!
OH! I can actually give you an answer for this: it’s because fast food places are usually staffed by high school students or people who have no other options BUT to work there. Restaurants usually have a trained chef, and waitstaff is usually qualified to be waitstaff and have taken smart serve courses and the like. They know that their tips will be better if they are better.
In fast food, you have Johnny Bob who is in 11th grade handling the food items and he hates the supervisor and she hates being there but it’s literally the only job she could get to feed her kids and pay her rent and it’s just until she can find something better. And the manager is only the manager because she’s already worked there for 10 years and she has no other options but to stay because she’s not qualified for any other job, but hey, that’s ok, she gets benefits and it’s enough to get by.
But Johnny Bob is upset because he’s working the 20th weekend in a row, and hes also on an 8.5 hour shift and guess what? The store isn’t unionized so he gets literally TWO fifteen-minute breaks. And the manager put both of them within the first 4.5 hours because of the dinner rush and now he has to go four hours without a break and that’s sucking out his soul. And of course, someone called in sick because it’s the weekend and it’s sunny out and no one else would come in to cover so they are short staffed, and he just doesn’t care any more.
I love this comment because it puts it all in perspective. It shows everyone’s side of the story. This could be a complete can of worms because then you have the side where instead of companies selecting a manager based on leadership and/or training them to be leaders, they simply throw someone with 0 leadership skills in that role only based on how long they’ve been there. Then your right, she schedules Johnny to work these long ass shifts, not caring about these little breaks or when. It’s sad.
That’s actually from my own experience – when I was working for Tim Hortons, for an 8.5 hour shift we got two breaks. That’s it. Management was trained as they moved up the ranks but like the majority of people I worked with, take into consideration this was a country town with little other job opportunities, were high school graduates who had no other options to support their families. Even if they would quit for a different job (grocery store, turkey factory) they’d almost always come back.
I’m sure it’s different in the city but also I think their stories might be the same. Once you get sucked into a job like that then you don’t really have the means to get out. Which is super sad for some people.
Hubby says you can always count on one thing when you eat at a Burger King, McDonald’s, etc.
It’ll make a turd.
OMG….so true! It’s almost like setting $5 on fire or something. Good call hubby!