Chipotle stock craters as company says young people without jobs can't afford their food anymore
Chipotle stock craters as company says young people without jobs can't afford their food anymore
It’s funny how companies just don’t get it.
Fast food has been historically cheap. Chipotle worked because it was fast, it was cheap, and you didn’t feel like you were as much of a fat ass compared to grabbing a giant bacon burger and a bucket of fries.
Now you go to chipotle and pay $20 for a burrito and a soda. Still fast, still decent enough (at least the one near me), but $20 is highway robbery.
OR, I can go across the street to a sit down restaurant, have a first generation Thai guy (who started his American dream restaurant) whip up the best damn drunken noodles I’ve ever had for $12. AND he does this FASTER than chipotle (seriously how does he do it? Must be a magic wok).
Guess where we grab lunch these days.
My issue with chipotle has always been that the food is lukewarm.
I’m not paying 20 dollars for a lukewarm, lightly seasoned burrito.
Now you go to chipotle and pay $20 for a burrito and a soda. Still fast, still decent enough (at least the one near me), but $20 is highway robbery.
Chipotle Burrito and a small fountain soda is $14 in my area. Its certainly risen in price over the last 6 years.
Sometimes I’m just out with coworkers but not starving. I used to get a cheese and chicken quesadilla. It used to cost $4 and change. Then they started charging burrito prices - $15 and change for a tortilla, a handful of shredded cheese and 1/4 of a chicken breast. I get there is regional pricing differences - but their costs (at least here) are out of control.
Yeah I think the sofritas burrito or bowl is like 10.99 or 11.99 where I live. The meats more expensive though.
The problem is that Chipotle was never really fast food, they were one of the pioneers of the Fast Casual concept, where it was good food, served quickly, but not necessarily cheap. They never really intended to compete against McDonalds head to head. They wanted to be something different.
Chipotle wasn't that fast. They were locally blacklisted by a lot of doordash drivers due to the wait.
Doordash is part of the reason it's not fast anymore. Chipotle, like everywhere else that makes your food on an assembly line as you order it, should take like a minute per person with overlap. Know what you want, have your card ready to pay, enjoy your lunch. But then a driver cuts straight to the register to grab an order of six burritos and a salad that is only half ready because most places wait until the last second to put take-out orders together (fewer complaints about cold/soggy food) which delays the whole process. Repeat every five minutes.
it used to be 7$ for a giant burrito, now its almost half the size and more than double the cost.
They do get it, better than most customers.
The entire point is maximizing profit. If you can charge fewer people more for the same product, you're doing less while making more.
This is just the result of crapitalism. It will never be a system where everyone can afford Chipotle.
Boatwright said Chipotle is "doubling down on restaurant execution," increasing marketing spend, plans to create more digital experiences, and introduce more innovation.
The problem is prices for the quality you get. Instead of spending money on improving those things, they're dumping it on more commercials and "digital experiences".
Yes, that will totally make people or want to buy overpriced mediocre fake Mexican food.
I went to Chipotle for the first time in a long while, and I don't even recall what the hype was to begin with. It's just not that great anymore. It's been a while since I've been back. Given inflation I'd rather learn how to make my own burrito that's better than them
The original hype as I understand it was that it was decently flavored food that they gave you plenty of for a reasonable price. Sounded like a regular old local Mexican restaurant to me, but as a national chain.
I only had it after it had peaked and it was fine. Guess it stood out more when it was catching on.
Corporate slop bowls.. I can't see them any different from that now
I don't eat there because the last time I did, I got severe food poisoning. If I want shit fast Mexican food, I'll go to Taco Bell.
Plus, at taco bell, you can get like 5 or 6 bean and rice burritos even if you add a few toppings to it and have it toasted, for the same price of one burrito at chipotle.
Isn't it Mission style which once was part of Mexico but is now the USA. It's the style from the SF bay area.
There is one sentence in that quote which isn't complete nonsense
Pretty sure a lot of young people with jobs can't afford it either.
Maybe robots and AI can buy your food. 😐
Do you people have phones Klarna?
Split that meal into four payments
I really hope that the cascading failure from this takes down the entire economy. Just complete destruction I'm done let's hit the reset button
I split that payment into five meals. I get a chicken bowl with extra rice and beans and all the free fixinz, then I shake it up and spoon it into tortillas and wrap them into individual burritos. Freeze and you have a zero effort M-F meal prep you just need to microwave each day, at about 300 cal each (get extra cheese too actually, and go heavy on the hot salsa, it’s tasty.)
It’s an older reference but it checks out sir.
So that means Chipotle will lead by example and start paying all their employees a livable wage, right? ... Right??
higher wages are not the solution; universal basic income is. higher wages just mean it's even more difficult for companies to higher employees, which means there will be fewer jobs overall. also, you're excluding people who are unable to work that way.
I'm all for higher employees!
Overall job loss is not what happened the last thirty-odd times the federal minimum wage was raised, or any of the times individual states raised minimum wage, but go ahead and believe it will happen the next time for sure.
What has happened is the newly higher-paid employees spend that money, and the new demand creates new jobs, enough to offset the losses from the old employers deciding to manage with a smaller staff. As long as the size of the increase is in the same range as all the previous ones, there's every reason to believe the effect would be the same.
I wish the federal congress would just do several years of catch-up increases, then tie it to inflation so we can stop arguing about it.
Higher wages also just translates to higher rent for their landlords.
Shame poor people can't connect these dots, but that's why we are where we are.
If you think inflation is bad now, wait until the government starts handing out free money. I'm no economist, but some of y'all are dumb as hell.
And their food is mostly rice and beans.
Yeah i don't eat there often so it was quite apparent the last couple times that they've removed everything with flavor and substituted it for extra rice and beans, while charging more for it. My city has dozens and dozens of Mexican restaurants and food trucks that offer way better taste and portions for way less money.
Nah, the food just really sucks. Used to be good, isn’t anymore. It’s not that they can’t afford it, it’s that if you’re going out for cheap food once in a while, Chipotle is somehow worse than what you can make at home, for more money.
I remember when Reddit was flooded with posts about how great Chipotle was. Felt a little manufactured; their food was fine, but nothing better than I can get from a halfway decent local place.
I love the taste of supply chain optimization.
and they charge extra for sloppy gaucomole, you might as well buy your own.
Well this is interesting to me given that my employer has internally been talking about how Chipotle, the fast casual counter serve restaurant, has been growing faster than our full service pasta restaurant. Which obviously means they're stealing our market share in our separate segment and we need to move to compete with CMG more.
Methinks it is time to leave this industry.
Edit: haha. hahahahahahaha
A particularly challenged cohort is the 25- to 35-year-old age group," Boatwright said. "This group is facing several headwinds, including unemployment, increased due loan repayment and slower real wage growth.
ahahahahahahaha they are so out of touch if this is news to them
shit. im over a decade older than that group and my wife and I have had to cut out all outside food for over a year.
I think folks in our age group have cut more aggressively. More responsibilities
less "more responsibilities" and more once-in-a-generation/century crises.
Also $11 for a burrito? Yeah, miss me with that bullshit. I'm thankful for chipotle keeping me full while I was in college but shit is literally double the price it was then.
My household and I weren’t able to eat at a restaurant since before COVID hit, even fast food had jacked their prices up too high. That’s only just now starting to change because we’ve left the US.
Just out of curiosity, what country did you move to and how does it compare with your lifestyle and cost of living in the USA?
fast food was cheap to me until a bit after covid although the dollar menus were getting pretty weak.
maybe it has something to do with ripping people off on takeout orders
I thought I was CRAZY. I tried the $5 burrito hack on a take out order and was mildly unimpressed. It’s ok in a pinch but for 50 cents more I’ll get way more food at McDonald’s. My wife went in and ordered it on a different day and they gave her SIGNIFICANTLY more food. Like double. In that scenario it’s definitely worth it.
hearing people say "get way more food for $5.50 (total) at McDonald's" is wild
in Canada, a jr chicken (mchicken equivalent? it's been a while) is $4. used to be a good value. not anymore
What is this hack? My Chipotle hack is to order a burrito bowl with all the free extra toppings, get two tortillas on the side, and you can portion out the bowl into about two regular sized Chipotle burritos.
The food is meh. The prices are high. Young people are broke. What do you expect?
Fuck all this capitalist bullshit. Bring about a basic income for all. No one should have to be forced into violence just to feed themselves or their family. A whole shitload of social problems would disappear if basic income were enacted.
I love Chipotle. Maybe it's just the locations near me, but the quality is good and prices are not as high as some others in the thread say; certainly not $20. Maybe $11 or $12, and for a really big meal.
Unfortunately I stopped eating there when I stopped shopping at Target, when they got rid of their DEI policies in clear capitulation to MAGA. Plenty of places with comparable quality & price that at least try not to do hiring discrimination
Nah, a standard Chipotle burrito bowl is about $15 where I am. That's before drink or chips.
Whaaa? I was just in Seattle, $13 for a chicken burrito and chips with salsa. I think chipotle is still the best deal in fast food, buying the two cheeseburger meal at McDonald's is basically the same price and way less healthy.
Oof media didn't talk about DEI. I'm not going to chipotle anymore
Any info on this? I can't find anything about Chipotle removing any DEI stuff.
I can get a bowl w/guac and a large drink for $17, including tax. I live in an HCOL area that has a high sales tax. The portion sizes seem reasonable, though they have gotten a little smaller over the years. Went from being an oversized meal to still a good solid meal. The drink is admittedly a bad value, but that's true of any fast food.
There is either some serious regional variances (with this locality being on the cheaper end despite being HCOL), or people are using apps and getting gouged. I order at the counter.
its definitely shrinkflaitoned, the price also has increased, thats why we dont buy it as often anymore. like may once every few months, if at all, there are other places that are better.
Usually these headlines are bs, but the stock price dropping by 50%, or several years' growth? Yikes.
I mean, still not really cratering but it's a big drop. Nothing they can't recover from.
The stock market is a psychopath. If you're not actively growing you're dying, so stable/steady profits and no year over year growth = stock plumits. That's why companies that are profitable, but hit a saturation point, start to try to squeeze. Gotta make the almighty line go up. It's all very short cited, but executive incentives are nearly always short term.
Idk why it got so popular. Plenty of better Mexican options and you don’t have to pay for chips or get e.coli.
Plenty of better Mexican options
It's not even recognizably Mexican. At best, it's vaguely Mexican-themed. Some of the ingredients are there (including the occasional e. coli), but none of the flavor. "Fresh Mex" is a brain-dead corporate abomination.
To be fair, I like to go to a Mexican place that serves me something off menu because it is the Chef's home town food. They had never seen a burrito in their life until they moved to the US.
Mexico is a big place, lots of variety depending on where you live.
The ecoli is the best part.
Is like a free game of Russian roulette.
It's a free weight-loss plan, unplanned.
This must be the end of the monopoly game. I guess we either flip the board or die
Nah, we set up some pillars across the board and place another board on top. Repeat after that one is full. Each level gets more rickety.
I feel like this jenga tower of monopoly boards were on is pretty rickety
The closest Chipotle to me is 45 minutes away and has a < 3 star rating - i think I'll go literally anywhere else and be content.
I never understood why chipotle was so popular. And then continued to be after their... What? Half dozen incidents of them spreading diseases around the country...
The food is actually good. The disease issue was lack of local food inspections. My problem with them is you get 25% less if you order online versus in person, so I stopped.
The food is.. fine, but overpriced. When it wasn't diseased, at least.
Thru were doing things unsafely. You can put the blame on the people doing the unsafe things and not that no one has caught them on it.
The people on the east coast have no idea what burritos are supposed to be. If they knew, Chipotle wouldn’t have gotten as far as it has.
I paid 16$ for a bowl the other day of the new steak. Ya. That was a hard pill to swallow. 16$. I could have gone to Applebee’s for that price, or Chilli’s!
the best taco place in town (current opinion fluid, we just lost the previous best taqueria and we're in mourning and search mode) has $2.50 tacos. I have the appetite of a teenager and three satisfy me, plus they're delicious. i have trouble justifying going elsewhere
Yeah, my favorite taco place is in the back of a gas station. The cashier doesn’t speak a single word of English, but you can get by with some pointing at the menu, hand gestures, and “más queso por favor, y extra picante. Limón apardo.” Tacos are $2.50 each, a giant cup of refried beans is another two dollars, and he’ll usually slide you some extra tortillas to go with the beans for free if you’re a regular.
Sadly, I changed jobs and haven’t been there in a long time. I still occasionally think about making the trek across town, just to get some tacos. I hope he’s okay with all of the ICE raids… People that are pro-ICE shouldn’t be allowed to eat seasoned food.
I miss my old spot. Only place that did chicken like I like. Dry and overcooked. They had 3$ tacos and 3 would hit the spot.
Most of the time Chipotle's "new" is just an old protein with a new exotic-sounding seasoning on it.
Uh, the food at both those restaurants is considerably worse. It’s all just microwaved crap as far as I can tell. You CAN get a beer as either tho, which has them generally winning in my book tho.
Are you trying to tell me that many restaurant chains have premade food they heat in a microwave?! Wheres Gordon Ramsay's kitchen nightmares when you need it?!
Chipotle is on it's way out. When they first opened, at least by my work, the food was fresh and decent and could be had for a little more than fast food but not by a lot so it was easy to go there. I wouldn't say it's Mexican or TexMex but it wasn't bad. Changed jobs and hadn't been there in a while but I was on a road trip and thought what they heck, there aren't too many options and this seemed like it would be good. The food was not fresh the meat was over cooked, you didn't get a lot of food and it was kind of over priced... I haven't been back since.
If I want cheap food, Chipotle is out. If I want good food Chipotle is out. Maybe if I hate myself and want to spend a lot of money for shitty food?
I think people are also just waking up to the idea that they're moving to beans and rice just to survive anyway, so why go out for the same shit with lime juice squirted on it?
they were on downward spiral once they started charging more and shrinkflationed thier product.
Middle age people with jobs also can't afford Chipotle in the PedoEconomy.
at least one is mostly frequented by upper middle class tech workers, near a conference center, so that made sense.
Chipotle has been shit ever since their data breach years ago. Fuck 'em.
I live twenty minutes from a Qdoba and they have yet to fuck up my order or skimp on toppings.
It wasn't the multiple ecoli scares?
Fuck, the chipotle skimping was such a load of bullshit.
Glad I don't go there, or any restaurant, any more.
The Qdoba near me is garbage at folding burritos, and I've rarely seen anyone else in there. I wonder if it's a money laundering front. Still better than Chipotle 😅
The food poisoning probably didnt' help
Food poisoning, exorbitant prices, what's not to love?
/s
you get a free norovirus side dish.
maybe they should letting it sit lukewarm out in the open, and the employees wash thier hands after pooping.
Their food has gone downhill and also they changed the chips recently which now suck. That’s the only reason I still went, the chips. Rip.
also the shrinkflation too.
Title should read:
#Chipotle goes under after last willing customer cratered pants after eating Chipotle
Remember the $1 grilled cheese truck guy?
https://www.distractify.com/p/one-dollar-grilled-cheese-truck
It didn't ever actually happen (that I know of) but those trucks should exist everywhere and park right next to overpriced fast food restaurants to exert some economic pressure on them to lower their prices. Shit is ridiculous.
Yeah, what we got instead was a place selling lobster rolls for $23 a pop.
I am with you, there should be (a place selling dollar cheesies), but the fact that there isn't is telling about how unfeasible that is.
Yeah, I mean, the dollar cheesy is in the supermarket.
Farmer's markets are pretty close to this though, sometimes.
As opposed to young people with jobs who can afford their food...?
Or put another way, have the unemployed been able to afford to eat at Chipotles up until this point? Strong doubt.
From the place i work, they have a convention center so its just upper middle class tech workers going to chipotle, barely anyone lower than thier income goes there if at all.
They could try not making as much per customer to increase the number of customers. This though would mean they were not gouging enough money per sale. A loop for which they can not get past.
I feel like I'm trying to rationalize insanity, and I do understand the reason, but why does the burrito company need stock?
Money
The stock holders are the owners. The owners can in theory direct the board of people representing their interests to do whatever, but generally stock owners want the board to do things they believe will make the value of the stock go up. Like any average owner of a private company, just we all get to watch since it's a public company.
On top of what others said, they issued it for cash so they can expand their business and pass the risk onto investors.
...Hence the risk now.
why not?
Maybe I'd eat there if they sold food.
And if it was cheaper. Real texmex costs less
Hell real proper Mexican food costs less. Literally went to a Mexican restaurant last week and it was $17 for a fuck ton of food. And that includes a drink, chips, salsa and guacamole on top of the 2 meals worth of food.
I remember when Chipotle was still a Colorado-only thing. Better than Subway or Quiznos and the price was right. You could get in, get lunch, and get out relatively quickly.
I don't know that things went pear-shaped the very instant they started their massive expansion everywhere, but it's been different for quite a long time. Like a lot of brands, I'm sure they sputtered along on their reputation mostly and the place made money even if consumers started to get disillusioned.
Used to be that Qdoba and Chipotle seemed to be pretty decent options, but I'm always kind of disappointed in both these days. Qdoba offered Impossible Meat as an option for a while, but seemingly no longer does...
I think it's just a classic case of profit maximization. Chipotle felt pressure from shareholders to continue increasing profit every quarter, and that inherently involves cutting costs and increasing prices
Yeah, it's pretty annoying - publicly traded companies must constantly be growing. Something like a restaurant cannot just be successful in making a mere profit, oh no, it has to be compared to last quarter/last year...even if it means endangering everything that made the restaurant successful in the first place...
Better than Subway or Quiznos and the price was right.
Yes I literally remember when a meatless chipotle bowl was only $6.45.
I'm pretty sure I haven't eaten there since those good old days.
Qdoba by me is one of the few that does breakfast. $5-7 for a breakfast bowl/burrito, and it's Qdoba so you get all the queso, salsa, guacamole, cheese, etc toppings for free.
When was Qdoba ever a decent option? Their best has always been "disappointing" for me.
I am not being snarky, I just don't ever remember them being good.
As for Chipotle, I don't go there very often but even the last time I was in and saw chicken going on the grill and they said fresh avocados are used every morning to make the guacamole, that was how I remembered them. And how I always figured the differentiation was: Chipotle made their food, but Qdoba was just put together Sisco truck food.
Qdoba was pretty good in the early to mid 00's.
I ate at Qdoba once. It made my butt explode.
Quiznos had the same effect.
I eventually learned how to eat clean, now my digestive system has been calm & happy for years. My rule of thumb is no restaurants. Ever. Control every ingredient that goes into my mouth.
When I first started going (maybe late 90s, early 00s) they had more salsa options, which I was keen on.
IIRC, their hottest was at least hotter than Chipotle, even if neither really dialed up the spice all that much.
I distinctly remember when Qdoba started phasing out the Impossible. My local one held onto it a bit longer and was one of the later locations to lose it.
I like Impossible, but it's a hard sell for many because it was the most expensive of the regular protein options. I say "regular" because they sometimes had limited-time specials that were more expensive. Chipotle took a better path with the sofritas because it is its own thing rather than a fake meat, and it is the lowest tier of pricing. From my own observation, it is at least somewhat popular with meat-eaters, but only a vegetarian/vegan is likely to get Impossible due to the higher price.
I just go to Cava instead these days. Way better
This is the way. I buy a CAVA bowl once a week. The way I have it made will feed me three times. That's three dinners for less than $14.
Lol same. I get a Cava bowl and will pick at it for like two days straight.
I'm just waiting for the time I go in and find out that they've all been told to make the bowls smaller to save money. Only a matter of time.
CAVA is doing the exact same business strategy as Chipotle. They're working on rapid expansion, but once they either reach market saturation, or stall out, they'll reduce quality and increase prices
It's the model for every fast-casual chain. I really wish people would support local restaurants more. You get better food at a cheaper price when you don't have corporate taking a 30% profit margin
You get better food at a cheaper price when you don’t have corporate taking a 30% profit margin
No we don't.
I go mostly to local restaurants, but sometimes I'm in the mood for Cava. And yeah I'm waiting for them to drop in quality and/or portion size
Shit, I discovered Izzos Illegal Burrito and it’s much better at a fraction of the cost!
But but but...
That's why it tastes so good.
They prefer to cook at home.
10+$ for a mostly rice burrito? hard pass
rice and beans mostly, almost non-existent "lettuce"
That's probably a good thing, don't want to be ground zero for another round of food poisoning.
wait, people were able to afford it before? never went becuase it was overpriced.
Used to be able to feed my partner and I for less than $20 easily and have leftovers.
Now it's damn near $30
thats still crazy, i don't eat out much just on price alone but also most places i find the food too much.
it was 7$, then it start shrinkflaitoning, and jump 2+$ everytime like in the past 5 years. it was quite cheap for the amount "burrito you are getting", now its not worth it.
If I still lived near one (and also had money) I’d probably go to them still.
Never went there, never will. Don't like gambling with food poisoning.
Edit: some chipotle simps out here today lmao
Who'd see this coming, when the population has no money to spend and the top 0.1% is taking all the money, so there's nothing to spend? Not the billionaires, that's for sure. I really cannot wait for the fall when they will realise how much they fucked up. I'm definitely not going to help them, no matter how much money they offer. They did this to themselves, and I'll be happy when the population starts eating the rich.
It's actually been this way for a while. The top 10% of American earners do half of all consumer spending. A massive amount of the economy has shifted to reflect this. Businesses are often targeting business to business sales rather than business to customer. Pay to win video games use free players as content for whales to play through. And if you're selling physical goods, you're probably either doing it as cheaply as possible, or absolutely gouging the assholes you're selling to (think ikea vs Kohler's premium brand, for which a lamp costs 5 figures and the website doesn't gave prices listed).
I always thought whales were actually middle class or even poor people that have essentially a gambling addiction.
Millionaires are part of the problem, too.
They shouldn't get a pass from swaths of never-millionaires.