Wendy's is introducing Uber style surge pricing.
Kirk Tanner, the new CEO and president of Wendy’s, shared with analysts his various plans to increase company profits, including investing in digital menu boards that will have the capacity to display dynamic pricing that fluctuates throughout the day by 2025. Here's what customers need to know.
Dear Wendy’s CEO,
This is not Uber. This is a Wendy’s.
This new CEO of Wendy's would be wise to remember that fast food is a convenience not a necessity. I've got a nice little propane grill in the backyard and I know how to make a square patty. I don't need you, you need me.
I've got a nice little propane grill in the backyard and I know how to make a square patty
Good for you, unfortunately there are many people out there that can't afford a propane grill or a backyard.
Okay? Skillets exist. Countertop George Foreman grills exist. Either of which can be purchased for $30 or less and will last for years. There are multiple affordable ways to make a hamburger without a yard if you'd like to do so. Not sure why you're trying to shame me for daring to say that I have an outdoor grill so I'm just gonna go ahead and block you. This isn't worth a moment more of my time.
If you aren't able to own a grill, perhaps you should be avoiding fast food since it's a rather small amount of food for the cost?
Where I am, the price of fast food is just about equal to some restaurants. There's no point in doing fast food anymore.
There is a local hamburger joint 3 blocks from my house that is far superior in taste, with lower prices, why the fuck would I ever go to endys?
If that place isn't getting enough business, maybe you should suggest they advertise their prices.
A simple sign showing how their prices compare to the competition's goes a long way.
I probably wouldn't stop in a hole in the wall, just because they usually charge as much or more than chains. Doing what I suggest would change my mind, if the prices were right.
Same with me in Canada. I go local almost all the time other than my annual Burger King impossible Whopper
I say this to some many people. Wendy's can get some good deals sometimes. Like BOGO spicy chicken, but if I order a meal from any fastfood place around me then just no. I would be better off just going to my Mexican restaurant across the street. On Tuesday is taco Tuesday (obvs) and you get 3 tacos, beans and rice for like $8-$9. They other deals weds, Thurs, but not as good as that Tuesday deal.
Seriously. Fast food just isn't for poor people anymore.
We have to use grocery stores.
Thankfully, grocery shopping online is much easier now.
I remember when Dave Thomas was still alive. I loved Wendy's quality over most everyone else, so I would prefer them even if something else was closer or cheaper.
THE VERY NEXT WEEK after Dave died, there was a very noticeable drop in burger patty size and quality. I basically stopped eating at Wendy's after that.
I'm sure this is also what Dave would have wanted.
Dave Thomas is up in hamburger heaven with a list of mfers he's gonna beat with a spatula for ruining his restaurants over the last 22 years.
There's a reason why the powers that be have been focusing on promoting businesses over people.
People have standards. People have pride. They can feel shame. Businesses can't. There's no one to blame when they lower their standards. They're predictable and easy.
Pretty sure there's a similar story with the Costco founder being the only thing keeping them from raising the price of their hot dogs.
We're so bad at employee management and don't want to pay a living wage, so we'll charge you extra when we're busy. But wait, there's more, we're still not going to pay a living wage to hire more employees, so you're not only going to pay more, but your wait will still be the same.
Why not just hike the prices and be done with it?
They will, after everyone tells them how much they hate this, they'll 'backtrack' to higher pricing. They're letting their first idea eat the hate and resistance so they can execute plan B.
I think this is exactly the plan. If the prices are constantly fluctuating, it will be easy to slowly rise them by a bit every week without everyone noticing.
Boiling frogs is literally becoming a business plan
Damn, I like some of their food. I guess this is a good reason to stop going there.
Fuck you, Wendy's.
Patronize your local burger joints instead, it's an excellent opportunity to get to know the local businesses.
I do that too. But they don't have a drive thru and are getting rarer and rarer.
There are no local burger joints. For several hours drive in every direction from me, every burger place is a chain. Sure some local restaurants also serve burgers, even the Mexican places because burgers are such a staple of American food, but none of them dedicate any real skill or quality to it. No local place dedicated to burgers would stand a chance competing against all the chains and every other bar and grill that makes everything else in addition to burgers.
Yeah, and I'm introducing "no more eating at Wendy's" pricing.
In an environment of painful (almost insulting) food price increases everywhere, Wendy’s decides to remove price predictability from the equation, ensuring that I never know what I’m going to pay, except that I can guarantee I’m going to be gouged when I most want to eat.
Yeah, I don’t care what they sell. I don’t want to be treated like that.
The next logical step is to use facial recognition to discriminate estimate how much money is in each customer's wallet to dynamically price the food.
The funny thing is, businesses already do this.
Prices for 'digital goods' tend to vary depending on the country the user is paying for them in.
It's just another shining example of how businesses charge the most people are willing to pay, not the minimum to keep the lights on.
Imagine walking in, seeing a price on the board, waiting behind someone with a big order, and by the time you get to the counter the price has increased. I forsee yelling and fights happening in lines.
I foreseee never stepping into a restaurant like that.
They will stop doing this when the poorest people are just sitting around the restaurant waiting for the price to go down.
If you only had $3 and the price of a burger was above that, you would just wait. The restaurant is sometimes nicer than sitting outside. They can't kick you out, because you're waiting to order. Now they're going have like 3-5 bums waiting around for the price to drop.
It's just stupid. Although I did go to a bar like that once that was pretty fun. It had a stock market board with drink prices that went up and down. You would go up there hoping to get a particular drink, but come back with something else because it was half off. It'd be like "tequila shots $7" but "red wine $3.50"! Wine it is!
Austin had/has a bar like that.
Bars are scams.
You can get an entire bottle of liquor for $11.
You can get an entire bottle of wine for $3.50.
People are not gonna like that. They will pull into the drivethrough line to buy the same thing they paid $3 for the day before, and leave or buy something cheaper when they see it's $4 right now.
Most of them are going to be on their lunch break, and have already wasted 15 minutes waiting in line to order. So they're going to order anyways, because they're stuck. They won't have time to get in the new line somewhere else. They just won't come back afterwards.
This right here. This is what would piss me off. On the off chance I walk in and order, the price changes by the time I get to the register to order.
People need to just go old school and start packing a lunch. It's probably time I got back in that habit. I drive for a living and I keep a stash of meat sticks in my car, I should probably start bringing some hard boiled eggs and maybe some meat and cheese wraps for when I am really famished.
What a bullshit idea. I fucking hate this timeline we’re on.
A Dave's Single combo already costs 12 bucks here. Fuck off Wendy's, like hell we're paying more for that.
Edit: And that's for a small combo. Want a large? Fuck you, pay 15.
... planning to invest approximately $20 million to roll out digital menu boards...
Wendy’s will also invest an additional $10 million over two years...
Have you tried not spending $30 million dollars to sell hamburgers?
I mean, holy shit. You sell burgers and fries. Does everything need to be digitally and AI enhanced?
A spokesperson for Wendy's confirmed the news with Food & Wine, stating the company is focused on providing "great-tasting" food and is "making a significant investment" to grow its digital business, including rolling out digital menu boards in some U.S. restaurants. "Beginning as early as 2025, we will begin testing a variety of enhanced features on these digital menuboards like dynamic pricing, different offerings in certain parts of the day, AI-enabled menu changes and suggestive selling based on factors such as weather. Dynamic pricing can allow Wendy's to be competitive and flexible with pricing, motivate customers to visit and provide them with the food they love at a great value. We will test a number of features that we think will provide an enhanced customer and crew experience."
The digital menu boards are there so they don't have to hire as many cashiers.
It's why Five Guys and In-n-Out have been gaining market share the last 10 years. Give me a good burger, good fries.... that's all I want.
Why would I, as a customer, be 'motivated to visit' to see your magic price changing menu? I'm going to a restaurant that can't fucking do that.
Baconator ain’t worth it
Wendy’s won’t last. Their quality is so bad, their menu is terrible, they deserve to die and this will help.
Wendy's is the busiest fast food restaurant in town where I live, and I consistently see most locations being very busy, so... no? They're not going anywhere.
Based of this line of thinking then they're absolutely going out of buisness. The one near me is lucky to get a couple of cars at a time.
They aren't the busiest here, they are the slowest though. They always have a line wrapped around the building, but that's because the line hardly moves.
It's amazing the nose dive their quality has taken
Cool, guess I will continue to avoid fast food.
Smart.
A combo anywhere I go is over 10 bucks. What do they want from us, consumers are already being overmilked like a skinny cow
What's going to happen is people will stop buying there. I hope anyway. I like a treat too but I'll give my local joints money first.
Some people will. But others will never admit that fast food is too expensive.
They'll just complain they're not making enough money.
They want us to take out a loan to give them more money.
Wouldn't this run afoul of most states weights and meaures?
Because only rich people are entitled to access to food.
This is great! Considering I haven't had Wendys for years and this is another reason not to!
I actually haven't either when I think about it, I last got my husband a Frosty about a year ago when he was hospitalized and it was the only kind of food he could tolerate, but I can't think the last time I ate food there.
Even McDonald's is seeing lowered sales due to these high prices. People are only willing to pay so much for grease with a side of "chicken."
Wendy’s has been going downhill ever since Dave died.
At least with Uber it made some sense. Higher prices and this payments to drivers was meant to compel more drivers to head out to pick up the increased demand.
But here, there are no surge wages, nor are employees coming in to cover a rush.
Wonder if they'll only pay them in wages earned during a surge.
This should be illegal.
Sure should. Conservatives think it's great I'm sure.
ITS THR INVISIBLE HAND OF THE MARKET!!
I just go to local burger joints now, it's the same price and the food is better, and (probably) someone local is getting money and not some ceo across the world who doesn't care about my local economy or people.
No thanks Wendys lol
Guess I'm going to Taco Bell.
Taco bell is also ridiculously overpriced.
I stopped going when they got rid of the $1 beef burrito, which was actually a double-beef burrito.
ITT: people who didn't eat fast food anyways stroking themselves at the thought of the poors getting poorer. The only people eating Wendy's go here because it is their comfort food and they probably feel like it's the best option. They will pay the higher prices.
Imma broke removed, it sucked giant ass when the biggie bag went from 4 to 5 then to 6 bucks in my area. There is no delusions of grandeur when eatin at Wendy's, is jus cheap an becoming less an less.
I mean, I used to eat fast food before it became ridiculously expensive.
You have a point about that 'comfort food' thing. Some people are legit addicted to this stuff and will never admit they can't afford it or it's too expensive.
These are the people the businesses are banking on exploiting.