9 ms·

As someone who worked in stores for years, this isn’t entirely accurate. The machine isn’t just being an asshole to drive up service calls. The machines are fi

As someone who worked in stores for years, this isn’t entirely accurate. The machine isn’t just being an asshole to drive up service calls. The machines are filled with a dairy product which makes the “ice cream”. This is boiled nightly to keep the mixture free of bacteria. If the nightly heat cycle fails to complete for one of a dozen reasons the machine locks out. Those unaware of the process usually end up calling for service even if it’s a operations error(not enough product to boil successfully) Every two weeks the machine must be torn down and cleaned. It’s slightly complex but all well documented. Once the 14 day marker has been passed the machine is inoperable. It must be cleaned for food safety reasons. If your “cleaner” is out or you just have poor operations you’ll end up placing service calls out of confusion. If the heat phase fails or the 14 day timer has expired the machine "locks out" and becomes inoperable. This is where the vast majority of service calls come from. I never had an issue with a machine that was less than 20 years old. Taylor makes good equipments you just need the most basic level of operations proficiency.

miked85 5y ago
Do you have any insight into why the machines are broken so often then?
- wronglebowski 5y ago
  They aren't "broken". It's operations failures. The basic fact of 1. Keeping the machine full of the right amount of product to complete it's nightly heat cycle 2. Have someone trained to fully clean the machine every 14 days Is a burden too great for many franchisees to bear. The turnover is too high and investment in people too low to keep them operational. Nothing about them is "broken"
  - sverhagen 5y ago
    Poor UI is also a bug. And why do other fast food chains not have this problem then? I appreciate that McDonalds tries to safe money on training of new staff, but I just can't imagine that they do so much of a worse job at it than the competition. Did you see the video?
  - asdff 5y ago
    Why are they using such a complicated ice cream machine? I worked in food service in the 2010s and ours was pretty simple. One switch at the back for on and off and that was it. It took one person like 10 minutes to break it down and have it cleaned at the end of the night. The hardest part was wiping the exterior down. You basically just put a bucket underneath, ran the ice cream out, then ran hot water through it (forgot if we used some sort of sanitizer here), and hand washed a couple pieces. Other commercial icecream machines I've seen work like this. This mcdonalds machine is blowing my mind. I wonder why they opted not to use the bog standard ice cream machine every other fast food place uses.
    - Cederfjard 5y ago
      It sounds like the idea is to only have to spend time manually cleaning it every fortnight instead of daily, and perhaps to limit waste of the product? But perhaps that gets offset by the fact that the increased complexity seems to make it so difficult to operate that it leads to constant interruptions and expensive service calls.
      - ogurechny 5y ago
        Most likely, the real answer was given straight away: a worker from other company says they clean their machines daily. I'd expect that in common language that means they disassemble and wash them the old way without using any automatic maintenance programs. But then you wouldn't have a vaguely sensational video on a pop cultural topic with a million of views. I guess it's a typical big company nonsense. Someone probably had an idea that daily cleaning is too time-consuming and expensive, and the task to solve that problem was introduced. Some lab made tests, and defined The Only True Way of keeping the product edible. (Side note: re-boiling a mix of fats and sugars each day for two weeks? Who would eat the result of that? Who thought it was a reliable idea?) The cleaning period could only be stretched to the maximum, for obvious business reasons. That resulted in tiny error margins (which maker can't voluntary change without spending money on new research). So presentations on clear financial gains were made, and the new option was proudly implemented. Some employee has probably been keeping eye on changes in cream composition, regulations, and related research, and issuing new checks for the machines. However, in reality this doesn't work that well (even indifferent part-time workers who don't give a damn after a shift are part of reality you can't simply rule out). But the goal of reverting or altering the process is not really important to McDonalds, as making it work is now pain in the store owner's ass. You have probably noticed similar cases in computing, when some high-tech solution are introduced, and their gains are shared with lots of pathos, but the resulting system looks way too complex and unstable even from a distance.
  - h0l0cube 5y ago
    It seems like you didn't bother to watch the video, but used the OP synopsis as an accurate distillation of the investigation... which it isn't. McDonalds (purportedly) have to use an inferior machine. This machine is used by many other franchises, including Wendy's, but the UX has been specifically throttled in the McDonalds mandated model such that the error messages are opaque. So much so, that when a newer version was rolled out, one of the techs posted a video wondering if anyone else noticed the error messages were getting worse (and the video was promptly taken down). Thus training becomes much more difficult when error messages are in Eldritch screeches instead of plain English, like every other model. I'm not sure if you've worked at McDonalds (you've never specifically stated in any comment) and you've never specified when. Is it possible things are different now to when (or whichever franchise) you worked?
noahtallen 5y ago
> If the nightly heat cycle fails to complete for one of a dozen reasons the machine locks out. Those unaware of the process usually end up calling for service even if it’s a operations error(not enough product to boil successfully) This example is covered in the video. ;) The thing is, at least according to the reporting, even these operations errors are not clearly defined by the messages given by the machine. So, according to franchisees they talked to, all roads lead to the service technician, even if the problem doesn’t need one. That obviously leads to more downtime. It’s part of the problem because Taylor is incentivized to keep people calling in technicians, which means they deliberately update the machines with error codes even more difficult to understand. (Examples covered in the video too) Additionally, the video covers that many other chains, such as Wendy’s, use machines from Taylor with no problems. Supposedly, this is something specifically wrong with the model given to McDonald’s, because franchises don’t have a choice to use other models. When the video came out, about 14% of machines in the US were “broken”, which is pretty terrible for an industry application regardless of the cause!
- wronglebowski 5y ago
  I always had access to a Taylor manual and a Taylor technician via phone at no cost. Even with machines that were far out of warranty. Troubleshooting was never an issue for me. I never worked anywhere else with a Taylor machine. Perhaps other companies have better deals or easier to use equipment. I would like to know if Wendy's and others machines operate using the same food safety standards.
  - megameter 5y ago
    "Food safety standards" would not result in downtime rising from <1% to over 10%.
  - sverhagen 5y ago
    > I always had access to a Taylor manual and a Taylor technician via phone at no cost. Was that technician for free? Or did your franchise owner pay for it, out of (your) sight? The claim isn't that they do a poor job with technicians, just that they are perversely incentivized to profit from it. The video also explains there was a (very limited) owner manual, while all the secrets were in the service manual. Which of those did you have access to? I find it potentially a bit of a low blow to question Wendy's and others' food safety standards. Did you see the video?
throwawayboise 5y ago
I worked at McDonald's in the 1980s. The machines weren't so fancy then. They didn't have a self-santizing heat cycle. We broke them down and cleaned and sanitized them every night after close. The next morning they were put back together and turned on. Once a week we discarded any remaining dairy product to break the cycle of any bacteria that might be present. Same with the milkshake machines. In several years of working there I cannot recall any breakdowns of these machines.
- hellbannedguy 5y ago
  I worked at the concessions stand at Muir Woods in the early 90's. Every night the machine was emptied, and the removable parts were put in the dishwasher. Every morning the goo was put back in, and there was never a complaint, or a down day. I rang up a lot of $1.00 Softies. (Loved my coworkers. Still think about them all the time. The greatest group of people I had ever met. Hated the private sector corporation who did everything they could to lower the percent they had to give back to the government.)
- joezydeco 5y ago
  Same here. But I also recall that when the health department would do spot checks of bacteria and coliform counts on the machines, they were always in or near the danger zone. All you need is one kid that didn't wipe their ass correctly before assembling the beaters and you've got a health problem in the making. The self-sterilizing machines were designed to prevent this.
- cptskippy 5y ago
  I worked at McDonald's for 6 months in the late 90s and it was the same process. I actually quit because someone started the machine breakdown early, incorrectly, and without telling anyone because they wanted to leave at close.
mjrpes 5y ago
The video says the Taylor machines at other fast food places (Burger King, Wendy's) rarely break down, or at least much less than McDonald's. So you're saying this is untrue? If not, why the discrepancy?
- gruez 5y ago
  the other machines don't self-sanitize?
- arbitrage 5y ago
  mcdonald's has much higher customer volume, and possibly much more intense burst traffic ... lunch & breakfast, for example. the higher frequency of machine breakdown probably should first be linked to frequency of use, rather than trying to find something nefarious going on.
- slantyyz 5y ago
  The Wired article explains this more clearly than the video. These machines do more than the ones at the other places. "But what makes the machine special is that it has two hoppers and two barrels, each working independently with precise settings, to produce both milkshakes and soft serve simultaneously."[1] 1: https://www.wired.com/story/they-hacked-mcdonalds-ice-cream-makers-started-cold-war https://www.wired.com/story/they-hacked-mcdonalds-ice-cream-...
  - dsr_ 5y ago
    Sounds like having two machines would cost them some space and increase the reliability. Do the franchise owners want that increased cost and reliability?
evil-olive 5y ago
> Every two weeks the machine must be torn down and cleaned. It’s slightly complex but all well documented. Once the 14 day marker has been passed the machine is inoperable. It must be cleaned for food safety reasons. If your “cleaner” is out or you just have poor operations you’ll end up placing service calls out of confusion. This seems entirely reasonable to me. I've heard horror stories about bacteria & mold growth in commercial ice machines from infrequent cleanings. But...how high is the barrier to entry to becoming a "certified" ice cream machine cleaner? How much training is required, how much does it cost, etc? In other words: > Once the 14 day marker has been passed the machine is inoperable. Who has "admin rights" to reset this "most recently cleaned" timestamp? Is there any reason why I, if I'm a McDonald's manager, couldn't take the training myself, and be the person who does the every-two-weeks maintenance?
- parineum 5y ago
  > Is there any reason why I, if I'm a McDonald's manager, couldn't take the training myself, and be the person who does the every-two-weeks maintenance? I'd go out on a limb and say that it's McDonalds corporate that doesn't trust the franchise owner with the machine, not the manufacturer trying to swindle franchise owners.
  - evil-olive 5y ago
    Sure. But replace "franchise owner" with "shift manager" or whatever other job title you want. The question remains - what's the barrier to entry to becoming "certified" as an ice cream machine cleaner? Is it legitimately a difficult cleaning process that requires an extremely specialized skill-set that only the High Priests of Ice Cream Machinery are able to perform? Or, as seems likely to me, cleaning the machine is relatively simple, but the ability to reset the "time since last cleaning" setting may be artificially restricted? If I were the manufacturer of these Taylor ice cream machines, setting them up with a "one of our certified technicians needs to touch them at least once every 14 days, or they stop working" seems like an excellent way to seek rent / generate passive income.
    - 5y ago
grecy 5y ago
Do you have any explanation why this is purely a McDonald's problem, and other fast food places who use essentially the same ice cream maker have much, much less down time?
- arbitrage 5y ago
  mcdonald's has more customers.
Taniwha 5y ago
'boiled' is AFAIK a misnomer - I believe it is pasteurised ... at 151F - not actual boiling
mrweasel 5y ago
That would explain why the ice cream machines a never broken at some location, but frequently at others. It depends on how the franchise is managed and run.
h0l0cube 5y ago
> worked in stores for years Specifically McDonalds? The video states these problem aren't experienced at the same magnitude at other franchises, and alleges that McDonalds franchisees are locked into purchasing a downgraded model with indecipherable error messages.
amelius 5y ago
Doesn't most of this apply to milkshakes as well?
zinok 5y ago
This doesn't appear to contradict the GP at all. You have pointed out that when the machine locks out, there is an actual reason behind it. I don't think anyone claimed that it's simply triggered by an RNG or a timer. However, why are the machines this opaque and difficult to keep running? I think the point has been clearly made, that an incentive structure optimises for low reliability. Nothing you said contradicts this.
dncornholio 5y ago
If it's mostly operator errors, than why not make the information clear to the operators on what the error actually is? Your post only confirms how bad Taylor machines at McDonalds are. It looks they are deliberately making the machines obscure to the operators
- monkey_monkey 5y ago
  Yes, this seems to be exactly what they're doing – I posted a link on another thread to a Wired article that sheds some light on why these machines break down, and how McDonalds have waged legal war on a startup trying to bring some transparency to the internal operations of the Taylor machine. Here it is again, to save searching through the comments: https://www.wired.com/story/they-hacked-mcdonalds-ice-cream-makers-started-cold-war/ https://www.wired.com/story/they-hacked-mcdonalds-ice-cream-... [edited to add link]
  - wronglebowski 5y ago
    Seems to be paywalled? Even if this was the best idea executed at the highest level it wouldn't matter. This is all politics. Any time the franchisees try and circumvent the system of corporate it brings massive amounts of force to the table. Mcdonald's 100% intolerant of any kind of franchisee revolt or action against their direction. It's got nothing to do with the mission and everything to do with it being "outside the system".
  - Wowfunhappy 5y ago
    As a note, a lot of that wired piece is also in the video, including the startup. :)
seanmcdirmid 5y ago
I was crew for a few years in the early to mid 90s. Back then, the machine simply needed to be cleaned nightly (water cycled through, all the gaskets cleaned and relubed). Not hard, but definitely required some training and most weren’t taught. It was rarely broken but we often started cleaning early so.... I guess it’s just way different now.
kjjjjjjjjjjjjjj 5y ago
If the machine is made for min wage employees and 14% of them are constantly broken, the machine is a failure
nathanvanfleet 5y ago
I guess you didn't read the article or watch the video.
whydoineedthis 5y ago
It's a restaurant - 99% of the machinery in there has to operate within certain boundaries for food safety. Somehow every other machine manages to be fine, execpt this one that has a 15% failure rate. Also, other restaurants service dairy - also with a much less than 15% failure rate. There are simple solutions for everything you just said. Taylor makes garbage equipment and is ripping off franchise owners. McDonalds corporate likely owns stock in the company and uses it as a side hustle of revenue from franchise owners.

miked85 5y ago

Do you have any insight into why the machines are broken so often then?

wronglebowski 5y ago
They aren't "broken". It's operations failures. The basic fact of 1. Keeping the machine full of the right amount of product to complete it's nightly heat cycle 2. Have someone trained to fully clean the machine every 14 days Is a burden too great for many franchisees to bear. The turnover is too high and investment in people too low to keep them operational. Nothing about them is "broken"
- sverhagen 5y ago
  Poor UI is also a bug. And why do other fast food chains not have this problem then? I appreciate that McDonalds tries to safe money on training of new staff, but I just can't imagine that they do so much of a worse job at it than the competition. Did you see the video?
- asdff 5y ago
  Why are they using such a complicated ice cream machine? I worked in food service in the 2010s and ours was pretty simple. One switch at the back for on and off and that was it. It took one person like 10 minutes to break it down and have it cleaned at the end of the night. The hardest part was wiping the exterior down. You basically just put a bucket underneath, ran the ice cream out, then ran hot water through it (forgot if we used some sort of sanitizer here), and hand washed a couple pieces. Other commercial icecream machines I've seen work like this. This mcdonalds machine is blowing my mind. I wonder why they opted not to use the bog standard ice cream machine every other fast food place uses.
  - Cederfjard 5y ago
    It sounds like the idea is to only have to spend time manually cleaning it every fortnight instead of daily, and perhaps to limit waste of the product? But perhaps that gets offset by the fact that the increased complexity seems to make it so difficult to operate that it leads to constant interruptions and expensive service calls.
    - ogurechny 5y ago
      Most likely, the real answer was given straight away: a worker from other company says they clean their machines daily. I'd expect that in common language that means they disassemble and wash them the old way without using any automatic maintenance programs. But then you wouldn't have a vaguely sensational video on a pop cultural topic with a million of views. I guess it's a typical big company nonsense. Someone probably had an idea that daily cleaning is too time-consuming and expensive, and the task to solve that problem was introduced. Some lab made tests, and defined The Only True Way of keeping the product edible. (Side note: re-boiling a mix of fats and sugars each day for two weeks? Who would eat the result of that? Who thought it was a reliable idea?) The cleaning period could only be stretched to the maximum, for obvious business reasons. That resulted in tiny error margins (which maker can't voluntary change without spending money on new research). So presentations on clear financial gains were made, and the new option was proudly implemented. Some employee has probably been keeping eye on changes in cream composition, regulations, and related research, and issuing new checks for the machines. However, in reality this doesn't work that well (even indifferent part-time workers who don't give a damn after a shift are part of reality you can't simply rule out). But the goal of reverting or altering the process is not really important to McDonalds, as making it work is now pain in the store owner's ass. You have probably noticed similar cases in computing, when some high-tech solution are introduced, and their gains are shared with lots of pathos, but the resulting system looks way too complex and unstable even from a distance.
- h0l0cube 5y ago
  It seems like you didn't bother to watch the video, but used the OP synopsis as an accurate distillation of the investigation... which it isn't. McDonalds (purportedly) have to use an inferior machine. This machine is used by many other franchises, including Wendy's, but the UX has been specifically throttled in the McDonalds mandated model such that the error messages are opaque. So much so, that when a newer version was rolled out, one of the techs posted a video wondering if anyone else noticed the error messages were getting worse (and the video was promptly taken down). Thus training becomes much more difficult when error messages are in Eldritch screeches instead of plain English, like every other model. I'm not sure if you've worked at McDonalds (you've never specifically stated in any comment) and you've never specified when. Is it possible things are different now to when (or whichever franchise) you worked?

noahtallen 5y ago

> If the nightly heat cycle fails to complete for one of a dozen reasons the machine locks out. Those unaware of the process usually end up calling for service even if it’s a operations error(not enough product to boil successfully) This example is covered in the video. ;) The thing is, at least according to the reporting, even these operations errors are not clearly defined by the messages given by the machine. So, according to franchisees they talked to, all roads lead to the service technician, even if the problem doesn’t need one. That obviously leads to more downtime. It’s part of the problem because Taylor is incentivized to keep people calling in technicians, which means they deliberately update the machines with error codes even more difficult to understand. (Examples covered in the video too) Additionally, the video covers that many other chains, such as Wendy’s, use machines from Taylor with no problems. Supposedly, this is something specifically wrong with the model given to McDonald’s, because franchises don’t have a choice to use other models. When the video came out, about 14% of machines in the US were “broken”, which is pretty terrible for an industry application regardless of the cause!

wronglebowski 5y ago
I always had access to a Taylor manual and a Taylor technician via phone at no cost. Even with machines that were far out of warranty. Troubleshooting was never an issue for me. I never worked anywhere else with a Taylor machine. Perhaps other companies have better deals or easier to use equipment. I would like to know if Wendy's and others machines operate using the same food safety standards.
- megameter 5y ago
  "Food safety standards" would not result in downtime rising from <1% to over 10%.
- sverhagen 5y ago
  > I always had access to a Taylor manual and a Taylor technician via phone at no cost. Was that technician for free? Or did your franchise owner pay for it, out of (your) sight? The claim isn't that they do a poor job with technicians, just that they are perversely incentivized to profit from it. The video also explains there was a (very limited) owner manual, while all the secrets were in the service manual. Which of those did you have access to? I find it potentially a bit of a low blow to question Wendy's and others' food safety standards. Did you see the video?

throwawayboise 5y ago

I worked at McDonald's in the 1980s. The machines weren't so fancy then. They didn't have a self-santizing heat cycle. We broke them down and cleaned and sanitized them every night after close. The next morning they were put back together and turned on. Once a week we discarded any remaining dairy product to break the cycle of any bacteria that might be present. Same with the milkshake machines. In several years of working there I cannot recall any breakdowns of these machines.

hellbannedguy 5y ago
I worked at the concessions stand at Muir Woods in the early 90's. Every night the machine was emptied, and the removable parts were put in the dishwasher. Every morning the goo was put back in, and there was never a complaint, or a down day. I rang up a lot of $1.00 Softies. (Loved my coworkers. Still think about them all the time. The greatest group of people I had ever met. Hated the private sector corporation who did everything they could to lower the percent they had to give back to the government.)
joezydeco 5y ago
Same here. But I also recall that when the health department would do spot checks of bacteria and coliform counts on the machines, they were always in or near the danger zone. All you need is one kid that didn't wipe their ass correctly before assembling the beaters and you've got a health problem in the making. The self-sterilizing machines were designed to prevent this.
cptskippy 5y ago
I worked at McDonald's for 6 months in the late 90s and it was the same process. I actually quit because someone started the machine breakdown early, incorrectly, and without telling anyone because they wanted to leave at close.

mjrpes 5y ago

The video says the Taylor machines at other fast food places (Burger King, Wendy's) rarely break down, or at least much less than McDonald's. So you're saying this is untrue? If not, why the discrepancy?

gruez 5y ago
the other machines don't self-sanitize?
arbitrage 5y ago
mcdonald's has much higher customer volume, and possibly much more intense burst traffic ... lunch & breakfast, for example. the higher frequency of machine breakdown probably should first be linked to frequency of use, rather than trying to find something nefarious going on.
slantyyz 5y ago
The Wired article explains this more clearly than the video. These machines do more than the ones at the other places. "But what makes the machine special is that it has two hoppers and two barrels, each working independently with precise settings, to produce both milkshakes and soft serve simultaneously."[1] 1: https://www.wired.com/story/they-hacked-mcdonalds-ice-cream-makers-started-cold-war https://www.wired.com/story/they-hacked-mcdonalds-ice-cream-...
- dsr_ 5y ago
  Sounds like having two machines would cost them some space and increase the reliability. Do the franchise owners want that increased cost and reliability?

evil-olive 5y ago

> Every two weeks the machine must be torn down and cleaned. It’s slightly complex but all well documented. Once the 14 day marker has been passed the machine is inoperable. It must be cleaned for food safety reasons. If your “cleaner” is out or you just have poor operations you’ll end up placing service calls out of confusion. This seems entirely reasonable to me. I've heard horror stories about bacteria & mold growth in commercial ice machines from infrequent cleanings. But...how high is the barrier to entry to becoming a "certified" ice cream machine cleaner? How much training is required, how much does it cost, etc? In other words: > Once the 14 day marker has been passed the machine is inoperable. Who has "admin rights" to reset this "most recently cleaned" timestamp? Is there any reason why I, if I'm a McDonald's manager, couldn't take the training myself, and be the person who does the every-two-weeks maintenance?

parineum 5y ago
> Is there any reason why I, if I'm a McDonald's manager, couldn't take the training myself, and be the person who does the every-two-weeks maintenance? I'd go out on a limb and say that it's McDonalds corporate that doesn't trust the franchise owner with the machine, not the manufacturer trying to swindle franchise owners.
- evil-olive 5y ago
  Sure. But replace "franchise owner" with "shift manager" or whatever other job title you want. The question remains - what's the barrier to entry to becoming "certified" as an ice cream machine cleaner? Is it legitimately a difficult cleaning process that requires an extremely specialized skill-set that only the High Priests of Ice Cream Machinery are able to perform? Or, as seems likely to me, cleaning the machine is relatively simple, but the ability to reset the "time since last cleaning" setting may be artificially restricted? If I were the manufacturer of these Taylor ice cream machines, setting them up with a "one of our certified technicians needs to touch them at least once every 14 days, or they stop working" seems like an excellent way to seek rent / generate passive income.
  - 5y ago

grecy 5y ago

Do you have any explanation why this is purely a McDonald's problem, and other fast food places who use essentially the same ice cream maker have much, much less down time?

arbitrage 5y ago
mcdonald's has more customers.

Taniwha 5y ago

'boiled' is AFAIK a misnomer - I believe it is pasteurised ... at 151F - not actual boiling

mrweasel 5y ago

That would explain why the ice cream machines a never broken at some location, but frequently at others. It depends on how the franchise is managed and run.

h0l0cube 5y ago

> worked in stores for years Specifically McDonalds? The video states these problem aren't experienced at the same magnitude at other franchises, and alleges that McDonalds franchisees are locked into purchasing a downgraded model with indecipherable error messages.

amelius 5y ago

Doesn't most of this apply to milkshakes as well?

zinok 5y ago

This doesn't appear to contradict the GP at all. You have pointed out that when the machine locks out, there is an actual reason behind it. I don't think anyone claimed that it's simply triggered by an RNG or a timer. However, why are the machines this opaque and difficult to keep running? I think the point has been clearly made, that an incentive structure optimises for low reliability. Nothing you said contradicts this.

dncornholio 5y ago

If it's mostly operator errors, than why not make the information clear to the operators on what the error actually is? Your post only confirms how bad Taylor machines at McDonalds are. It looks they are deliberately making the machines obscure to the operators

monkey_monkey 5y ago
Yes, this seems to be exactly what they're doing – I posted a link on another thread to a Wired article that sheds some light on why these machines break down, and how McDonalds have waged legal war on a startup trying to bring some transparency to the internal operations of the Taylor machine. Here it is again, to save searching through the comments: https://www.wired.com/story/they-hacked-mcdonalds-ice-cream-makers-started-cold-war/ https://www.wired.com/story/they-hacked-mcdonalds-ice-cream-... [edited to add link]
- wronglebowski 5y ago
  Seems to be paywalled? Even if this was the best idea executed at the highest level it wouldn't matter. This is all politics. Any time the franchisees try and circumvent the system of corporate it brings massive amounts of force to the table. Mcdonald's 100% intolerant of any kind of franchisee revolt or action against their direction. It's got nothing to do with the mission and everything to do with it being "outside the system".
- Wowfunhappy 5y ago
  As a note, a lot of that wired piece is also in the video, including the startup. :)

seanmcdirmid 5y ago

I was crew for a few years in the early to mid 90s. Back then, the machine simply needed to be cleaned nightly (water cycled through, all the gaskets cleaned and relubed). Not hard, but definitely required some training and most weren’t taught. It was rarely broken but we often started cleaning early so.... I guess it’s just way different now.

kjjjjjjjjjjjjjj 5y ago

If the machine is made for min wage employees and 14% of them are constantly broken, the machine is a failure

nathanvanfleet 5y ago

I guess you didn't read the article or watch the video.

whydoineedthis 5y ago

It's a restaurant - 99% of the machinery in there has to operate within certain boundaries for food safety. Somehow every other machine manages to be fine, execpt this one that has a 15% failure rate. Also, other restaurants service dairy - also with a much less than 15% failure rate. There are simple solutions for everything you just said. Taylor makes garbage equipment and is ripping off franchise owners. McDonalds corporate likely owns stock in the company and uses it as a side hustle of revenue from franchise owners.