4 ms·

I understand individual actors following incentives wherever they lead. I wouldn't say condone, but understand. What I don't understand is how it came to pass t

I understand individual actors following incentives wherever they lead. I wouldn't say condone, but understand. What I don't understand is how it came to pass that McDonalds, whom I would assume are canny and cutthroat in their own right, would find themselves maneuvered into a position like this. Is there no equivalent phenomenon when it comes to their grills, deep fryers, drive-thru comms systems, self-order kiosks, etc?

jerf 3y ago
This isn't an answer, so much as a sketch of my guess at answer, but check out "path dependence": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Path_dependence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Path_dependence If they go down the right path right at the beginning, a bit of payoff in the right places in McDonalds (which, remember, can be just taking the right people out to a really nice dinner every so often), and it could be that one equipment supplier managed to go down a path that no other current supplier could ever hope to replicate because it really depends on some early decisions, and those suppliers no longer have any opportunity to make "early" decisions.
- glenstein 3y ago
  I've heard of path dependence but had not considered it in this context. Thanks for the link!
mherkender 3y ago
Given the poor technical choices made regularly in old corporations, I'm guessing they had no idea what they got themselves into. That or it's their franchisee's problem and they don't have any incentive to fix it.
- toomuchtodo 3y ago
  > That or it's their franchisee's problem and they don't have any incentive to fix it. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29326999 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29326999
- karaterobot 3y ago
  I think of McDonald's as being pretty savvy, having dominated for decades in a competitive domain with large volume and low margins. In violation of Hanlon's Razor, I'd bet the reason is more malice rather than stupidity. Or rather, the specific form of malice more precisely called short-sighted greed.
  - bombcar 3y ago
    McDonald's probably has paperwork that shows "ice cream machine broke" doesn't really cost them anything in sales or return visits, so why work on fixing it? If it was a critical product, they'd have multiple machines per store, just like the friers (often way more than is needed).
LinuxBender 3y ago
Here [1] is a video on this topic by Johnny Harris from a couple years ago. It's been a while since I watched it but IIRC there is a conflicting relationship between specifically McDonalds the corporation and Taylor which benefits both of them but screws over the individual franchise owners. Here is an interactive map [2] that shows where all the broken machines are. [1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrDEtSlqJC4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrDEtSlqJC4 [video][30 mins] There is a sponsor ad from 06:49 to 08:47 [2] - https://mcbroken.com/ https://mcbroken.com/
- lotsofpulp 3y ago
  All franchise brands do this once they have sufficient power relative to the franchisees. Hotel brands force hotel owners to use only certain vendors, taking a kickback from the vendor. Same with restaurants/etc. I can give a specific example. Roughly 8 years ago, IHG hotels required all of their branded hotels to only sell Coca Cola products. The only reason this would happen is if Coke paid IHG. It has nothing to do with a person’s hotel stay. It just restricts hotel owners and hotel guests from being able to sell and buy their preferred products, such as Red Bull or Starbucks or Pepsi/Tropicana, for the benefit of Coke and IHG.
  - nradov 3y ago
    Beyond vendor kickbacks, hotel brands do have legitimate reasons to ensure a consistent guest experience regardless of which franchisee owns a particular property. Frequent travelers can be surprisingly picky about little things like soft drinks and they don't like surprises.
    - lotsofpulp 3y ago
      Then they would have required offering specific products. It would not require prohibiting other products. Edit: to respond to tomnipotent: I don’t see why a distributor is relevant. There are myriad to choose from. Hotel owners/operators can buy from the local Coke/Pepsi/whatever distributor, or Sam’s/Costco/grocery store, or Restaurant Depot/US Foods, etc. Edit 2: note that IHG is not buying the beverages to sell in the franchised hotel, the IHG franchisees are. IHG does not suffer any costs from making an exclusive deal with Coke, or not making an exclusive deal with Coke.
ehutch79 3y ago
Short answer; the franchisee pays for the repairs, and allegedly McD's corporate gets a kickback. Supposedly, wendy's, burgerking, etc, have a model that is identical except for the opaque error system. Info from the internet at large, so big grain of salt.
Someone1234 3y ago
McDonald's are the bad actor here. There is two "McDonald's" the corporation, that requires a specific machine and by extension a specific company to repair it exclusively, and then there is a ton of "McDonald's" franchises who are the victims (paying the literal price). So McDonald's corporate didn't get out-maneuvered, they just found a new way to extract money from their franchises, who tried to fight back (and kind of lost the first battle). Sounds like the FTC/DOJ are stepping in to give the franchises more ammo to fight back with.
- autoexec 3y ago
  > and then there is a ton of "McDonald's" franchises who are the victims (paying the literal price). Everybody loses in this situation. the biggest victims here are the consumers who can't get the products that they want, and have had to resort to developing/using apps to track down working machines, followed by the employees who have to deal with the constantly angry/frustrated customers, followed by the franchise owners who are losing money and disappointing their customers. The franchise owners are acting in self-defense by working around the vendor which means the vendor is losing money on service calls, and the corporation loses because (quite rightly) their image suffers for causing this mess in the first place and allowing it to continue.
cogman10 3y ago
> grills, deep fryers, drive-thru comms systems, self-order kiosks, etc? The key difference between all those things is there's almost no moving parts involved. Grills are simply resistive heaters and a thermostat that will outlast everyone. Deep fryers are exactly the same, but with a tub to put in oil. Drive through comms systems are simply speakers/telephone systems with the only moving part being the speaker itself. (The rest is software). And The kiosks are basically just giant touch screens with a small computer running everything. Ice cream is different. It's a thick highly spoil-able product being pushed through tubes which need to be clean. It involves a refrigerant and often a mixing device to keep the ice cream from freezing solid. Mcdonalds isn't the only one with icecream machines that constantly break down. If you notice, everyone has this problem. It's simply a hard product to serve in a sanitary way using machinery.
- 7thaccount 3y ago
  Negative. Yes, others break down, but at a MUCH lower rate. It's a scam.
  - cogman10 3y ago
    Oh sorry, I wasn't trying to say it wasn't a scam. Just explaining why ice cream machines would be harder to maintain/install than something like a grill and why there might be limited options on who to go with.
    - 7thaccount 3y ago
      Ah gotcha and totally agree.
- jdietrich 3y ago
  >Deep fryers are exactly the same, but with a tub to put in oil. Not really true. The fryers used by McDonalds and the vast majority of QSRs are digitally controlled have a fairly sophisticated recirculating filter system to keep the shortening in good condition. The state of this system is much less critical from a food safety standpoint, but it can be extremely hazardous to employees for obvious reasons. The pressure fryers used by fried chicken restaurants are potentially even more hazardous. To my knowledge, none of these systems have weird DMCA-protected firmware to prevent unauthorised maintenance.

jerf 3y ago

This isn't an answer, so much as a sketch of my guess at answer, but check out "path dependence": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Path_dependence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Path_dependence If they go down the right path right at the beginning, a bit of payoff in the right places in McDonalds (which, remember, can be just taking the right people out to a really nice dinner every so often), and it could be that one equipment supplier managed to go down a path that no other current supplier could ever hope to replicate because it really depends on some early decisions, and those suppliers no longer have any opportunity to make "early" decisions.

glenstein 3y ago
I've heard of path dependence but had not considered it in this context. Thanks for the link!

mherkender 3y ago

Given the poor technical choices made regularly in old corporations, I'm guessing they had no idea what they got themselves into. That or it's their franchisee's problem and they don't have any incentive to fix it.

toomuchtodo 3y ago
> That or it's their franchisee's problem and they don't have any incentive to fix it. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29326999 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29326999
karaterobot 3y ago
I think of McDonald's as being pretty savvy, having dominated for decades in a competitive domain with large volume and low margins. In violation of Hanlon's Razor, I'd bet the reason is more malice rather than stupidity. Or rather, the specific form of malice more precisely called short-sighted greed.
- bombcar 3y ago
  McDonald's probably has paperwork that shows "ice cream machine broke" doesn't really cost them anything in sales or return visits, so why work on fixing it? If it was a critical product, they'd have multiple machines per store, just like the friers (often way more than is needed).

LinuxBender 3y ago

Here [1] is a video on this topic by Johnny Harris from a couple years ago. It's been a while since I watched it but IIRC there is a conflicting relationship between specifically McDonalds the corporation and Taylor which benefits both of them but screws over the individual franchise owners. Here is an interactive map [2] that shows where all the broken machines are. [1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrDEtSlqJC4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrDEtSlqJC4 [video][30 mins] There is a sponsor ad from 06:49 to 08:47 [2] - https://mcbroken.com/ https://mcbroken.com/

lotsofpulp 3y ago
All franchise brands do this once they have sufficient power relative to the franchisees. Hotel brands force hotel owners to use only certain vendors, taking a kickback from the vendor. Same with restaurants/etc. I can give a specific example. Roughly 8 years ago, IHG hotels required all of their branded hotels to only sell Coca Cola products. The only reason this would happen is if Coke paid IHG. It has nothing to do with a person’s hotel stay. It just restricts hotel owners and hotel guests from being able to sell and buy their preferred products, such as Red Bull or Starbucks or Pepsi/Tropicana, for the benefit of Coke and IHG.
- nradov 3y ago
  Beyond vendor kickbacks, hotel brands do have legitimate reasons to ensure a consistent guest experience regardless of which franchisee owns a particular property. Frequent travelers can be surprisingly picky about little things like soft drinks and they don't like surprises.
  - lotsofpulp 3y ago
    Then they would have required offering specific products. It would not require prohibiting other products. Edit: to respond to tomnipotent: I don’t see why a distributor is relevant. There are myriad to choose from. Hotel owners/operators can buy from the local Coke/Pepsi/whatever distributor, or Sam’s/Costco/grocery store, or Restaurant Depot/US Foods, etc. Edit 2: note that IHG is not buying the beverages to sell in the franchised hotel, the IHG franchisees are. IHG does not suffer any costs from making an exclusive deal with Coke, or not making an exclusive deal with Coke.

ehutch79 3y ago

Short answer; the franchisee pays for the repairs, and allegedly McD's corporate gets a kickback. Supposedly, wendy's, burgerking, etc, have a model that is identical except for the opaque error system. Info from the internet at large, so big grain of salt.

Someone1234 3y ago

McDonald's are the bad actor here. There is two "McDonald's" the corporation, that requires a specific machine and by extension a specific company to repair it exclusively, and then there is a ton of "McDonald's" franchises who are the victims (paying the literal price). So McDonald's corporate didn't get out-maneuvered, they just found a new way to extract money from their franchises, who tried to fight back (and kind of lost the first battle). Sounds like the FTC/DOJ are stepping in to give the franchises more ammo to fight back with.

autoexec 3y ago
> and then there is a ton of "McDonald's" franchises who are the victims (paying the literal price). Everybody loses in this situation. the biggest victims here are the consumers who can't get the products that they want, and have had to resort to developing/using apps to track down working machines, followed by the employees who have to deal with the constantly angry/frustrated customers, followed by the franchise owners who are losing money and disappointing their customers. The franchise owners are acting in self-defense by working around the vendor which means the vendor is losing money on service calls, and the corporation loses because (quite rightly) their image suffers for causing this mess in the first place and allowing it to continue.

cogman10 3y ago

> grills, deep fryers, drive-thru comms systems, self-order kiosks, etc? The key difference between all those things is there's almost no moving parts involved. Grills are simply resistive heaters and a thermostat that will outlast everyone. Deep fryers are exactly the same, but with a tub to put in oil. Drive through comms systems are simply speakers/telephone systems with the only moving part being the speaker itself. (The rest is software). And The kiosks are basically just giant touch screens with a small computer running everything. Ice cream is different. It's a thick highly spoil-able product being pushed through tubes which need to be clean. It involves a refrigerant and often a mixing device to keep the ice cream from freezing solid. Mcdonalds isn't the only one with icecream machines that constantly break down. If you notice, everyone has this problem. It's simply a hard product to serve in a sanitary way using machinery.

7thaccount 3y ago
Negative. Yes, others break down, but at a MUCH lower rate. It's a scam.
- cogman10 3y ago
  Oh sorry, I wasn't trying to say it wasn't a scam. Just explaining why ice cream machines would be harder to maintain/install than something like a grill and why there might be limited options on who to go with.
  - 7thaccount 3y ago
    Ah gotcha and totally agree.
jdietrich 3y ago
>Deep fryers are exactly the same, but with a tub to put in oil. Not really true. The fryers used by McDonalds and the vast majority of QSRs are digitally controlled have a fairly sophisticated recirculating filter system to keep the shortening in good condition. The state of this system is much less critical from a food safety standpoint, but it can be extremely hazardous to employees for obvious reasons. The pressure fryers used by fried chicken restaurants are potentially even more hazardous. To my knowledge, none of these systems have weird DMCA-protected firmware to prevent unauthorised maintenance.