4 ms·
> On the official website of McDonald’s, the company claims that their meat is cheap because, while serving many people every day, they are able to buy from the
by corin_ 13y ago
> On the official website of McDonald’s, the company claims that their meat is cheap because, while serving many people every day, they are able to buy from their suppliers at a lower price, and offer the best quality products. But if “pink slime” was really the “best quality” that McDonalds can muster in the US, then why were they able do better in Latin America and Europe? More to the point, why can they apparently do better now in the United States?
Is the author genuinely confused, or even under the impression that anyone might be confused, by that statement from McDonalds, into thinking that the meat they use is the absolutely very best meat possibly available? That when you're paying $1 for a burger, you probably aren't getting quite the same quality as when you buy a nice fillet in a good restaurant, and that "best quality" was not only standard marketing hyperbole, but also was a reference within the context of their goal of being better than their rivals?
- DanBC 13y agoMcD's use a low quality product in one country. This isn't just "not best quality", it is very low quality meat. UK advertising laws have the concept of "Legal, Decent, Honest, and Truthful", I don't know what it's like in the US. But calling the worst quality level of meat available from a carcass "best quality" seems deceitful. These ingredients have terms in the UK, but there are loopholes and these are exploited sometimes. Mechanically recovered meat used in Sausages (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21530861 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21530861) (Something called a "sausage" in England needs to have certain quantity of meat, where both the quantity of meat and the meaning of meat are defined in law) (https://www.gov.uk/food-standards-labelling-durability-and-composition#meat-products https://www.gov.uk/food-standards-labelling-durability-and-c...)
- corin_ 13y agoHow do you define "quality" when talking about McDonalds food? If their burgers taste better than their rivals (subjective, of course) then aren't they the best?
- seanmcdirmid 13y agoI believe superlatives are like this: "best" means "as good as anything else" and is incredibly vague from a legal standpoint. You could safely say "our hamburgers are the best" but you probably couldn't say "our hamburgers are better than Burger King's", given that the latter statement is a specific claim.
- James_Duval 13y agoThe final product isn't the same as the ingredients, though. If they are using the absolute worst cut of meat, bleaching it and flavouring it to taste good, the food might be considered "best quality" in terms of taste, but the meat cannot be considered "best quality". Conversely, the wholly fictional "Kobe beef jerky" kickstarter scam would have been mediocre (if not poor) quality jerky, but (arguably at least) best quality meat, had it existed.
- corin_ 13y agoThey said they "offer the best quality products", not that they offer products made with the best quality ingredients.
- James_Duval 13y agoAha, my mistake - I misread. In that case my comment is an argument for your point of view, not against it.
- DanBC 13y agoQuality for a meat product would cover things like breed of cow used; cut of meat used; and the way that meat is processed. Using meat from Aberdeen Angus beef cows, and using nice cuts of steak, and mincing it, would result in a high quality product. Using meat from old dairy cows, mechanically recovered from the carcass after everything else has been used, results in a lower quality product. I think taste is not relevant to quality. They're not saying "tastier than the rival products".
- 13y ago