Carl's Jr. & Hardee's Testing 4 for $6 Menu

[storewanderer]

Not really..............................

The fat drips off the burgers the entire time they are cooking (same at Burger King or anywhere else that cooks the burger on a BBQ set up). For a thin fast food burger, a very significant amount of the fat just drips away. For the "thickburger" still plenty of fat left there, it is too thick to have most of that melt away.

Compared to a burger cooked on a flat grill where the burger just cooks in the grease that comes out during cooking, and soaks it up...

[storewanderer]

I'm surprised either chain is still around, although they apparently have big "transformational" plans. https://www.forbes.com/sites/aliciakels ... 9c0ec06033 It sounds like one pilot area did very well, but the second did more modestly. Carls Jr lost their halo a long time ago and Hardees has grown and retrenched more times than I can remember---they seem to do best in small towns and underserved exurbs but even in those places, they often seem to come and go.

The idea of combining a burger place that had a following in an intensely competitive burger market with a mediocre burger place known mostly for breakfast must have seemed like a good idea "on paper" but they've never really made it work very well. The Carls Jr menu didn't play well with Hardees customers who were used to a cheap but forgettable burger and didn't want to pay more even if it was something better. The franchisees didn't like it either, but still they seem to be trying to tinker with some version of a common operation. It's difficult to find numbers on their domestic operations for Hardees, which is the larger operation in the US, but I'm guessing it's less than it was 10-15 years ago.

I have yet to see any of these upgrades at any Carls units I have observed. Most Carls feel like they are barely hanging on. Somehow they've dragged Carls down to the feel of Hardees in the late 90's.

Actually I have noticed Carls has more traffic at breakfast than it does at most times of day around Reno. It is strange. I am sure the breakfast as a % of total sales is still less than 20% due to lower ticket, but they have an impressive amount of breakfast traffic. Carls are usually so dead, to see more than 5-6 customers there at the same time is impressive. But the breakfast product is a solid program and they have been keeping open inside during breakfast while others including McDonalds and Wendys do this drive through only thing.

Carl's has been surprisingly stable. I have been predicting significant store closures out of this chain for years now and it is not happening. I know the expansion into Dallas has been troubled and they have had mass closures there, also a lot of closures in OK where they converted Hardees units to Carls. But in the core CA/AZ/NV/OR/UT/ID/CO markets, there are location closes here and there but not in mass, and that is how it has always been. I don't know how so many locations of this chain are staying in business. They seem to have very few customers. Their prices are very, very high. You are very lucky if you get food that is fresh and hot from them, and the service tends to be slow. I will say their locations seem pretty clean, but I credit that to the lack of customers.

[veteran+]

Not really..............................

The fat drips off the burgers the entire time they are cooking (same at Burger King or anywhere else that cooks the burger on a BBQ set up). For a thin fast food burger, a very significant amount of the fat just drips away. For the "thickburger" still plenty of fat left there, it is too thick to have most of that melt away.

Compared to a burger cooked on a flat grill where the burger just cooks in the grease that comes out during cooking, and soaks it up...

Cholesterol is still there.

Carl's - Hardee's were both on the list of top 6 fast food cos. that are the worse for cholesterol.

[storewanderer]

Cholesterol is still there.

Carl's - Hardee's were both on the list of top 6 fast food cos. that are the worse for cholesterol.

A lot of the issue with that is the condiments going onto the burgers. Too many burgers with multiple mayonnaise/cheese/bacon combinations which shoots up the cholesterol.

For instance- looking at Carls Jr. nutrition:

The small patty (used on kid burger/2 of them on 3.49 double burgers) start with a stripped version (kid burger- bun, meat, ketchup) that contains 25mg cholesterol.

Sticking with the no cheese/no mayo theme let's go to the standard size patty which goes Big Burger (1 patty) another stripped item with bun, meat, ketchup, maybe some pickles- that item contains 50mg cholesterol.

Now go to the Famous Star which is Big Burger but with mayo/cheese added and you are at 75mg cholesterol (and a huge sodium jump too).

The old days fast food more in line with the two items I described above first, was rather innocent with simple little burgers that had ketchup and some pickle/mustard on them. Those little burgers won't kill anyone. The larger burgers that are loaded up with mayo/cheese/bacon are another story.