Breakfast Traffic Plunges In November

Alpha8472
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Breakfast Traffic Plunges In November

Post by Alpha8472 »

Breakfast traffic has plunged at fast food restaurants. This is strange as dinner traffic has not shown such a decrease. More people are returning to in person work, but breakfast sales are not going up as expected.

It is assumed to be due to a lack of breakfast promotions. Promotions eat into margins.

https://www.nrn.com/quick-service/why-b ... d-november
storewanderer
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Re: Breakfast Traffic Plunges In November

Post by storewanderer »

Wendys was doing a $3 Croissant/Small Fried Potatoes for $3 most of November and maybe a little into December.

I don't think Wendys has resumed a breakfast promotion for December. I have not consumed breakfast from Wendys since November. I do notice their dine in is open during breakfast lately, probably desperate for any customer they can get at this point.

Egg prices have gone up drastically nationwide in recent months. What was previously a cheap ingredient has gone up significantly in price. Promotions are often planned months in advance and promotions planned last summer for instance to run this winter were not able to predict the egg prices spiking the way they have. I would not be surprised if some chains pulled their promotions planned for December due to the situation with egg prices.
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Re: Breakfast Traffic Plunges In November

Post by pseudo3d »

storewanderer wrote: December 17th, 2022, 2:02 am Wendys was doing a $3 Croissant/Small Fried Potatoes for $3 most of November and maybe a little into December.

I don't think Wendys has resumed a breakfast promotion for December. I have not consumed breakfast from Wendys since November. I do notice their dine in is open during breakfast lately, probably desperate for any customer they can get at this point.

Egg prices have gone up drastically nationwide in recent months. What was previously a cheap ingredient has gone up significantly in price. Promotions are often planned months in advance and promotions planned last summer for instance to run this winter were not able to predict the egg prices spiking the way they have. I would not be surprised if some chains pulled their promotions planned for December due to the situation with egg prices.
Back in the late 2010s, a breakfast sandwich meal cost maybe a little over $5 with tax; now it's closer to $7-8 with the base price of a sandwich spiraling upwards. I know this is probably the price of eggs almost quadrupling but it is discouraging.
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Re: Breakfast Traffic Plunges In November

Post by storewanderer »

pseudo3d wrote: December 18th, 2022, 2:10 pm

Back in the late 2010s, a breakfast sandwich meal cost maybe a little over $5 with tax; now it's closer to $7-8 with the base price of a sandwich spiraling upwards. I know this is probably the price of eggs almost quadrupling but it is discouraging.
So before the egg cost .10 but now it costs .40. That doesn't explain a price hike of $2-$3.

Like a lot of things, many businesses are just trying to "get theirs" if you know what I mean. They are taking radical price increases to see if customers will be willing to pay or not. Fast food breakfast appears to be a thing that many customers are not willing to pay these increased prices for. Add in more competition (Wendys and also Taco Bell's relaunch) and the pie is sliced into smaller and smaller pieces at breakfast. Add in stupid decisions like "drive through only" which drove away the old newspaper reading coffee drinking customer who reliably showed up almost every day and sat there for a couple hours and spent $5 but that is $5 more than they are getting out of them with their "drive through only" policy...

Meanwhile what I am noticing is a larger and larger customer segment has no problem paying "local" sit down restaurants upwards of $20+ for breakfast after tax/tip (closer to $25 with a drink).

I am wondering if what happened is folks who used to get fast food breakfast a few times a week are instead routing that spending to a sit down place once a week.
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Re: Breakfast Traffic Plunges In November

Post by pseudo3d »

storewanderer wrote: December 18th, 2022, 2:35 pm
pseudo3d wrote: December 18th, 2022, 2:10 pm

Back in the late 2010s, a breakfast sandwich meal cost maybe a little over $5 with tax; now it's closer to $7-8 with the base price of a sandwich spiraling upwards. I know this is probably the price of eggs almost quadrupling but it is discouraging.
So before the egg cost .10 but now it costs .40. That doesn't explain a price hike of $2-$3.

Like a lot of things, many businesses are just trying to "get theirs" if you know what I mean. They are taking radical price increases to see if customers will be willing to pay or not. Fast food breakfast appears to be a thing that many customers are not willing to pay these increased prices for. Add in more competition (Wendys and also Taco Bell's relaunch) and the pie is sliced into smaller and smaller pieces at breakfast. Add in stupid decisions like "drive through only" which drove away the old newspaper reading coffee drinking customer who reliably showed up almost every day and sat there for a couple hours and spent $5 but that is $5 more than they are getting out of them with their "drive through only" policy...

Meanwhile what I am noticing is a larger and larger customer segment has no problem paying "local" sit down restaurants upwards of $20+ for breakfast after tax/tip (closer to $25 with a drink).

I am wondering if what happened is folks who used to get fast food breakfast a few times a week are instead routing that spending to a sit down place once a week.
Not sure about Cracker Barrel but when I visited a location of Original Pancake House (I believe most of their locations are West Coast), the restaurant was still maybe 50% full at around 10am to 11am on a weekday morning (enough that a small party could easily be seated but far from empty), and this was considered a "slow period". It's not anywhere close to 24 hours and is located in a strip mall but if that's a slow period, I'd hate to see it on weekends.
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Re: Breakfast Traffic Plunges In November

Post by storewanderer »

pseudo3d wrote: December 18th, 2022, 3:01 pm

Not sure about Cracker Barrel but when I visited a location of Original Pancake House (I believe most of their locations are West Coast), the restaurant was still maybe 50% full at around 10am to 11am on a weekday morning (enough that a small party could easily be seated but far from empty), and this was considered a "slow period". It's not anywhere close to 24 hours and is located in a strip mall but if that's a slow period, I'd hate to see it on weekends.
I don't see the crowds at these national chains like Cracker Barrel, IHOP, or Dennys at breakfast ever anymore (yes there are people at these chains but there is no 1 hour waitlist). The crowds and 1 hour waitlists are at the locally owned places at breakfast especially on weekends... at least that is what I see in my area, and when I travel.
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Re: Breakfast Traffic Plunges In November

Post by mbz321 »

storewanderer wrote: December 17th, 2022, 2:02 am Wendys was doing a $3 Croissant/Small Fried Potatoes for $3 most of November and maybe a little into December.
They were still doing this promo, at least in my area, as of this past Saturday, as that was my breakfast :P. The best part is if you order in the app at least, you can switch the croissant out for a buttermilk biscuit.
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Re: Breakfast Traffic Plunges In November

Post by BillyGr »

storewanderer wrote: December 17th, 2022, 2:02 am Wendys was doing a $3 Croissant/Small Fried Potatoes for $3 most of November and maybe a little into December.

I don't think Wendys has resumed a breakfast promotion for December. I have not consumed breakfast from Wendys since November. I do notice their dine in is open during breakfast lately, probably desperate for any customer they can get at this point.

Egg prices have gone up drastically nationwide in recent months. What was previously a cheap ingredient has gone up significantly in price. Promotions are often planned months in advance and promotions planned last summer for instance to run this winter were not able to predict the egg prices spiking the way they have. I would not be surprised if some chains pulled their promotions planned for December due to the situation with egg prices.
Eggs have certainly increased, but even at $5 per dozen (most regular ones are less than that here, and you can only figure that someone buying in quantity like a fast food place will get an even lower price than at retail), that's still less than $1 total for two eggs (are most sandwiches even two, or just one?).

So, it's not impossible to still be at a lower price on those than many things.
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Re: Breakfast Traffic Plunges In November

Post by storewanderer »

mbz321 wrote: December 19th, 2022, 7:05 am
storewanderer wrote: December 17th, 2022, 2:02 am Wendys was doing a $3 Croissant/Small Fried Potatoes for $3 most of November and maybe a little into December.
They were still doing this promo, at least in my area, as of this past Saturday, as that was my breakfast :P. The best part is if you order in the app at least, you can switch the croissant out for a buttermilk biscuit.
Promotion has been gone out west since after Thanksgiving. It was showing on the app as "local breakfast deal" or something.

There is a big push within Wendys to get breakfast sales per store up to $3k per day in sales. I doubt the locations around me even break $1k. Would be surprised if a couple of the locations even break $500.
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Re: Breakfast Traffic Plunges In November

Post by cjd »

You also have new places like Wawa coming in that for whatever reason, despite not having a drive thru are very popular for breakfast sandwiches. Not sure if it’s just because they’re completely new, and that’s what people gravitate to is all new, or what.
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