Wendy's Franchise Files Bankruptcy

[babs]

Wendy's does offer a better product than many fast food chains. One of the problems with Wendy's is that they don't always have the most visible locations. (Burger King is like this to some extent) But Wendy's as of late is getting expensive for regular menu items, and it's not uncommon for a combo of any kind to be over $10 now (although this is an issue just about everywhere, with every chain, in Washington now)

I don't mind spending a little more at Wendy's when I know I am getting quality food. And while I have encountered a few truly bad Wendy's locations, I really do not have issues at most of them.

Burger King has issues with inconsistency. One restaurant will be clean and food cooked fresh. Another will be dirty, and just about everything is precooked and reheated in the microwave. And others will randomly be drive thru only.

The one I am waiting to see a bankrupt franchisee from is Jack In The Box...probably the chain that slipped the most during COVID, and to this day. seems to be making up hours as they go along and sometimes still not opening dining rooms. I think, at this point, Subway is even more consistent than Jack.

Wendy's seems to have some OK employees. Burger King has the worst employees who could care less about service. Some thing is wrong with your order, they just shrug their shoulders. I only go there because I like the Impossible Whopper. However, they constantly screw it up. Can't tell you how many times I have had to file a complaint online. Getting a credit through the app is super easy however, .

[ClownLoach]

Wendy's does offer a better product than many fast food chains. One of the problems with Wendy's is that they don't always have the most visible locations. (Burger King is like this to some extent) But Wendy's as of late is getting expensive for regular menu items, and it's not uncommon for a combo of any kind to be over $10 now (although this is an issue just about everywhere, with every chain, in Washington now)

I don't mind spending a little more at Wendy's when I know I am getting quality food. And while I have encountered a few truly bad Wendy's locations, I really do not have issues at most of them.

Burger King has issues with inconsistency. One restaurant will be clean and food cooked fresh. Another will be dirty, and just about everything is precooked and reheated in the microwave. And others will randomly be drive thru only.

The one I am waiting to see a bankrupt franchisee from is Jack In The Box...probably the chain that slipped the most during COVID, and to this day. seems to be making up hours as they go along and sometimes still not opening dining rooms. I think, at this point, Subway is even more consistent than Jack.

I haven't seen a Burger King that cooks anything fresh in years, and frankly I stopped looking when the prices shot through the roof and worthwhile promotions on the Whopper disappeared. They are consistently bad. They are dead to me even if they offered one penny Whoppers.

Jack in the Box has always been equal to McDonald's in my, product that barely resembles "food" and the only redeeming quality is that Jack decided to pickup the $1 any size soda promo that McDonald's used to use. The food tastes like it is all fully cooked then frozen and reheated. If you told me their burger patties are previously cooked and frozen then reheated on a flat top I'd believe you. There are textures that are disturbing and just not natural, like their milkshakes which are allegedly made with "real ice cream" yet they have the slimy texture of thick Cool Whip. And every time they run a promotion for something that sounds like it should be decent, like Ribeye burgers, they're the same nauseating processed tasting food. I was getting a drink at one the other night and saw they were the test location for the new Smashed Jack, with pictures that looked magically identical to the LA startup I've praised Heavy Handed. But their price was very expensive and I just know it will not be a legitimate Smash burger.

Wendy's used to always serve very hot and fresh burgers that taste like they just came off the grill, but clearly they've transitioned to the labor savings of Carl's and BK with batch cooking a bunch of patties and throwing them into a steamrable or something like that. Their fries were never very good. Dave Thomas invented that lightning fast double sided grill to enable them to rapidly cook burgers to order; if they're not going to anymore then they've sealed their fate as they will never serve food that measures up to the price. A good hot and fresh Wendy's burger was always second to In-N-Out in my mind for fast food chains, but their reheated stuff is probably even worse than Carl's and BK.

[ClownLoach]

Wendy's does offer a better product than many fast food chains. One of the problems with Wendy's is that they don't always have the most visible locations. (Burger King is like this to some extent) But Wendy's as of late is getting expensive for regular menu items, and it's not uncommon for a combo of any kind to be over $10 now (although this is an issue just about everywhere, with every chain, in Washington now)

I don't mind spending a little more at Wendy's when I know I am getting quality food. And while I have encountered a few truly bad Wendy's locations, I really do not have issues at most of them.

Burger King has issues with inconsistency. One restaurant will be clean and food cooked fresh. Another will be dirty, and just about everything is precooked and reheated in the microwave. And others will randomly be drive thru only.

The one I am waiting to see a bankrupt franchisee from is Jack In The Box...probably the chain that slipped the most during COVID, and to this day. seems to be making up hours as they go along and sometimes still not opening dining rooms. I think, at this point, Subway is even more consistent than Jack.

I haven't seen a Burger King that cooks anything fresh in years, and frankly I stopped looking when the prices shot through the roof and worthwhile promotions on the Whopper disappeared. They are consistently bad. They are dead to me even if they offered one penny Whoppers.

Jack in the Box has always been equal to McDonald's in my, product that barely resembles "food" and the only redeeming quality is that Jack decided to pickup the $1 any size soda promo that McDonald's used to use. The food tastes like it is all fully cooked then frozen and reheated. If you told me their burger patties are previously cooked and frozen then reheated on a flat top I'd believe you. There are textures that are disturbing and just not natural, like their milkshakes which are allegedly made with "real ice cream" yet they have the slimy texture of thick Cool Whip. And every time they run a promotion for something that sounds like it should be decent, like Ribeye burgers, they're the same nauseating processed tasting food. I was getting a drink at one the other night and saw they were the test location for the new Smashed Jack, with pictures that looked magically identical to the LA startup I've praised Heavy Handed. But their price was very expensive and I just know it will not be a legitimate Smash burger.

Wendy's used to always serve very hot and fresh burgers that taste like they just came off the grill, but clearly they've transitioned to the labor savings of Carl's and BK with batch cooking a bunch of patties and throwing them into a steamrable or something like that. Their fries were never very good. Dave Thomas invented that lightning fast double sided grill to enable them to rapidly cook burgers to order; if they're not going to anymore then they've sealed their fate as they will never serve food that measures up to the price. A good hot and fresh Wendy's burger was always second to In-N-Out in my mind for fast food chains, but their reheated stuff is probably even worse than Carl's and BK.

I should have mentioned that Jack in the Box is starting a major new franchising initiative and is going to make a heavy push into Utah with smaller locations sans dining rooms of course. They have sold nearly every company location to franchisees as well. Although they've been hands-off with Del Taco so far operationally, apparently they are actively selling off their company stores to franchisees already. Del Taco is one of the most consistent fast food chains in my opinion, but I have seen a few select locations that seem to be really stingy on portion size so hopefully whatever quality control programs they have in place will remain or expand.

[storewanderer]

Jack in the Box has always been equal to McDonald's in my, product that barely resembles "food" and the only redeeming quality is that Jack decided to pickup the $1 any size soda promo that McDonald's used to use. The food tastes like it is all fully cooked then frozen and reheated. If you told me their burger patties are previously cooked and frozen then reheated on a flat top I'd believe you. There are textures that are disturbing and just not natural, like their milkshakes which are allegedly made with "real ice cream" yet they have the slimy texture of thick Cool Whip. And every time they run a promotion for something that sounds like it should be decent, like Ribeye burgers, they're the same nauseating processed tasting food. I was getting a drink at one the other night and saw they were the test location for the new Smashed Jack, with pictures that looked magically identical to the LA startup I've praised Heavy Handed. But their price was very expensive and I just know it will not be a legitimate Smash burger.

Wendy's used to always serve very hot and fresh burgers that taste like they just came off the grill, but clearly they've transitioned to the labor savings of Carl's and BK with batch cooking a bunch of patties and throwing them into a steamrable or something like that. Their fries were never very good. Dave Thomas invented that lightning fast double sided grill to enable them to rapidly cook burgers to order; if they're not going to anymore then they've sealed their fate as they will never serve food that measures up to the price. A good hot and fresh Wendy's burger was always second to In-N-Out in my mind for fast food chains, but their reheated stuff is probably even worse than Carl's and BK.

That $1 drink thing has increased my frequency to Jack in the Box. The central core Reno locations have been turned around and are operating very well again (as they used to before COVID). Their Brewed Iced Tea is excellent and the locations I am near all have brewed iced tea (some others I've gone to out of town only have a fountain one, no thanks). I also really like the $3 Chicken Strip Crunchy Wrap but without the "Good sauce" which is sweet spicy stuff and not my thing. Jack in the Box if buy an egg product you get a fresh cracked egg that is usually pretty good. The Spicy Chicken Fillet is pretty good (you can order just the fillet at like 1/3 the cost of the sandwich if the employee knows how to find it on the register).

Actually there has been no change to how Wendy's cooks or holds its meat. They never cooked to order and have always batch cooked. The old way was small batches. The biggest change I would point out is the units just don't do the sales volume in terms of number of burgers sold they once did. The way Wendys cooks is they cook a bunch of patties then move them onto a "warm" area on the grill to hold. They are only supposed to hold meat for a limited time period then move it to the chili (I think it is 30 minutes) but based on how a lot of the meat I get there tastes I think the timer is not in use. The other thing is Wendys used to steam its buns and use a potato bun; now they butter the bun and run through a toaster for "premium" items but for the junior burgers they just use a dried out room temperature really bad quality bun. The old steamed buns added some moisture to the scenario and made the entire burger seem fresher/hotter/juicier. More recently they got some fuzzy directive to microwave the junior buns to address the dryness issue but that causes other problems (rubbery, etc.). The microwaves had no use after they got rid of the Sausage Burrito as that was the only microwaved product at Wendys so I guess someone wanted to come up with some way to use them.