McDonald’s franchise owners are reporting that the decision to serve breakfast all day has been an organizational disaster, and that they’re losing money because of it.
It sounded like a great idea — at first. Egg McMuffins, hash browns, and some of the other popular breakfast items were made available for order at any time of the day. The breakfast menu was previously discontinued at 10:30 a.m.
But what may have sounded promising in concept is proving to be difficult in practice for McDonald’s employees, who are definitely not lovin’ it.
Business Insider reports that the bigger menu is increasing the time it takes for each order to be processed, as kitchen staff are getting in each other’s way and equipment is jamming.
Not only is the all day breakfast menu hindering operations, it is apparently causing profit losses as well. One franchise owner told Nomura analyst Mark Kalinowski that the promotion hasn’t resulted in increased business. What it has done is allowed their existing regular customers to purchase the low cost breakfast items in place of the higher priced lunch and dinner meals.
The kitchen disorganization has also resulted in “sub-par” meal preparation quality, according to another franchisee, who wrote that “Customers are abandoning us in droves because we are either too slow, or sub-par quality.”
As if to contradict these sentiments, McDonald’s U.S. President Mike Andres sent an email to franchisees declaring the all day breakfast model a “successful launch”.
The successful launch of All Day Breakfast proves that when we listen to and respond to our customers and align around a great execution plan, we will grow our business
With such a large amount of negative feedback from franchisees, the declaration by Andres must have been heavily based on the overwhelmingly positive response from McDonald’s customers, who have been asking for all day breakfast menus for years.
Bloomberg reports that Mickey D’s has experienced seven straight quarters of declining sales. However, they noted the chain’s stocks have been on the rise this year, reporting a 9.7 percent gain.
McDonald’s CEO Steve Easterbrook is trying to turn the profitability of the company around, and exploring ideas such as the highly requested all day breakfast may just be the way to do that. It’s unclear if McDonald’s plans on addressing the organizational struggles some of their restaurants are experiencing. McDonald’s spokeswoman Heidi Barker has not commented on the claims.
