(Toronto) Customer-made menu changes are increasingly being adopted at fast-food chains, letting popular preparations shape their menus, marketing, equipment and training.
These menu “diversions” rarely escape Meera Patel.
The marketing director for fast food chain Harvey’s keeps a growing list of ways customers mix or transform menu items into something new.
Some are as simple as coating chicken nuggets in a mixture of barbecue sauce and ghost pepper sauce – nicknamed “cowboy caviar” – but others go further, like adding tart or mini donuts with sugar and cinnamon in a milkshake or integrating a hot dog into onion rings.
“Two weeks ago, while I was at a restaurant for a photo shoot, someone ordered our double cheese bacon poutine with just an Angus hamburger patty, then cut up the Angus patty and put it in poutine, said Mme Patel. There are crazy things people do. »
PHOTO NATHAN DENETTE, THE CANADIAN PRESS
Piece of pie in a milkshake
Conventional wisdom might view such combinations in fast food chains as an irritant. They can add complexity and delays to the ultra-optimized processes that restaurants have developed to quickly produce items that taste the same no matter where you order them.
But chains are increasingly adopting modifications — in most cases, as long as diners prepare the dishes themselves.
The reasons restaurants are turning to this phenomenon are as much to appease customers as to increase brand awareness and profitability.
“More and more restaurants are understanding that they need to move toward the social element rather than just a value and enjoyment gaming experience,” said Robert Carter, a food industry analyst at the group. StratonHunter.
Mr. Carter and other industry experts agree that menu hacking is nothing new. People have been reinventing fast food for decades, but social media has taken the pastime to the extreme.
Much of the early reinvention came from secret menus – unannounced dishes whose existence often spread by word of mouth – and increased access to customizations such as choosing burrito fillings or toppings. hamburger and pizza, Mr. Carter said.
Coffee shops like Starbucks have even made individualization their specialty, allowing customers to enhance their drinks with whipped cream, extra pumps of flavored syrup, custom amounts of ice, or stronger coffees.
Starbucks now has 170,000 different drink combinations – a staggering number considering that the company only began to see customization skyrocket around 1989, when it first allowed customization of milk .
“Since then, we’ve just expanded,” said Deborah Neff, vice-president of product and marketing for Starbucks Canada.
The growing trend to go beyond standard customizations and hack menus, many observers say, is driven by social media, shorter attention spans, an affinity for anything new, and a generation younger.
“They want instant gratification and constant stimulation, and often that comes from combining and crushing things,” Ms.me Patel.
Millions of views on TikTok
Much of the menu changes are being shared online by influencers showing how to make unofficial dishes like the “Land, Air and Sea,” which combines a Big Mac, fish fillet and Chicken Mac.
For Jay McKinney, the Calgary man behind @tacotycoon420, the “big kibble” was a major success. The sandwich ditches the middle bun of a Big Mac and replaces it with croquettes. This has earned him over 1.4 million views on TikTok. He’s also the one behind the hot dog surrounded by onion rings.
His menu hacking began when he moved from British Columbia’s Lower Mainland to Calgary during the COVID-19 pandemic and didn’t know anyone, so he started reviewing tacos.
He eventually grew tired of taco restaurants and began experimenting with wacky and wonderful dishes that he created himself.
“Now the staff at my local Harvey’s know me and they’re pretty in on my shenanigans,” he said with a laugh.
Other diners and his followers also consider him a source of inspiration, recreating his orders.
“It’s like a snowball effect,” added Mme Patel.
Before adopting a new dish, the chain studies whether customers are likely to try a new creation, then looks into perfecting a recipe and ensuring that suppliers will be able to stock enough ingredients to prepare it in large quantities.
Harvey’s takes into account the cost, preparation time, whether new equipment is needed for production and even how long the dish will hold up.
“Does it travel well if someone is going to order it at a restaurant and then have it delivered? Will it still look good 15 to 20 minutes later?, detailed Mme Patel. All these little things come into play.”
McDonald’s Canada considered similar factors when it launched a series of modified menus last week, including a chicken burger and a junior sweet chili chicken.
A&W did the same ahead of the February launch of the piri piri potato “Buddy burger,” a sandwich stuffed with hash browns.