https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/06/business/mcdonalds-prices/index.html
The Today show did a story this morning about the high price of fast food.
I went to a Subway recently and a six inch sub combo was over $14. I even asked the guy if he accidently charged me for a foot long. Nope. These are the new prices. It was half that price before the pandemic. I get that prices have gone up but 100% price increase in a couple of years?
It wouldn’t hurt a lot of people to eat out less. I wonder if we will start to see fast food locations shutting down because people can’t afford to eat there? Or they just don’t want to feel taken advantage of.
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Several Subway stores have closed in our area in the past few years. I go out to lunch with a friend once a week and we only go to places we can get deals. It’s the one day a week where I throw healthy eating out the window. Those deals are getting harder and harder to find, though we manage to find something generally. I still get Subway coupons in the mail, but none of the stores in our area accept them and haven’t for several years. We quit going there altogether.
Used to go to McD’s more, but since they stopped the $1 menu, haven’t as much. Now we only go if they have a deal on their app, like BOGO quarter pounders or something.
Arby’s still sends out coupons occasionally. So we’ll go there, and they often have deals on their app. They give seniors (I don’t feel senior, I just meet their age requirement 
) free small drinks.
Just before the pandemic, you could go to a Mexican Restaurant here and get the lunch special for $6.95. now it’s $11.95 or more. Between that and the constant badgering about the increased tipping everyone wants, we just don’t go out much any more and we can afford it, we just choose not to. I suspect more places will close.
I priced a 6" combo (italian) sub here in Hawaii and came up at $8.26 including tax. Prices here are usually much higher than mainland. Did you look at the pricing board to see what they charge? Perhaps your Subway is in one of those locations that are requiring owners to pay tremendous wages?
Here in Hawaii a Big Mac meal is $10.49, where I can get an Outback 6oz sirloin steak with potato and a side for $19.79, granted, no drink but still…
The Dennys double cheeseburger is $17.79,. but it really is a meal but for the same price, Outbaks steak might be the answer.
I am spoiled because I helped start a pet food coop that gets meat from the local beef producer; local beef, USDA inspected. We use lower cuts for the animals but the ownsers can order cuts directly. This producer also supplies local restaurants and the local hospital.T bone $7.10 a pound and Ribeye is $8.50 a pound. Cheaper than COSTCO and you don’t have to buy half a cow. Actually the co-op has bout over 1,000 pounds at a time, but it is rare.
I just went on the Subway website and recreated my order. Over $8 for just the six inch sub and then I made it a meal with soda and chips. With tax (over a dollar) it came to $14.20.
We do have a terrible labor shortage in the Twin Cities. They may have to pay higher than average wages to get workers.
I rarely get fast food anymore because it is not that much le$$ than better quality food from a regular (albeit casual) restaurant. Subway prices have gone up, but I can’t really compare since I do not get combos (I dislike all their drinks, and my favourite coffee shop makes excellent teas, and is only a few doors down).
I bake whole wheat bread at home and make sandwiches. Screw Subway.
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If we want a burger for lunch, we go to Longhorn steakhouse. Their lunch menu has a great burger with a side for $9.95.
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Same. I have a chronic health condition that prohibited me from eating most foods for nearly 20 years. The past seven years were especially difficult. I had completely stopped going to restaurants and had to eat the same three things each day (cereal, etc). Finally found medicine that helped accidentally as the docs were trying to fix something else.
After seven years, I was able to eat out again. I had no idea FF prices had gone up so high! I felt like I had been frozen in time and then was thawed out to astronomical high FF prices.
Longhorns is our only chain restaurant in our small mountain town. I say the same thing in that a value meal at a FF restaurant goes for $12-$15. Buying for three people was costing me almost $50! I started thinking, ‘Hey - that’s how much I spend at Longhorns!’
To offset costs, I will bring a can of soda or water if I am going through drive-thru and just get a sandwich or something but even that the burgers are $5-6 each. If you have the app, there are deals that make it worth it. For McDs, in GA they have a 2 for $3.49 deal. I will get a double cheeseburger and 6 piece nugget on the way home sometimes.