Tuesday, June 02, 2020

The Hottest Item on Takeout Menus: Leftovers

Pandemic prompts customers to place orders that yield more than one meal—and restaurants oblige

By Annie Gasparro and Heather Haddon of The WSJ.

It seems like when people are ordering restaurant food to be delivered they are ordering alot. Sort of a way to economize. Get it all at once so they don't have to keep doing it again.

Excerpts:

"The dozens of Chick-fil-A Nuggets, Taco Bell At-Home Taco Bars and buckets of KFC chicken that Audrey Simes ordered recently have something in common: The meals are big enough to yield leftovers for her family of eight.

“It’s a huge, huge help to have that extra food on hand,” Ms. Simes said.

She is working from her home in suburban Denver, where she and her husband care for five daughters and her 90-year-old dad. Fast-food leftovers save time and give her a break, said Ms. Simes, who works for a law firm. She has deconstructed a Chick-fil-A wrap to build a salad and cooked her father an omelet from the “guts of a Chipotle burrito.”

“I am creative,” she said.

The coronavirus has made leftovers newly appealing to families isolated in their homes, eager to save time and money and minimize outside trips. McDonald’s Corp., MCD 0.10% Wendy’s Co., WEN 0.18% Grubhub Inc. GRUB -2.18% and Papa John’s International Inc. PZZA 2.32% have all reported a rise in average order sizes. In the U.S., spending per purchase last month rose 18% at fast-food restaurants, according to data-provider Black Box Intelligence, while rising 15% at fast-casual chains such as Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc.
 
The trend mirrors what is happening broadly in supermarkets and other retailers. Spending per purchase is up as people limit their visits to stores and buy things in bulk online."

No comments: