McDonalds Responds To Minimum Wage Hikes, Launches McCafe Coffee Kiosk

Zero Hedge ^ | 04/07/2016 | Tyler Durden

[SeekAndFind]

When it comes to jobs growth in the US, all one can say is thank god for waiters and bartenders: after all, a Starbucks barista is precisely what a recently fired oil chemical engineer making half a million dollars really wants to do with their life.

 

However, the days of easy job gains for the BLS may be coming to an end (even if on a seasonally adjusted, goalseeked basis the trend has a long way to go).

According to Brand Eating, fast food king McDonald's has been spotted testing a self-serve McCafe coffee station/kiosk out in downtown Chicago. The station is located in the restaurant but apart from the counter and looks to be a theoretically more convenient way for those who just want a cup of coffee to skip the regular line (while also freeing employees from having to make each drink in the back).

In essence, this is the company's latest venture to make employees responsible for one less task as corporate HQ slowly but surely responds to minimum wage hikes sweeping all states, and in the process, outsource its minimum wage workers to simple machines which will never unionize or have any demands aside from being cleaned occasionally.

As shown below, the coffee station includes a touchpad for ordering and paying (it appears to take credit card only), a beverage spout, and a dispenser for cups.

 

According to Brand Eating, "drink options include lattes, mochas, and cappuccinos that are customizable with various flavorings, types of milk, and amount of espresso. There doesn't seem to be an option for drip coffee. The price for the drinks is $2.99. The concept and set up is very similar to McDonald's Create Your Taste customized ordering available at some restaurants.

The idea makes a lot of sense seeing as, here in the U.S., the McCafe espresso and steamed milk is automatically dispensed from a machine anyway, with syrups added after accordingly. What they've basically done here is put the dispenser on the other side of the counter and added automation for the syrup and ordering/payment.

 

At the very least, having a touchscreen menu to look through is much preferable to me than the video screen menu at my local McDonald's that intermittently plays a montage of the drinks so that I have to wait through to see the menu.

What's next? Why more of this of course.

[xzins]

Personally, I HATE any kind of vending machine food that I’ve ever run across.

[Donglalinger]

Hilarious article on how SF keeps putting more burdens on business but has no idea why the cost of living is so high.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/san-francisco-tries-life-affordable-060337975.html

[DungeonMaster]

Good job Obama, help those ATMs steal more jobs.

[for-q-clinton]

McD’s is vending machine food served by a person. :-)

[ObozoMustGo2012]

The greatest invention are these self-service kiosks.

I do everything I can to use the self-checkout lines at the supermarket. One, it’s faster, two, I can pack my own groceries, and three, I don’t need to deal with the lower-intelligentsia of the people these places hire.

I can only hope these machines are used more and more, whether or not there is an increase in the min. wage.

[xzins]

It’s hard to imagine, but vending machine food is actually worse than Micky D’s food served by a person

[AEMILIUS PAULUS]

When McDonald’s coffee is FRESH I find it to be satisfying and better than Starbucks.

[WKUHilltopper]

Funny how many times they’ve raised the minimum wage over the decades...and not once has it “saved” anyone.

[AEMILIUS PAULUS]

Lord you have a point.

[circlecity]

I see this type of automation returning many fast food joints back to their original roots. Only three or four options, very fast service and cheaper than their competitors. Keeping the menu limited would allow vastly increased automation to where one or two employees could run the whole store. (keeping the machines stocked with fresh food product). If they maintained quality they could make up for the limited menu with much lower prices then their competitors and faster service, all made possible by eliminating expensive employee costs.

[xzins]

It’s the preservatives, the deadness of both bread and meat, the frostbit edges on the cheese, the total lack of freshness, the very real prospect that it’s a year or more old.

It’s tasteless, creepy, and possibly an attack by ISIS.

[V_TWIN]

Niel Cavuto had one of these $15 an hour people on his show the other day, he asked her if as a customer she would be ok with the price of things on the menu going up because of $15 min wage.....you’d have thought he had asked her to explain the theory of relativity. You could tell that little thought had obviously never even entered her mind and she had absolutely no concept of the consequences of what might/will happen. Just GIVE ME MY MONEY.

[Ellendra]

But does it know that a frappe is supposed to be cold?

(Seriously, the last time I was at a McD’s, the person taking my order thought a frappe was hot. She got pretty much everything else wrong, too.)

[Mr. K]

you make a good point- i thought the LAST TIME they raised the minimum wage it was supposed to lift the ‘most needy among us’ to a better living wage...?

Didn’t work, did it?

[Bubba Gump Shrimp]

-—I do everything I can to use the self-checkout lines at the supermarket.
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I like them as well. I use paper bags, and can bag my own groceries nice and neat (you know they way they used to do it), instead of sticking two items in each flimsy cling wrap bag. The wife loads the conveyor and I bag at the end of the conveyor.

I even double bag them (the paper bags are free at the end of our self checkout, or you can use plastic), and I swear the younger people behind me look at me like I’m nuts.

Proper bagging is a lost art, once mastered by all teenagers working at a grocery store.

[BwanaNdege]

Personally, I HATE any kind of vending machine food that I’ve ever run across.

Never been REALLY hungry, huh?

[xzins]

I don’t think anyone in America has been...not truly hungry...except for the psychologically disturbed.

Too easy to get food in America.

But, if you are asking if I’ve ever spent a day working so hard and fast that food didn’t enter the picture, then, yes, I’ve been there.

[minnesota_bound]

More unemployed and those employed thanks to obamacare can only get 29 hour work week. Thank the democrats.

[CodeJockey]

When I was a teenager I bagged groceries at the commissary at SJAFB. This was in the mid 1970’s. No plastic bags, just thick brown paper bags that we would often double.

There was a “follow you” system. You would ask to follow someone. Eventually your time came to bag. You would go from bagger two, to bagger one and then you would be the one who carted the groceries to your customer’s car.

A one dollar tip was an awesome feeling back then! When you came back you started asking “follow you”? If some said yes you would follow them through the bagging and carting routine.

If your folks were checking out it was standard protocol to let their kid cart their groceries out. I miss those days.