Super low pay, frozen beef loaded with antibiotics, and questionable menu items like deer burgers. Arby's has the meats — but they also have plenty of reasons why their food is so inexpensive.
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00:00Super low pay, frozen beef loaded with antibiotics, and questionable menu items
00:05like deer burgers, Arby's has the meats. But they also have plenty of reasons why
00:10their food is so inexpensive. Let's be honest here. How many
00:14drive-thru chains have ever touted fresh, handcrafted food prepared on site? In-N-Out
00:20being the exception, the answer is not a lot. Arby's, which is first and foremost a fast food
00:25enterprise, is certainly no exception. Arby's promises cheap, convenient eats on the fly.
00:30And it's a given that the majority of its lineup has been frozen and thawed out before
00:34ever hitting the fryer.
00:36You said you were gonna come here and I should leave you some delicious Arby's on the table
00:39because you wanted some Arby's too? It's called that.
00:42In the case of the chain's signature curly fries, one individual who used to work at Arby's
00:46recounted their experience touring the restaurant and seeing the spuds stashed away in a massive
00:51walk-in freezer. As the Quora post recalled, there are bags and bags of curly fries, already
00:57curled and ready for the deep fryer. Although a former manager did confirm that Arby's acquires
01:01its meats from farms, an employee on Reddit revealed that the slabs of beef are sealed
01:06in plastic bags before being thawed, a process that can take multiple days before the flank
01:11sizzles away in the oven.
01:13Frozen goods definitely explain Arby's' lower price point. Acquiring the ingredients,
01:18not to mention the labor of preparing mozzarella sticks from scratch, would be much more costly
01:23than stashing them away in the freezer. And it stands to reason that Arby's probably has
01:27a supplier who offers a decent deal on buying items in bulk.
01:31Compared to the thinly sliced cutlets from your neighborhood sandwich shop, spending under $4
01:36for a classic roast beef sandwich is a hard bargain to beat. The trade-off? You're not
01:40exactly paying for quality. Arby's takes shortcuts by using meats pumped full of antibiotics,
01:45a practice that maintains the profit-driven nature of factory farming, and doesn't necessarily
01:50lead to the freshest grub around. While the U.S. Food and Drug Administration ensures
01:54antibiotics remain at safe levels for human consumption, Healthline explains,
01:59farms that have medicated livestock have created bacteria immune to the treatment,
02:03rendering many standard medications ineffective in combating infections.
02:08Experts have warned of the terrifying possibilities resulting from the excessive
02:11pattern established by farms, and solutions have included demanding restaurants to shift
02:16their practices. Arby's, unfortunately, is no role model here. A massive study in 2021,
02:22conducted by several major nonprofits, gave the chain's meat a failing grade on this front,
02:27joining Jack in the Box, Sonic, Burger King, and others in missing the mark.
02:32According to the National Resources Defense Council, Arby's might claim to have the meats,
02:36but those meats are going to be cheap. To pile on fistfuls of beef onto bread for millions of
02:41hungry customers, it's inevitable that the quality won't be anything to rave about.
02:46With these expectations in mind, enjoying a quick bite on a budget is what Arby's is built for.
02:52There are so many flavorful condiments to smother your fries or favorite Arby's sandwich in.
02:56Employees will even toss in an extra couple packets, just to make sure there's ample sauce
03:00for coating each and every meat-filled bite. And it's no trouble. Arby's can afford it because
03:05the condiments on their own are quite inexpensive, thanks to the cheap ingredients.
03:09As confirmed by Arby's handy ingredient guide, many of the components that make up the chain's
03:14sauces are quite basic on the surface. Arby's sauce, the in-house equivalent to ketchup,
03:19contains water, corn syrup, tomato paste, and distilled vinegar. Smokey Q sauce,
03:23the smoked brisket sandwich's exclusive topper, consists of the above mix-ins,
03:28in addition to molasses and garlic powder. Nothing fancy.
03:31Frankly, no one has to venture far to find any of these products. Assuming you're swinging by
03:36the supermarket for groceries, finding mayonnaise and horseradish is more than guaranteed, even if
03:40you're not planning to whip up homemade horsey sauce. Though, when it's this easy to make,
03:45why not give it a go?
03:46I got people to answer to, just like you do. I'm gonna charge them.
03:49With what? Possession of a condiment?
03:52The ultimate profit killer for a fast food chain is unpopular menu items.
03:56Arby's made the call to streamline their offerings in 2021,
03:59when it officially removed pizza sliders and potato cakes from the menu.
04:03People weren't buying them at the rate of the other, more popular snacks,
04:07and that forced the franchise to slim down on the selection.
04:10When it comes to curating a financially successful menu, Arby's clearly enjoys variety. Just look at
04:15the array of meats, cheeses, and starch-centric finger foods that are plastered all over the
04:20drive-thru. However, if specific items aren't selling well, or at a pace that satisfies
04:24corporate's expectations, then customers can expect to find cuts on occasion.
04:29Hey, what's going on in that room?
04:30It's a focus group of Arby's executives watching us eat.
04:35No way! People will eat anything!
04:37Plenty of fans were gutted by Arby's decision to discontinue the potato cakes,
04:42and went to great lengths in expressing their frustration.
04:45One Reddit commenter wrote,
04:46"'Guess I'm never eating at Arby's again.'"
04:48Another vowed,
04:49"'If they don't return, my days as a customer are truly numbered.'"
04:53Even if Arby's food is cheap, the expenses that come with running a restaurant are not.
04:57Paying rent, heating and cooling the building, and using energy across a multitude of kitchen
05:02appliances is bound to gobble up a pretty penny. In order to keep costs down, Arby's goes the
05:08rational route by simply using less energy in its stores. And this has produced big dividends
05:12for the company, according to QSR Magazine. A 2015 press statement by the Environmental
05:18Protection Agency program Energy Star gave a shout-out to the chain's sustainability efforts,
05:23which resulted in a 15 percent drop in energy that same year. How did Arby's do it? By simply
05:28tweaking existing protocol, combined with some much-needed industrial upgrades.
05:33The chain switched over to energy-efficient appliances, as well as effective heating,
05:37air conditioning, and a water-saving irrigation system. Arby's senior director of engineering
05:42provided QSR Magazine with a few examples of how quick fixes, often at a store level,
05:47could cut unnecessary spending. Arby's relies on utilities to function,
05:51but it's irresponsible to burn through energy willy-nilly, no matter how high you
05:55stack that sandwich. And when you have over 3,000 locations operating simultaneously,
06:00any solution to save a few bucks is money in the bank.
06:03Arby's food is served in clean, well-lit quarters across thousands of locations,
06:07and that's by design. Over time, the chain has happily renovated its stores to reflect a modern
06:13dining experience, whose success Carl Redditt, manager of business intelligence and analytics,
06:18credits to something simple — cold, hard statistics. Speaking on the company's use of
06:22the logistics platform Tableau, Redditt says,
06:25"...the data showed that we need to spend more money remodeling our restaurants,
06:29freshening up the look, that it really has helped the business."
06:32Whether it's replacing furniture, updating point-of-sale software,
06:36or spiffing up the menu board, improving a chain's look carries plenty of advantages.
06:41Getting people through the doors is how a fast food chain makes money. By utilizing this business
06:45strategy, Arby's proves that revamping physical locations is not counterintuitive to saving money.
06:51If anything, it's an investment on future returns for Arby's,
06:54and by extension, the unbelievable value found on its menu.
06:58At Arby's, it's about inspiring smiles through delicious experiences.
07:01And that's what we want when anybody walks into the restaurant.
07:04While there's plenty of perks to having a cashier take your order,
07:07fast food giants are opting for savvier methods to conduct business.
07:10Things have gone digital at Arby's, and that's due to mobile ordering.
07:14Using either the chain's website or mobile app, customers can, with the click of a button,
07:19select their favorite sandwiches, sides, and drinks, for pickup or through their takeout
07:23app of choice. Investing in new technology can sometimes be a costly undertaking. However,
07:28providing multiple ordering platforms is a safe bet to encourage more customers to visit Arby's.
07:33And as Inspire brand's CFO David Pipes explained in 2018,
07:37the company's gone through the calculations to ensure that the move is still profitable.
07:42Pipes told Forbes,
07:43When guests are paying by means other than handing their cash or card to the frontline team member,
07:48such as via a website or a mobile device, we ensure that all costs are considered
07:52and determine what we need for these transactions to be successful.
07:56Because the only requirement for mobile ordering is a cell phone and Wi-Fi connection,
08:00there's less need for service workers. After all, the customer can do it on the spot,
08:05anytime, anywhere. This allows for flexibility on the consumer side,
08:09all while handing Arby's a financial advantage by cutting out the middleman and effectively
08:13outsourcing the labor onto the customer. Arby's is part of a $30 billion empire
08:19under Inspire Brands. But while Arby's is cashing in with mind-blowing profits as of late,
08:24the employees responsible for this wealth have largely scraped by on the minimum wage.
08:29A team member can expect to make $12.40 per hour, while positions with more seniority,
08:34like shift leaders, only pull in a little extra at $14.65 an hour. With those numbers,
08:40it's no coincidence that only 35 percent of employees reporting on Indeed
08:44felt that Arby's compensation was reasonable. Even under circumstances where Arby's workers
08:49were financially stable, issues surrounding work-life balance prevented most employees
08:53from feeling content about their jobs. According to a shift manager who wrote on Indeed,
08:58the chain barely provided any benefits to the senior hires, who were expected to, quote,
09:03"...dedicate their entire lives to the franchise."
09:05Another individual, on Simply Hired, noted Arby's was prone to limiting hours in a way
09:10that made the, quote, "...decent wages, irrelevant in the face of less work,
09:14and therefore meant less money they could earn as a whole."
09:17At the end of the day, Arby's is a corporation, and corporations run on the premise that there's
09:22money to be made. The ends justify the means, as the saying goes. The cost of your roast beef slider
09:28can only stay cheap because the chain is maintaining a low-paid workforce
09:32to churn them out in record numbers. Otherwise, prices will look noticeably different.
09:37Now hiring anybody.
09:41Wow.
09:42Anybody.
09:44Roast beef sandwiches, the prime driver of business going back to the Raffaelle brothers,
09:49are far from Arby's only specialty. Chicken salad, hamburgers, smoked ribs,
09:54even breaded fish sticks have also appeared on the menu. The trick to keeping these items around?
09:59Let's just say they graduate and fly the coop, so to speak. Often, the chain releases products
10:03for a limited time so that fun, out-of-the-box bites can flourish without breaking the bank.
10:09Probably the finest example of the scarcity approach was the venison sandwich, which was
10:14initially sold in five states back in 2016 before launching nationwide the following year.
10:19In each rollout, the product flew out of drive-thru windows almost immediately,
10:24and set off polarizing feedback from the public at large, according to NPR.
10:28Per Forbes, it did exactly as the company intended, generate a lot of buzz. There's no
10:33doubt the cost of ingredients and supplies skyrockets when a chain attempts to play
10:37all the hit records at once, or in this case, offer every single dish under the sun. On the
10:42flip side, releasing a temporary one-off can mix up the current offerings, all while keeping Arby's
10:48budget under control. Cheese stick Jenga aside, there's no denying that Arby's knows who it is
10:54and what it does best. Big piles of beef between bread. It's nothing flashy or adventurous,
10:59but that isn't the point. Arby's brand identity has always been strong,
11:03and this clear-eyed perception of its image has, without a doubt, helped the company flourish.
11:08Consider, for example, when Arby's hopped aboard the hamburger bandwagon with the limited-run
11:14Wagyu Steakhouse Burger in May 2022. Arby's could have rolled out dozens of different hamburgers
11:19should its debut launch have been a hit, as is the pattern most fast food chains follow.
11:24But surprisingly, that isn't what happened. Rather than oversaturate the menu,
11:29the restaurant decided in favor of offering a single, albeit better-tasting product. Patrick
11:34Swing, chief of marketing officer, told CNN,
11:37"...instead of focusing on making billions of mediocre burgers,
11:41we're taking a stance on high-quality meat that deserves to be cooked properly."
11:45Besides its soft spot for beef, Arby's menu skews to the lavish side of the drive-thru
11:50because of its premium fare, including lofty condiments and smoked brisket.
11:54A high-end burger by that token is completely within the bounds of what the brand has
11:58specialized in for decades, all the while remaining enough of a curiosity to draw in
12:04new converts under the franchise's wide, welcoming brim, and help Arby's in the
12:08long run pile on the money like they pile on the meat.