Americans are obsessed with fast-food. They are so obsessed that 1/4 of the adult population ate at a fast food restaurant on any given day. McDonald’s is the most popular fast food restaurant with nearly 30 million people eating at McDonald’s every day and around 315 million people in the country, approximately 10% of the population is eating at Rotten Ronnies EVERY. SINGLE. DAY.
With their sales continuing to skyrocket, it’s no wonder McDonald’s felt the need to add another restaurant in between two other McDonald’s only a few miles in either direction near the corner of Dodd and Cedar in Lakeville. The restaurant is small, very small in fact, which will probably work well in a strip mall which doesn’t get all that much traffic or interest–yet. While a nearby Subway is usually empty, people are probably going to line up around the block to try this new McDonald’s on day one simply so they can have a chance to further contribute to this nation’s obesity and diabetes epidemics.
I can’t tell you how disgusting it was to see this sign on Cedar Ave the other day. Yes, I know this is commonplace with many restaurants, but I just can’t believe that in 2012 they still believe this is something they should be doing. I couldn’t imagine eating McDonald’s once a month, let alone once a day for a year. Gross.
What do you think about this one? Do you think it’s shameful and disgusting for McDonald’s to run such a promotion? Would you be willing to wait in line to get free Rotten Ronnies for a year? Do you think it’s funny the sign is pointed towards the south side of Cedar rather than the north to avoid getting as much attention? Whatever you have to say about this one go ahead and comment on as I’d love to hear your thoughts.
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November 19th, 2012 at 8:17 am
Bill,
Can you even read? It says, …A FREE VALUE MEAL FOR A YEAR!
It does not say every day for a year. It just means that they get a free value meal that day that will likely sit upon their colons for the better part of a year.
It is no different than the value meals people pay for, just free.
Glad I could help there. You should probably re-write your post.
lefty
November 19th, 2012 at 9:39 am
We’ll just keep on reaping what we sow.
People will just keep getting more obese and disease-ridden, and doing so younger and younger.
Pharmaceutical companies will keep developing drugs to help people deal with their disease creating more and more cost.
And, medical claim costs will continue to balloon, exacerbated by sick and obese people being kept alive longer by the expensive drugs.
We’ll eventually plunge over enough “fiscal cliffs” that they’ll finally prove fatal to the American way.
But….at least we will have satisfied ourselves by cramming our pie holes full of Big Macs.
Congratuations America.
p.s. — Did you know: For the FIRST TIME IN HISTORY, children today are projected to have a SHORTER life expectancy than their parents?
If you don’t believe it, you can read about it here: http://designedtomove.org/ (and it isn’t another “partisan” study or effort pointing at profit…this is a very solid and well-produced study/initiative)
November 19th, 2012 at 9:47 am
I read an article in the Lifetime fitness magazine that said their McNuggets were scientifically engineered in such a way that the nugget’s fat/salt ratio causes some primitive part of our brain to switch on that makes us seek this sort of food to sustain us in our caves while we try to survive the winter.
Unfortunately the average person isn’t out chasing mastodons. Most people are lucky if they move their finger to even change the channel. It makes me sad to see how sedentary we’ve been able to become in the last 100 years.
November 19th, 2012 at 12:53 pm
I miss Dino’s.
November 19th, 2012 at 4:23 pm
In addition to what this says about the health of Americans, it also speaks to the health of our development pattern…. How pathetic that a building less than 10 years old was torn down to be replaced with another building. It’s a shame so few places in America are built with a sense of value and longevity anymore… and we’re paying the high cost of not building Strong Towns.
November 19th, 2012 at 8:39 pm
Lifetime fitness magazine… yeah, that’s the journal of fact and truthiness. Whatever, most process foods are going to be engineered with the goal of satisfying a human and leading to them wanting more. The entire tobacco industry is based on such things.
In general I think the lambasting McDonalds as the terrible fast food provider is starting to get old. They are hardly the only company with less than nutritious foods as their more popular choices. I can’t imagine a butter burger from Culvers is particularly healthy, nor the cheese curds, etc. How about White Castle, Wendies, Raising Cains… Fast Food places tend to have more options that are generally unhealthy, than they do that are healthy. Not a shock. The only time I go to McDonalds for the past few years is when my Wife wants a carmel sunday, or an ice cream cone.
The interesting thing for me with McDonalds is that they seem to feel they can make money there. I assume they see some future development yet in the area.
I keep forgetting there is a Subway over there. I was down at the one in Farmington off Pilot Knob road on Sunday and was stuck in line for nearly a 1/2 hour because a couple people in front of me ordered 9 and 10 sandwiches on their own. I bet the one over by Cedar wasn’t so busy. the only time I’m really over there is in the summer visit Berry Blendz for an Orange Crush!.
November 19th, 2012 at 9:59 pm
I agreed w ks that its a sad commentary in how sedentary we’ve become. I am trying to raise my awareness and movement levels by wearing a WW active link for the past several weeks. So far it accurately reflects how much I just sit at a computer screen for much of my day. :(
November 19th, 2012 at 10:09 pm
I agree with Matt about the building. The really odd thing for me is that the entire area around the frickin place is corn fields! Was that exact location that much better than the 40 other sites around it? They just built the old building a few short years ago. What a huge waste.
I’m no building expert, but it looks like the McDonalds building might even be somewhat lower quality than the building they tore down. I know that is a relative term here, but the old building looked to have more solid looking block while the new McD’s is more of a prefab veneer that went up overnight.
Another McD’s is planned for the open lot next to the Brunswick bowling alley on 160th. Lakeville will soon have four of these fine dining establishments.
November 20th, 2012 at 10:23 am
Mikeh, and anyone else who is interested – Here’s the online article (though the one I read was in print). I think it’s an interesting read.
http://experiencelife.com/article/scary-food-science/
Google ‘sensory science’. You’re correct that many companies do this. However, the problem I have with McDon’s is that I believe their aim is specifically toward children. Hook em early. Heck, like the article says, nuggets are so processed that you barely have to use your teeth.
They have taken steps to make their Happy Meals healthier, I’ll give them that, but still, I feel they market heavily to kids to ensure constant consumers who grow up accustomed to fast food.
Not mine.
November 20th, 2012 at 1:28 pm
I get the sensory science, but the author in that article puts too much strength in it. Sensory Science is at best a preference guide, but only in a very small population does it come to the same level of Alcohol, or drug addiction. The mechanism that creates addiction in humans for alcohol, nicotine, or other drugs is not the same one that causes people to eat every chip in the bag (generally).
The every chip in the bag, or a 20 pack of chicken nuggets comes from a mechanism that for most people holds much less sway than that of a true addiction.
Everyone markets to kids or somehow includes kids in their advertising. From minivans, to washing machines, to political parties. Again, it’s not just the fast food industry that does this.
The problem is not the advertisers or the sellers of products. The problem is the consumer that doesn’t moderate their intake or make good decisions.
Going through open enrollment for health insurance at work right now, and I can tell you that the future is going to be people forced into seeing that poor choices lead to higher costs, and good choices will lower your costs.
November 20th, 2012 at 6:31 pm
It was my understanding that McDonald’s gave up their plans for the site by Brunswick Bowl due to the City’s resistance to their plans. Lakeville never wanted fast-food near that intersection. The owners of the old landscaping business and land just below there tried to sell to fast-food chains but the City said they wouldn’t approve any plans there.
March 4th, 2013 at 8:52 am
Bumping this semi-old thread to add this: (copied from Amazon)
Sugar, Salt, Fat:
From a Pulitzer Prize–winning investigative reporter at The New York Times comes the explosive story of the rise of the processed food industry and its link to the emerging obesity epidemic. Michael Moss reveals how companies use salt, sugar, and fat to addict us and, more important, how we can fight back.
In the spring of 1999 the heads of the world’s largest processed food companies—from Coca-Cola to Nabisco—gathered at Pillsbury headquarters in Minneapolis for a secret meeting. On the agenda: the emerging epidemic of obesity, and what to do about it.
Increasingly, the salt-, sugar-, and fat-laden foods these companies produced were being linked to obesity, and a concerned Kraft executive took the stage to issue a warning: There would be a day of reckoning unless changes were made. This executive then launched into a damning PowerPoint presentation—114 slides in all—making the case that processed food companies could not afford to sit by, idle, as children grew sick and class-action lawyers lurked. To deny the problem, he said, is to court disaster.
When he was done, the most powerful person in the room—the CEO of General Mills—stood up to speak, clearly annoyed. And by the time he sat down, the meeting was over.
In Salt Sugar Fat, Pulitzer Prize–winning investigative reporter Michael Moss shows how we got here. Featuring examples from some of the most recognizable (and profitable) companies and brands of the last half century—including Kraft, Coca-Cola, Lunchables, Kellogg, Nestlé, Oreos, Cargill, Capri Sun, and many more—Moss’s explosive, empowering narrative is grounded in meticulous, often eye-opening research.
Moss takes us inside the labs where food scientists use cutting-edge technology to calculate the “bliss point” of sugary beverages or enhance the “mouthfeel” of fat by manipulating its chemical structure. He unearths marketing campaigns designed—in a technique adapted from tobacco companies—to redirect concerns about the health risks of their products: Dial back on one ingredient, pump up the other two, and tout the new line as “fat-free” or “low-salt.” He talks to concerned executives who confess that they could never produce truly healthy alternatives to their products even if serious regulation became a reality. Simply put: The industry itself would cease to exist without salt, sugar, and fat. Just as millions of “heavy users”—as the companies refer to their most ardent customers—are addicted to this seductive trio, so too are the companies that peddle them. You will never look at a nutrition label the same way again.
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Has anyone has read this new book? It’s exactly what I was talking about in my post(s) above. I thumbed through it and it looks like a good read.
March 4th, 2013 at 9:06 am
Link to NY Times article: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/24/magazine/the-extraordinary-science-of-junk-food.html?ref=michaelmoss&_r=0
March 4th, 2013 at 9:22 am
Nurd – much easier to read. Thanks.
March 4th, 2013 at 10:03 am
Yes, that is a good read, and a nice precursor to the book that it is based on that is released tomorrow. I plan to buy it.
Too bad most people don’t really care though. They’ll keep eating their Doritos and Cheesy poofs and Value Meals just like they always have and the junk food makers will keep getting little kids hooked to replace the people they have killed off. And so it goes…
March 4th, 2013 at 10:42 am
I’m not a book buyer for the most part but will probably run out to get it if I feel like braving the snow after my workout- they had copies at the Eagan B & N. Besides, I can show my friends who are always calling me a conspiracy theorist and maybe they’ll shut up now. ;)
March 4th, 2013 at 12:51 pm
This article is not surprising, but I am glad to see the attention it is getting. I will look for the book as well.
Restaurants are guilty of this,too – they buy the pumped-up food and bill it as “fresh” or “homemade”. Subway is particularly disgusting – the chemical swill that they advertise as “healthy” is terrible.
Pharmaceutical companies should be included in our scorn. Their products do not promote health; they only promote further prescription use.