Patrons enter the drive-thru at a Chick-fil-A restaurant August 1, 2012 on Chick-fil-A Day of Appreciation in Manassas, Virginia. AFP PHOTO/ Karen BLEIER (Photo credit should read KAREN BLEIER/AFP/GettyImages)
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According to a new study from the National Restaurant Association, 39% of consumers have used the drive-thru more this year versus last year. Not bad for a channel that’s been around since 1947.
According to Hudson Riehle, senior vice president of the association, there are more points of access for the drive-thru now than at any other time in foodservice history. Credit our commuter lifestyles for this increase.
“It’s important to understand what has gone on in terms of the amount of time an individual spends commuting now. The increased work and commute time commitments have aligned with a long-term societal change, which has led to the long-term growth of drive-thrus,” Riehle said.
Despite this growth in demand, however, the drive-thru is getting slower. The 2019 QSR Drive-Thru Performance Study was released last week by QSR Magazine, with data compiled by market research firm SeeLevel HX. Unquestionably the biggest takeaway from the study is that quick-service drive-thrus are slower than they were last year. Customers spent an average of 255 seconds from speaker to order window in 2019, about 20 seconds longer than in 2018.
This is a bit of a surprise. As the last round of earnings reports taught us, chains across the board are focused heavily on speeding things up at the drive-thru: re-training crews, simplifying menus and operations, and adding new technologies and processes. But many of these initiatives are new and have yet to prove fruitful.
“The improvements restaurants are making in technology and efficiency is being thwarted to some degree by all of the other things going on—mobile ordering, third-party delivery, on-demand. It’s cluttering up the kitchen and slowing down operations,” said Lisa van Kesteren, CEO of SeeLevel HX. “It’s all happened so quickly in an industry which just isn’t used to changing that fast.”
In addition to pressured operations, van Kesteren points to complex menus as a factor.
“Restaurants have bloated their menus to try to be everything to everyone. It confuses customers and employees who have to figure out all these iterations,” she said.
We’re starting to see companies correcting this issue, however. In the past year alone, for example, chains from Taco Bell to McDonald’s to Jack in the Box have simplified their menus.
Notably, the industry is also navigating the tightest job market in 50 years—and a consequently high turnover rate—no doubt slowing down the pace of operations.
“I think much of this comes down to pure bandwidth. You can only focus on so many things at once,” van Kesteren. “But the drive-thru is table stakes. I think 20 years ago, people forgave more than they do now. Now, you have to do all of these things reasonably well to compete anymore.”
Chick-fil-A proves customers want more than speed
In the context of this specific report, the slowest chain is Chick-fil-A, clocking in at nearly 323 seconds. This is followed by McDonald’s (284 seconds), Hardee’s (266), KFC (243), Carl’s Jr. and Taco Bell (240), Wendy’s (230) and Dunkin’ (the fastest at 216 seconds).
But such timing is a bit misleading here. Consider Chick-fil-A’s volumes compared to its peers, for example. More than 35% of the chain’s restaurants have six-plus vehicles in line at any given time, according to the study. The next closest competitor is McDonald’s at 9%. That’s quite a discrepancy.
Also, as Sam Oches, editorial director of QSR Magazine, explained in a phone interview, the study’s auditors started the clock when customers placed their order. For Chick-fil-A, that often means “further upstream,” or prior to the speaker box, as about 60% of the chain’s drive-thrus have employees taking orders outside in the queue.
Because the chain is increasingly relying on this “face-to-face ordering” (as the process is called internally) in the drive-thru line, its accuracy and friendliness scores are higher than its peers, according to Khalilah Cooper, Chick-fil-A’s director of service and hospitality.
“We know when you’re at the drive-thru that speed is everything, but so is making sure you have an accurate meal and making sure we add in our hospitality,” Cooper said. “We are exploring ways that technology can enhance the experience so employees can be freed up to better engage our guests. By having that face-to-face ordering, a person can confirm the order.”
This, Cooper adds, is why Chick-fil-A’s order accuracy is 94%, a full four percentage points higher than the next highest chain, Burger King. Conversely, accuracy scores for the QSR segment overall dropped more than 5% this year (complex menus, operations are culprits here, too).
“Accuracy is a significant component as to whether or not people choose to visit a restaurant. There are only so many times I’ll be willing to turn around and come back if I don’t get what I ordered. That’s also additional sales lost for the brand itself. It’s just a bad impression overall,” said Ken Lundin, chief sales officer at SeeLevel HX.
Also, and perhaps most importantly, Chick-fil-A has the friendliest drive-thru in QSR, and by a huge margin (65% of consumers consider the chain to be “very friendly,” versus No. 2 Taco Bell at 43%). This should come as no surprise since the chain has been named the top limited-service restaurant for four straight years on the American Customer Satisfaction Index.
“What I believe Chick-fil-A has done well is lean into what its customers expect from the brand. It is manically focused on the ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ effect, and for good reason. I’m amazed whenever I feel like an obligation as a customer. That’s not the case at Chick-fil-A,” Lundin said.
Likely because of these attributes, customers felt like the drive-thru experience—even at 323 seconds—was fast, Oches said. No matter, the pace of Chick-fil-A’s drive-thru is clearly not deterring consumers. The chain generates over $4.1 million in sales per unit, nearly twice as much as McDonald’s ($2.7 billion). This year, the chain surpassed Taco Bell and Subway for the No. 3 spot in the industry in sales, according to National’s Restaurant News. All of this despite being open just six days a week.
What Chick-fil-A has proved time and time again is that there is, indeed, a correlation between good service and high sales. What this study further proves is that good service is still worth the wait.