The local McDonald's dollar menu cheeseburgers are kicking my butt for the second day in a row. On Sunday night my wife stopped by our local McDonalds and picked me up a few of their 99 cent double cheeseburgers from the dollar menu. I know it’s not a good idea to eat late at night but I hadn’t eaten all day and was hungry so I gave into temptation. Monday morning I woke up in complete misery. Today although I’m feeling better I have been breaking out in cold sweats and have felt generally shaky all day with a throbbing headache.

Now I’m not a doctor and haven’t seen one as I typically put off medical visits unless absolutely necessary but the only thing I can connect my sickness to is those dollar menu cheeseburgers. So McDonalds hold off with the big guns from your legal team, I’m not accusing you of poisoning me BUT I did call the franchise these were picked up from and 3 of your employees are also sick. In fact I sat on the phone for nearly 10 minutes waiting for the store manager because “she hasn’t been feeling well and has been in the bathroom all day”.  I was also told another employee had spent the previous day “throwing up”.

I have made the decision I will not be buying any further items from this McDonalds franchise. It is the most irritating location to deal with because of the slow service, uncaring employees and incorrect orders. It does make sense that if the image they are presenting to the public is so whacked out the food handling and safety taking place in the kitchen isn’t getting the proper attention it deserves.

As an example of the type of service and experiences I have had with the local McDonalds franchise here is a small list of some things I have encountered:

• A McDonald's Big Mac which is normally assembled in the order of “bun, patty, bun, patty, and bun” was put together as “bun, patty, patty, bun, and bun.” Now this wouldn’t have really been a big deal except the gal at the drive thru window made the comment when handing me my order that “there was a problem putting together my Big Mac but don’t worry, everything is ok”. I had no idea what she was talking about and assumed whatever issue was encountered was dealt with and she was simply making an excuse for the delay in serving me my food. So two people actually knew about this, the drive thru gal and whomever assembled the sandwich and still allowed it to go out the door.
• Stopping one evening to pick my wife up ONE order of McDonalds Chicken Nuggets I was given a bag with EIGHT packages of sauce, about 30 napkins, but no Chicken Nuggets. When the error was discovered and I went back (we live about two blocks away) and drove straight up to the window as no one else was in line. The young boy at the window said “are you here for your Chicken Nuggets?” No apology, only a smirk on his face and the obvious indicators he was holding back his laughter for his little stunt.
• My wife always orders her food without lettuce because she can’t eat it. I won’t go into why here but 50% of the time, and probably closer to 75% of the time this simple request is not followed. It ends up taking twice as long to get our order fixed and many times we will get an attitude from the window worker. “Are you sure you ordered it that way?” Yeah, I’m sure. See we order it that way because she won’t eat it with lettuce and I’m not inclined to purchase food for the privilege of throwing it away. “Well next time you need to make sure they heard you” Yeah, sure. Next time I will make sure they are doing their job. Next time I will make certain their attention span stretches further than “A Big Mac” and they actually pay attention to the remainder of that sentence – “without lettuce.” Lord knows it has got to be my fault for making two requests in the same sentence. Over and over again, round and round we go.

Now not all of their employees are this bad. In fact there was this gentleman working there last year with the name “Old Man Jack” on his name tag. He worked mornings and was always ready with a smile, always asked how our morning was going and sometimes even had a little joke to share. What you need to do is bring Old Man Jack out of retirement and resist your temptation to put a person of his caliber on the window taking orders. Have him teach the rest of your employees why it is important to care about their jobs and give it their best effort – even if they are making minimum wage. Have him show your crew why treating customers with respect and making them feel welcome is so vital to a business like yours. Oh, and maybe have or someone else go over proper food safety issues.

We live in a relatively small town and their isn’t many choices for fast food especially late at night but this town in growing quick and that will change soon. Sure you guys are the kings of fast food and don’t have a lot to fear but just imagine for a minute how much you could improve your bottom line if you didn’t have people like me saying “not McDonalds again.” Until this case of suspected McDonald’s food poisoning from your value menu I didn’t really have much against your company other than the service. That has all changed. I’m done with you.

I will be back for one of those McDonalds Shamrock Shakes but I guarantee you it won’t be from my local McDonalds Franchise.

21 Days-