Sometimes, I end up doing research without even knowing it. Or even want to.
more technically incorrect
Not your real science type, you understand. Just the last kind that lights up my world in unexpected ways.
The other day, I was at Lisbon Airport, Terminal 2, and suddenly hunger struck.
At a close distance is one of society’s premier culinary sanctuaries, McDonald’s. So while my wife went shopping for something healthy, I couldn’t resist the pleasure of enjoying a Portuguese Big Mac and of course fries.
There are six large screens that you can order. All were already occupied, so I ambled over to the counter, where a very kind man was quick to respond to my needs. The food came quickly, some might say unsettlingly quick.
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Then I sat down and watched the stream of people flock to their red and yellow beacons.
The screens have an advantage. They are placed near the aisles where people are walking. So many people immediately gravitate towards them.
Most mine with confidence. No one, in the hour that I sat there, seemed to have any difficulty navigating these nearly giant iPads.
My completely unscientific estimate is that for every customer ordering at the counter, 30 choose a display.
Is the screen necessarily faster? I really do not know. At the counter, you look up the menu, talk to a person and then pay. On the screen, you have to scroll a little, tap a little, wait a little, then pay.
However, it seems clear that the vast majority of people believe that screens will bring them gratification more quickly.
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I hear you grumbling that only older people hang around the counter. Not so. There is absolutely no age bias that I can see.
What is curious, however, is that of those who choose to go to the counter, the majority are men. The men were alone and the men were in groups.
Maybe they have special commands that they think a monitor can’t handle. Maybe they don’t want anyone to see how much they have booked, or what. It certainly can’t be that they see the scary screen.
Watching people in action, making natural choices — or rather choices they feel natural — is absolutely fascinating.
However, if you order via screen, the amount of human interaction is limited to someone handing you a tray or bag and you — maybe — say, “Thank you.”
However, this is fast food, so the most important thing is not human contact. It’s speed, regulated by demand.
Of course, on-screen ordering is just one aspect of the fast food future. For example, McDonald’s deploys robot to order at drive-thru.
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However, the company’s CEO, Chris Kempczinski, went on to emphasize that McDonald’s doesn’t have an all-robot future. Recently, he explained, “The idea of robots and all that, while it can be great to attract headlines, it’s not practical in the vast majority of restaurants.”
I’m afraid what he means is actually, in fact, profitable.
As with all research, I was left with questions. What is it about men and ordering counters? Why don’t people consider ordering on the screen less hygienic? Won’t the future just require ordering via mobile devices instead of these big screens?
However, I suspect that you are left with only one question: How is my Big Mac?
Honestly, it crashed within seconds.
