Subway getting in on value menu trend

Subway getting in on value menu trend

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
And uh, let's bring him in. It is the one and only Alex
Stone from ABC News Wow joining usnow, and uh, Alex, it
is uh, we are under heatadvisories near a hundred plus degrees. I
mean it is absolutely just you couldjust wring the air out. It is

(00:21):
so humid and so hot here andit has been for the last few days
and it will be for the nextfew days. So uh that doesn't sound
nice now right now beautiful outside.Gosh, you wouldn't. You would absolutely
melt here if you stepped into this. I know you guys get some heat
there though, So we do,yeah, we do, but no,

(00:41):
no, right now, it's especiallyin the evenings, it's gorgeous. Yeah,
we it is not here. Itis. Uh, it's just crazy
how hot it's been. But andthen we're gonna have like they said,
oh, we're cooling way off toeighty six on Monday, udity right still
with the human slightly less and uh, and then it will begin climbing again

(01:03):
next week. So that's where we'reat. We're in the throes of summer.
As a matter of fact. Theother it's a couple of days ago
the first time we hit ninety fivesince twenty twenty two. They were kind
of pointing out, so, yeah, we've been quite a while before we've
had this type of heat, andthe lawn's all crispy now, so I
don't have to mow ready, Ohgosh, but we've been going at it.

(01:25):
It's been we've had no rain forseveral days now. Basically in my
area, my negative would So youknow what I thought was interesting. I
don't know if you saw this,the uh how the summer Olympics where they're
going to feed these fifteen thousand athletes. I was. I was fascinated by
some of this stuff. The cateringteam's going to be making two million meal

(01:46):
two million meals, that's crazy,from two hundred and six countries. Only
three items will be coming from othercountries. Bananas, coffee, and chocolate.
Talking a lot of bananas, threemillion bananas, twenty seven tons of
coffee. In Olympic village, they'refocusing on four different culinary themes French,

(02:07):
Asian, World, and African Caribbeanor Caribbean however you say it. In
the Olympic Village, there'll be asalad bar, grill cheese station, bakery,
hot food buffet, fruit, bar, dessert bar as well as condiment
bar with eighty five options. Twofoods you won't find there. I know,

(02:29):
two foods you won't find their Frenchfries because of the risk of fire
from using deep fryers in space withso many people. Into avocados because they'd
have to be imported from so faraway, require so much water to grow,
so on and so forth. Fifteendifferent dining spaces in this fifty two
acre village, including a main dininghall with thirty five hundred seats that will

(02:51):
be open twenty four hours a day, so round the clock they'll be feeding
these hungry athletes. Going to bemore than twenty senior chefs from around the
world who speak a range of languages. And then, uh yeah, the
Athletes Village will be open for twomonths total when the athletes start arriving here

(03:12):
in a few days July twelfth,and then the until the Olympics begins September
eleventh, at the close of theParalympics, with just a three day break
between the two events. So yeah, I thought some of that was fascinating
about the two million Let's just godown there. Let's go there to eat
like we won't be athletes. Wedon't need to perform, We just let's
just eat. It sounds like it'sgoing to be scrumptious. They're really taking

(03:34):
care of them, right, Imean, pretty cool. A third of
the food's going to be plant based, thirty percent will be organic, eighty
percent of it will come from France, which makes sense. It's it's you
know there, sure so, butyeah, anyway, I just forty thousand
meals a day is what how they'llbe doing this. Fifteen thousand athlete athletes,
So pretty fascinating, quite frankly hereand all that. It's like pretty

(03:58):
nuts kind of food, kind ofneat, but yeah, it looks like
something that it looks it looks reallydelicious based on all the stuff I was
reading without going really deep on allthat stuff, but we were just talking
a little bit ago. It's interestingthat, you know, Burger King's doing
this five dollars meal, and thennow McDonald's has announced they're beginning their's officially

(04:21):
next week, the five dollars meal, so it's we're the recipients. But
they did say the McDonald's five dollarsmeal would be hiring California and Hawaii,
which makes sense. I don't knowwhat with everything else, with gas prices
exactly and everything. But but yeah, do you where you got like a
five dollars meal there? Is it? What is it like nine dollars probably

(04:42):
or ten dollars? Yeah, Idon't know what it's going to be,
but it's it's partly because of laborcosts that now California has the minimum wage
law for fast food workers at theminimum wages twenty bucks. And so everybody
in and out burger, everybody's pricesare going up. Are they speaking of
in and out? Are they doinglike a meal deal? Do you know
they've never had one? But theirprices are up. But you know,

(05:03):
typically I think it was like underit was like eight bucks to get a
like a double double and a drinkand a fry, and now it's gone
up to like eleven dollars. Soit's going up. Yeah. Politicians will
tell you, well, no,the labor laws don't haven't had the impact,
that it's inflation and other things.But the companies say, no,
that they've got to pay twenty bucksan hour, that the prices have had

(05:24):
to go up. Well, that'sbasic, it's basic economy right there.
I mean, if it costs themmore to run the place, then they
got to charge more of the product. It's this vicious cycle, as they
say, right, yeah, yeah, but this is interesting. Someone else,
of note, a big old companyis getting in this race too.
They're like, hey, we're gettingin on this, right, Yeah,
they're all doing it, and youknow, you talk about McDonald's as well.

(05:46):
But they just they came out todaywith the details of what they're going
to do. June twenty fifth iswhen it's going to begin. The five
bucks you'll get the it's kind ofwhat was rumored a bunch of you know,
four weeks ago something like that,where it's going to be a mcdouble
or a McChicken, small fries,four piece nuggets, and a small drink
for five bucks. But the reallyto catch on it is that it's only
going to be a limited time,only about probably a month. They haven't

(06:10):
said exactly how long, but it'sgoing to be a matter of weeks,
so it's not going to be forever. And then Wendy's, Burger King,
Starbucks they've had to follow. Butalso they now Subway is getting in on
the action, and Subway, asNorth American presidents sat down exclusively with ABC
and Nick Fryes say this, aswe look at the restaurant industry as consumers,
we're starting to see a lot ofrestaurants focused on adding greater value.
The challenge that comes with greater valuesometimes is that there's a sacrifice for consumers,

(06:33):
and the sacrifices quality to get toprice. So clearly he's saying,
well, you get a lower levelitem from those other places. He's saying,
come to Subway that you're going toget something of quality. And so
what they're adding is a new footlong roll up dipper that will be three
dollars, so they're making it lessand inflation causing prices to go up.
Piece saying people see, and we'veseen this in polling, that they now

(06:56):
see going out to fast food asa luxury because it does cost and the
prices have gone up. So they'redoing these roll ups that are going to
be flat bread roll ups. Youcan get pepperoni and cheese, just straight
cheese or chicken and cheese where theyhave a little bit of that in them
and they roll them up. Andhe says about doing something different, giving
options, giving value with a threedollars foot long dippers you know, it

(07:18):
comes with eleven different sauces to choosefrom, so our consumers get to mix
and match. And that even hitson trends today such as swicy. I'm
not sure if you've heard of that. That's sweet and spicy together, all
right, So start using swicicy.That's what it's all about. You want
to be a little swicy. Sothat's going to be their value meal.
A subway gets in on the gameand it's everybody competing the biggie bag at

(07:39):
Wendy's McDonald subway Burger King. Yeah, there's been complaints about Chipotle as well.
There was one social media video wherea guy was like, well here
here's what he said. He had. This went all over the place.
This was like twelve thirteen dollars.I'm the keet on two packs like four
pieces of chicken, and Chipotle's hadto come back and say, no,
our portion sizes have not gotten smaller. We're not only giving you four pieces

(08:00):
a chicken in there now. Sothey're all dealing with it. Yeah,
the whole Chipotle thing, like wejust had it the other night, and
that the ladle they use when theyscoop you know out whatever protein you're getting
the guy. It seems like everytime i'm they're actually pretty generous with that.
Yeah, I've always noticed that too. I've never had a problem with

(08:20):
it. What is the dipper?So it was it's only the cheese and
the pepperoni and then the chicken andcheese. Is that all? That's a
norgeous straight cheese. So it's flatbread. They put a little bit of
cheese, a little bit of eitherpepperoni or chicken in there, and then
roll it up and then I didn'tput it in the loving thing to warm
it up to melt the cheese,and then you get a dipping sauce with

(08:41):
it as well. For three bucks, it's a foot long. The man
the thing was some stone loves that. My son, he loves Subway.
He would eat it every night ifI would get it. But the foot
long in this area, Alex,they're like in the nine dollars ring.
Oh yeah, I remember when itwas five bucks. I can't do that
anymore. And I think that that'swhy they're not saying, you know what,
we're gonna go back to five dollarsfoot long. They just can't make

(09:03):
any money doing that, and thatwas the problem. With McDonald's is that
they had to get the franchisees onboard because they set their own prices as
they do it subway as well,and there was that argument of that the
franchisees just could not make money doinga five dollars meal deal, so that's
why they're doing it limited at McDonald'sfor only a couple of weeks. Kind
of seen as kind of like costcobeing with the rotisserie chickens, being a

(09:26):
loss leader, knowing that you maynot make a lot of money or any
money, but it's going to getpeople back in and they're going to like
eating McDonald's again and want to smelland crave it and start going back even
when the meal deal goes away.So they're kind of using it as a
promotion instead of a long term thing. But trying to get the franchisees on
board if they weren't going to makea lot of money or any money.

(09:46):
That seems like that that was akind of a point that they had to
debate and figure out. I wonderif the franchisees if they're going, you
know, no, I'm not doingthat. I guess they have to of
corporate. I think they have togo along with promotions. They do said
their own prices, but I thinkthat there's clauses in their contract that if
there's a nationwide promotion, they gotto go along with it. Yeah,

(10:07):
that is that is really interesting thatsubway's now getting in the mix here.
But again it's a dipper And Iwonder did they say anything about are those
that is a new item and arethey going to be around or are they
for a limited time and then theygo away? You think? You know,
the CEO was asked today and hekind of went around that issue,
not really answering it. So Iassume it's going to be somewhat limited,

(10:28):
at least for three dollars. Probablylimited, but just like McDonald's is just
saying limited time, but they're notsaying how long they're all getting. They're
a little squishy on the details ofthese, right, Yeah, they got
to be cryptic, so you wouldthink they would create urgency and say,
hey, it's only the July thirtyfirst or you know whatever. I don't
know, is there a thirty firstin July or thirtieth? I don't know,

(10:50):
probably thirty first? Is there Augustor thirty first? Back to back?
Okay, that makes sense. ThenI was wondering if there was,
but I they would create urgency anyway, I'm just thinking out loud here spitball
and if you will, Alex Stone, ABC News, And I was gonna
say, stay cool, but you'realready cool, so it doesn't know we're
doing we're doing well out here.You're right, there is a thirty first
in July and August. I neverrealized that. I didn't either. I

(11:13):
did know. Does that thing work? Did you ever do it on your
knuckles when you were kids? Yes, exactly, because you got January,
February, March, April, May, June, July, August, and
then you switch over to a newhand. Well, yeah, because if
you start like see you start withyour left hand, you just you put
all four knuckles out, keep yourthumbs out of it. All your knuckles
are thirty one days. All theindentations between your knuckles on my sense.

(11:35):
Now, really you jump over andyou're back on a knuckle. Oh,
that's the that's the knuckle shuffle.I've heard of that. I have heard
of knuckle shuffles. I've heard ofthat too, you Alex, you heard
of that. No, I haveno idea what you're talking about. I
think I shouldn't know. Uh,do you have fun at disney Land yesterday?
I have to go ridin tonight.I'll be back tonight. You ride

(11:56):
anything when you're in there. Well, we, uh, we were in
meetings and then maybe had a coupleof drinks and then went in. So
I did one ride and then Iwent home. Oh, very good.
You gotta get right to the Caribbean. And then I bailed out. Oh
you got to get a ride inwhile you're there, especially you'll do it
for free for you tonight. Okay, very good posting Chase Mountain tonight.
Oh perfect, perfect, I loveit. Alex Stone, ABC News,

(12:18):
Alex, thank you.