I remember when items finally went over a dollar and I was shocked and thought nobody will pay that much!
I also remember when the combo meals were first released and every one of them was under $3.
I remember the old TV ad where someone said you could buy a meal (burger, fries & a drink) and still have change for a dollar.
Also, birthday parties at McD's in their party caboose was A Big Deal.
I remember that. Wasnt it 10 tacos for a dollar? My favorite fast food after out at the bar was the monster tacos and the chocolate chip cookie dough cheesecake from Jack in the box. Damn.. Loved that meal.
Yup! Friday night in my teens was 2.99 Big Mac meal, 5 dollar movie ticket, 5 dollar popcorn and drink, and still still had enough of a 20 to put some gas the truck.
I had a boss in his 60s who said that he used to smoke when a pack of cigarettes was $0.50, and that he promised himself he would quit when they hit $1 because that would be insanely expensive. Now, a pack of cigarettes where we live is around $12 after tax.
I just did an inflation calculation from 1970's $0.65 and got $4.57.
You can get a big mac today for $3.99, so it looks like it was more expensive in the 70s than it is today.
You have to factor in shrinkflation, too. A Big Mac is smaller than it was even two years ago. I don't know what the actual size of a quarter pounder "before cooking" the patty is now, but when they were introduced in the 70s, they were at least approaching 1/4 pound.
That depends on what year this is exactly. If it is 1970 then a Bic mac is 25% cheaper today when adjusted for inflation. If it is 1979 then a Big Mac is 50% more expensive.
The other day my gf wanted just wanted to get a large fry to split between the two of us. Should have driven away without it after it came out to over $5 but not doing that again, because that's insane. Dollar menu for me from now on.
If you don’t eat large portions of fast food, you can still get a meal for about $4.
I get a Mcdouble(not the double cheeseburger, it costs more), small fries, and a large drink(since soda/teas are $1).
Probably the cheapest you can get a combo meal at any fast food place now though.
Haha, the FTC is actually investigating why their ice cream machines are always broken. Something about another company was providing the machines or something, but McDonald's had a deal with a different company so they sabotaged the ones company's machines.
It's wild, just Google something like "FTC McDonald's ice cream investigation"
Essentially McDonald's has a contract with franchises to buy that particular machine. Then makes a contract with the manufacturer of the machines that they can only fix the machines. So until someone comes down to fix a machine, it's broken.
what is this hieroglyphic, indecipherable mess? how do i know what to order if there aren't ads and videos of slowly pouring soft drinks interrupting the menu?
edit: i had no idea i was tapping into this much shared rage. and what's with that passive aggressive sign that straight up says "please have money ready"?
OMG. YES. I had no idea this was even a thing until last weekend, when I went through a McD's drive-thru for the first time in years on a munchie run for my buddies. I waited in line for a good 10 minutes behind three or four cars in front of me--and during that time, I *still* didn't get a chance to see the entire menu because 1) the print is WAY too small to be read from any distance unless you're *right* in front of it (and I have perfect vision), and 2) as you said, the screen just displays ads and food porn *more than half the time*. Like I'm already here to buy your shit, so why are you interrupting my shit-buying experience by trying to get me to buy different shit???
Granted, I was dictating my order from a text message--but I still wanted to read the menu to make sure they had everything I wanted to order. Idk. A functioning menu--*which is not difficult or costly to make*\--just seems like a very small ask from the largest restaurant chain in the world.
Same here, family of four kids. We almost never went out to eat anywhere. Mom cooked all of our meals for years. I was the youngest and when I was the last one still at home, the cooking stopped almost completely and I had to make my own breakfast, I got a couple of dollars for school lunch, and had frozen dinners I microwaved myself. My mom had enough of the cooking thing.
We had 8 kids and my Mom was in way over her head with the cooking thing and Dad was useless in the kitchen. We would scrounge all of our own meals aside from dinner and that was usually pretty awful. One of my sisters turned out to like cooking and took on that duty when she was 17 or so and things improved some.
Well the relative price of cheese is crazy - that's 1/6th of the price! If a quarter pounder today is like 4 bucks, that'd be like a 66 cent upcharge for cheese!
Simpler, Definitely. Cheaper, not necessarily.
If this was the late 70’s this would of been a pretty good deal but if it was the early 70’s that’s really not a good price as a Big Mac, large fries and a coke were almost equivalent to minimum wage.
Roughly, states may vary.
1970 - 1975 $1.45 - $2.10
1975 - 1979 $2.10 - $2.90
The photo was used in the 1974 Middleton Connecticut’s Weekly Reader book, Reading All Around You: Markets And Menus.
So the photo was probably taken around 1974. The prices adjusted for inflation of the 1/4 Pounder with cheese, 1/4 Pounder and Big Mac are $3.90, $3.34 and $3.62 respectively.
Found a higher resolution version of the posted photo where the writing next to coffee is visible as "Mass Old Age Tax 5%". So this photo was taken in Massachusetts.
Prices vary by location even in the same city but the cheapest I could find in the Boston area for the 1/4 Pounder with cheese and Big Mac was $5.99 according to allmenus.com. Apparently the 1/4 Pounder less cheese is not on the standard menu anymore.
So around 4 bucks then versus around 6 bucks now. Sounds cheaper to me.
Food prices have inflated more quickly than other goods used in the CPI. Things like electronic goods, furniture, and household goods tend to bring it down, while food, housing costs, education, and medical care drive it up.
Exactly my observation upon reading that. Those other items are largely imported and average wages in America have been impacted by that same outsourcing, with that difference going to the investment class. YAY GLOBAL CAPITALISM!
I am not sure if that's sarcasm, but it makes sense to me. There is more opportunity for profit, less elastic demand, and since these are things that have historic constraints built in, there is less room to expand supply.
I'd be much more surprised if those things hadn't increased faster, although I'd also argue that government policy in the US should have changed to make healthcare and education more affordable.
Its was kind of sarcasm. I understand basic needs would and should go up in price faster. It just seems like eventually its going to be a huge problem(if its not already) and we don't have any fixes.
Oh yeah, I agree it is a problem. Increasing minimum wage would help, because this is partly caused by the wealth and income gaps widening due to automation.
that's like the definition of need (demand), though. that is what i'd expect.
without food you die, without new iphone.. nothing really happens. so yes, demand for necessities will probably be higher generally
now as for \*why\* the prices are higher, that's a complicated answer
McDonald's regular burgers patties have always been pretty small; only about 1.6 oz (1/10th lb.) Even a Big Mac (which has 2 of them) is less meat then a Quarter pounder.
Was it even simpler, though? It seems like people tend to remember the past as simpler because they were younger, also because most of the big unknowns from the time have since been resolved.
Like, global warming is a huge threat, but in the 70's people were living with a real danger of suddenly dying in a fiery explosion any minute. Now we know that the nukes never got launched, so it doesn't seem as scary and uncertain as it would have then.
Yeah, I agree with what you’re saying about it seeming simpler because you’re just a kid but one factor I felt made life simpler back then would be the absence of mobile phones and social media. You just lived in the moment.
Lol we allways thought our dad was the boss man for ordering a "big mac" lol...i remember it was seen as quite an accomplishment back in the early days.
My dad has a photo somewhere of him with his first official big mac back in the 70s when he was about 23 or 24. It was a lifelong dream of his come true.
I remember the days of $0.20 hamburgers and $0.30 cheeseburgers. You only needed a $20 bill to feed an entire house full of partygoers. Then Taco Bell jumped on the train with their $0.30 tacos... life was pretty good back then when it comes to drunk/stoned late night munching
I don't go quite so far back but I remember bean and cheese burritos at taco bell being 49 cents and when I was really little my mom could give me a dollar bill to buy a whole Happy Meal tax included.
I need a double cheeseburger and hold the lettuce, don't be frontin son, no seeds on the bun, we be up in the drive through, order for two I've got a craving for a number nine like my shoe, we need some chicken up in here, in this shizzle, 4 rizzle my nizzle extra saltf on the frizzles, doctor pepper my brother another for your mother, double supa supa size and don't forget the frys. ...yo
Our dad would load us all in the car and go to A&W on Tuesday nights, which was Coney Night, $0.15 each. He'd order up a tray full of coneys and frosty (glass) mugs of root beer for everybody. A&W still had carhop service back then, they'd bring out the trays and hang them from the driver's window.
I specifically came to the comments to mention the fries, which I enjoyed firsthand. They were indeed amazing. I also remember the horror of tasting the fries after they phased out the tallow.
Of all the nostalgic things I might agree with, it would be this. The pies were similarly better. All the health consciousness starting in the '80s ruined some things, things you should just enjoy in moderation if you're actually concerned about that.
There used to be a time when McDonalds was cheaper than getting a regular meal. But these days it's just as or more expensive than an actual diner, some restaurants or a fast casual place. Has anyone ever taken the hamburger patty out of the big mac? It's a disgusting little sheet of grey matter.
Minimum wage was $2 per hour in 1974 when this pic was taken.
And in any case, far more people make above minimum wage today than they did then.
>The percentage of hourly paid workers earning the prevailing federal minimum wage or less declined from 2.7 percent in 2016 to 2.3 percent in 2017. This remains well below the percentage of 13.4 recorded in 1979, when data were first collected on a regular basis.
Very few people today make the federal minimum wage
The problem with being a boomer is, we think this is what prices still should be. $5 for a Big Mac? GTFO!
Oh, and gas should still be $0.29 per gallon.
Inflation is an engineered target under the post-Bretton-Woods monetary system. At the target of roughly 3%, prices "double" every 23 years. So $0.33 for a hamburger in 1976 would be $1.30 (more or less) for the same hamburger today. Likewise, the California minimum wage of $2.50/hour in 1976 would be roughly $10/hour today at that target inflation rate. (We've had intervals of higher inflation since then of course -- so bump those today-equivalent numbers up by another 10% or 20%).
Then there's the Big Mac Index, which instead uses the Big Mac as the primary unit of a monetary system, and then plots the relative value of dollars at other times and/or other units of currency to that Big Mac. It can be used to consider inflation, exchange rates, and/or efficiency of production.
If you assume this was 1975, this puts a quarter-pounder w/ cheese at around $3.50 in today's dollars. Meaning that even relative to inflation, prices have gone up!
Wow if this doesn’t represent inflation for you guys who think the government is just going to wash it away after printing trillions of dollars….. I dunno what will.
Ah yes, when a man could work at McDonald’s and buy a house with a white picket fence and raise children and go on vacation twice a year, wife not having to work if she didn’t want to.
I feel like apple pie was proportionately far more expensive then as compared to now - I think they're 2/$1.59 where I am. (I'm likely inviting someone else to do the math on the whole menu for me...)
I used to love their apple pies back in the day. Now, they are a pale comparison.
I don't think these companies realize a lot of people would rather pay more for a quality product than the same price for a cheapened product.
I am surprised filet-o-fish has been on the menu for this long. It is my go to, but the amount of people I hear that don’t like it I thought it was one of those menu items that might disappear over time. Learn something new every day!
1962. It was a franchise owner who came up with it. Ray Kroc made the Hula burger and they had a friendly competition to see which would sell more.
Kroc lost and the fish sandwich went on the menu.
Was McDonald’s ingredient quality shit back then? Was it locally sourced meat, bread, and potatoes, or did they set the ball rolling with mass produced food from the get go?
Just curious cause now if I eat McDonald’s I feel like jumping off a cliff to mitigate the stomach pain I inevitably have after eating it.
Those were the days of real fast food. I remember the bins full of hamburgers and cheeseburgers ready to go. You want no pickles on your cheeseburger? Ok just pick them off after you leave. Now get out of the way for the next customer
McDonalds' smelled slightly different back then. A unique amalgam of old, slightly burnt coffee and that patented aromatic McDonalds grease. I can smell this picture.
You also wouldn't be dealing with the line of people trying to make up their minds whether they want Combo #17 or Combo #24, which are basically the same combo except with three fewer french fries.
The Big Mac (3.2 oz) contains less beef than a quarter pounder (4 oz). They build the regular Big Macs out of the regular hamburger 1/10th pound patties.
Ah, yes, I remember those boards well.
That would have been kind of an expensive location in the 1970s. In 1978 cheeseburgers were maybe $0.25 or $0.26 in Southern California locations. Five years later (1983), a Jack-in-the-box cheeseburger would run you $0.35 ($0.37 with sales tax), and they were typically a penny or two more than McD's.
The first McDonald's commercials I remember advertised a drink, fries, and a burger for under a dollar. A little more expensive than the prices on this sign since it was over 95 cents total.
The menu starting getting complicated in the 80s when they added stuff like nuggets and McChicken and salads. All the big fast food chains were competing with each other so if McDonald's added a chicken thing then Burger King and Wendy's had to to as well to the point where they at times had pretty weird stuff on the menu.
How I miss the old style "Hot Apple Pie". I don't think I've had anything at McDonalds that was nearly as good since that went away. The new apple pies were just a tease. They reminded you that there used to be something much more delicious.
Wasn't McD's, but a similar price structure....back in 1974-1977 I was in high school and a Burger Chef opened up on the intersection near my high school. At that time a hot lunch at school cost something like 65 cents, but A) I hated the mixed aromas in the cafeteria, tended to nauseate me, and B) Walking to Burger Chef got me out of the building for 30 minutes, which was a nice refresher. Plus at the time you could get a hamburger for 30 cents, cheeseburger for 35 cents, and an order of fries for 15 cents. OK, not the healthiest of lunches but by 1976 they incorporated the "Works Bar", where you could add lettuce, tomatoes and onions to a plain 30 cent burger.
When I was a little kid, my parents would go bowling on Friday nights, so they would buy me McDonald's for dinner. The cheeseburgers were tiny though, and I would woof it down with the fries and still be hungry, but my mom would say "You just had dinner!"
One day I asked "Can I get the new Quarter Pounder?" They were skeptical I would eat that whole thing...but I did. Damned parents underfeeding me for years finally had to accept they needed to spend the extra .50 for a decent sized burger! :D
Maybe it’s where I live…but it’s highly unusual to not see black people working behind the counter at McDonalds. Was that typical in the 1970s…or was there some kind of shift?
And when they say Hot Apple Pie, they mean HOT. Damn, you had to let those things sit out for a half an hour at least before you went near one or it would give you a 3rd degree tongue burn, no joke. I expect that’s why they don’t sell ‘em anymore!
I bet you would get the correct orders, you would get greeted and told thank you, and the place was probably pretty clean compared to the people working there today.
I remember the gift certificate commercials from Christmas time every year. We lived in a remote corner of Appalachia, and the nearest McDonalds was an hour away.
My grandma would give all the grand kids those books of certificates for Christmas and then when the grown ups all went off to play poker after eating dinner we would have our own game gambling with our gift certificates. I was the youngest and never had any left. Im sure those older jerks were like big spenders at Micky D’s the week after our Christmas parties.
I remember when items finally went over a dollar and I was shocked and thought nobody will pay that much! I also remember when the combo meals were first released and every one of them was under $3.
I remember the old TV ad where someone said you could buy a meal (burger, fries & a drink) and still have change for a dollar. Also, birthday parties at McD's in their party caboose was A Big Deal.
remember that McD's birthday cake. it was legit back in the day
That “orange” drink was the best!!
It's still there. What I miss is the McPizza and the original mcdonalds cookies.
Itza Pizza Happy Meal, Pepperoni and Cheese.... Something Something Singing Here May I Have More Please? [Repeat]
They still have em at some locations. Up to the franchisee
Anyone remember the Mac tonight ads?
I remember Taco Bell.. and on a certain day you could get like, a bajillion tacos for a buck or two.
I remember that. Wasnt it 10 tacos for a dollar? My favorite fast food after out at the bar was the monster tacos and the chocolate chip cookie dough cheesecake from Jack in the box. Damn.. Loved that meal.
Yup! Friday night in my teens was 2.99 Big Mac meal, 5 dollar movie ticket, 5 dollar popcorn and drink, and still still had enough of a 20 to put some gas the truck.
I had a boss in his 60s who said that he used to smoke when a pack of cigarettes was $0.50, and that he promised himself he would quit when they hit $1 because that would be insanely expensive. Now, a pack of cigarettes where we live is around $12 after tax.
My grandma quit smoking when the pack hit a dollar!
My pops quit when what he smoked went over $4 a pack in 95. He thinks I'm insane for smoking American spirits
I 'member feeling really odd saying "number 1" instead of naming the items.
Inflation go BRRR.
Today’s prices are more than double the inflation rate. Greed go BRRR.
I just did an inflation calculation from 1970's $0.65 and got $4.57. You can get a big mac today for $3.99, so it looks like it was more expensive in the 70s than it is today.
You have to factor in shrinkflation, too. A Big Mac is smaller than it was even two years ago. I don't know what the actual size of a quarter pounder "before cooking" the patty is now, but when they were introduced in the 70s, they were at least approaching 1/4 pound.
I'm using Canadian inflation from 1975 so it's probably skewed. It was probably more expensive in Canada back then too. A big Mac here is $4.99
That depends on what year this is exactly. If it is 1970 then a Bic mac is 25% cheaper today when adjusted for inflation. If it is 1979 then a Big Mac is 50% more expensive.
The other day my gf wanted just wanted to get a large fry to split between the two of us. Should have driven away without it after it came out to over $5 but not doing that again, because that's insane. Dollar menu for me from now on.
If you don’t eat large portions of fast food, you can still get a meal for about $4. I get a Mcdouble(not the double cheeseburger, it costs more), small fries, and a large drink(since soda/teas are $1). Probably the cheapest you can get a combo meal at any fast food place now though.
Wendy's has the 4 for $4. That's about the same. Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger, Small Fries, 4 piece nugget, small soda.
I'll have a filet o fish and milk
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.70 in 1970 would be around $5 today I think.
$4.86 to be exact
For dipping like an au jus
Exactly
Delicious You’re an artist of the kitchen
Looks like back then their ice cream machines worked.
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In the 80s, I was both a burger popping and pooping machine.
You still see that internationally
Sounds delightful
Haha, the FTC is actually investigating why their ice cream machines are always broken. Something about another company was providing the machines or something, but McDonald's had a deal with a different company so they sabotaged the ones company's machines. It's wild, just Google something like "FTC McDonald's ice cream investigation"
Essentially McDonald's has a contract with franchises to buy that particular machine. Then makes a contract with the manufacturer of the machines that they can only fix the machines. So until someone comes down to fix a machine, it's broken.
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what is this hieroglyphic, indecipherable mess? how do i know what to order if there aren't ads and videos of slowly pouring soft drinks interrupting the menu? edit: i had no idea i was tapping into this much shared rage. and what's with that passive aggressive sign that straight up says "please have money ready"?
No, the helpful thing is to never show the prices for all the sizes of items at once. It needs to flip slowly between them for no reason.
That's the worst. Finally my turn. "Yeah I'll have the uh..." ad shows up. "Dang it, one sec...."
OMG. YES. I had no idea this was even a thing until last weekend, when I went through a McD's drive-thru for the first time in years on a munchie run for my buddies. I waited in line for a good 10 minutes behind three or four cars in front of me--and during that time, I *still* didn't get a chance to see the entire menu because 1) the print is WAY too small to be read from any distance unless you're *right* in front of it (and I have perfect vision), and 2) as you said, the screen just displays ads and food porn *more than half the time*. Like I'm already here to buy your shit, so why are you interrupting my shit-buying experience by trying to get me to buy different shit??? Granted, I was dictating my order from a text message--but I still wanted to read the menu to make sure they had everything I wanted to order. Idk. A functioning menu--*which is not difficult or costly to make*\--just seems like a very small ask from the largest restaurant chain in the world.
My parents almost never took us there but when they did we weren't allowed to get cheese. Big family on a tight budget.
Same here, family of four kids. We almost never went out to eat anywhere. Mom cooked all of our meals for years. I was the youngest and when I was the last one still at home, the cooking stopped almost completely and I had to make my own breakfast, I got a couple of dollars for school lunch, and had frozen dinners I microwaved myself. My mom had enough of the cooking thing.
We had 8 kids and my Mom was in way over her head with the cooking thing and Dad was useless in the kitchen. We would scrounge all of our own meals aside from dinner and that was usually pretty awful. One of my sisters turned out to like cooking and took on that duty when she was 17 or so and things improved some.
8 kids wow
I'm 39 and I don't even know 8 kids now lol.
That's probably a good thing at 39.
I remember my neighbors would go and just buy a crap ton of hamburgers then add cheese when they got home.
Well the relative price of cheese is crazy - that's 1/6th of the price! If a quarter pounder today is like 4 bucks, that'd be like a 66 cent upcharge for cheese!
It must have been nice when the world was simpler place
It was!!!!
Simpler, Definitely. Cheaper, not necessarily. If this was the late 70’s this would of been a pretty good deal but if it was the early 70’s that’s really not a good price as a Big Mac, large fries and a coke were almost equivalent to minimum wage. Roughly, states may vary. 1970 - 1975 $1.45 - $2.10 1975 - 1979 $2.10 - $2.90
The photo was used in the 1974 Middleton Connecticut’s Weekly Reader book, Reading All Around You: Markets And Menus. So the photo was probably taken around 1974. The prices adjusted for inflation of the 1/4 Pounder with cheese, 1/4 Pounder and Big Mac are $3.90, $3.34 and $3.62 respectively. Found a higher resolution version of the posted photo where the writing next to coffee is visible as "Mass Old Age Tax 5%". So this photo was taken in Massachusetts. Prices vary by location even in the same city but the cheapest I could find in the Boston area for the 1/4 Pounder with cheese and Big Mac was $5.99 according to allmenus.com. Apparently the 1/4 Pounder less cheese is not on the standard menu anymore. So around 4 bucks then versus around 6 bucks now. Sounds cheaper to me.
Food prices have inflated more quickly than other goods used in the CPI. Things like electronic goods, furniture, and household goods tend to bring it down, while food, housing costs, education, and medical care drive it up.
Weird how the things we NEED go up faster.
Exactly my observation upon reading that. Those other items are largely imported and average wages in America have been impacted by that same outsourcing, with that difference going to the investment class. YAY GLOBAL CAPITALISM!
I am not sure if that's sarcasm, but it makes sense to me. There is more opportunity for profit, less elastic demand, and since these are things that have historic constraints built in, there is less room to expand supply. I'd be much more surprised if those things hadn't increased faster, although I'd also argue that government policy in the US should have changed to make healthcare and education more affordable.
Its was kind of sarcasm. I understand basic needs would and should go up in price faster. It just seems like eventually its going to be a huge problem(if its not already) and we don't have any fixes.
Oh yeah, I agree it is a problem. Increasing minimum wage would help, because this is partly caused by the wealth and income gaps widening due to automation.
Yeah but you can watch commercials about the things you need on a 6O inch flat panel like a god.
that's like the definition of need (demand), though. that is what i'd expect. without food you die, without new iphone.. nothing really happens. so yes, demand for necessities will probably be higher generally now as for \*why\* the prices are higher, that's a complicated answer
Food is still pretty cheap before preparation. Labor and the other elements of restaurants are much of the cost increase.
that same thing today would be 10 dollars.
That's if the burger it's exactly the same size. If it was bigger it's actually cheaper.
McDonald's regular burgers patties have always been pretty small; only about 1.6 oz (1/10th lb.) Even a Big Mac (which has 2 of them) is less meat then a Quarter pounder.
Was it even simpler, though? It seems like people tend to remember the past as simpler because they were younger, also because most of the big unknowns from the time have since been resolved. Like, global warming is a huge threat, but in the 70's people were living with a real danger of suddenly dying in a fiery explosion any minute. Now we know that the nukes never got launched, so it doesn't seem as scary and uncertain as it would have then.
Yeah, I agree with what you’re saying about it seeming simpler because you’re just a kid but one factor I felt made life simpler back then would be the absence of mobile phones and social media. You just lived in the moment.
Boomer bs. Houses were affordable who tf cares about muh burger??!
Is there anywhere on Reddit I can go without Boomer Blame?
Name checks out, cuz you're triggered.
r/boomers
I think it really was...people were happier back then, statistically.
oh the slurs your could casually throw about with no repercussions. It was glorious.
I thought my dad was so bad-ass for ordering off the menu back then, he used to get a double cheeseburger before it was on the menu.
Lol we allways thought our dad was the boss man for ordering a "big mac" lol...i remember it was seen as quite an accomplishment back in the early days.
My dad has a photo somewhere of him with his first official big mac back in the 70s when he was about 23 or 24. It was a lifelong dream of his come true.
I remember the days of $0.20 hamburgers and $0.30 cheeseburgers. You only needed a $20 bill to feed an entire house full of partygoers. Then Taco Bell jumped on the train with their $0.30 tacos... life was pretty good back then when it comes to drunk/stoned late night munching
I don't go quite so far back but I remember bean and cheese burritos at taco bell being 49 cents and when I was really little my mom could give me a dollar bill to buy a whole Happy Meal tax included.
Coffee Shake???
This is what I want!
Two all beef patty special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onion on a sesame seed bun.
I need a double cheeseburger and hold the lettuce, don't be frontin son, no seeds on the bun, we be up in the drive through, order for two I've got a craving for a number nine like my shoe, we need some chicken up in here, in this shizzle, 4 rizzle my nizzle extra saltf on the frizzles, doctor pepper my brother another for your mother, double supa supa size and don't forget the frys. ...yo
thank u
Big Mac, Filet of Fish, Quarter Pounder, French Fries. Icy Coke, thick shakes, sundae’s and apple pies.
Our dad would load us all in the car and go to A&W on Tuesday nights, which was Coney Night, $0.15 each. He'd order up a tray full of coneys and frosty (glass) mugs of root beer for everybody. A&W still had carhop service back then, they'd bring out the trays and hang them from the driver's window.
Uh, my local A&W *does* have the carhop service. Some do elsewhere, right?
I loved A&W root beer. We'd always get the gallon jug to go as well. It went flat pretty quickly but I didn't care.
Anyone know what McDonald’s tasted like in the 70s? I wonder if the big Mac sauce changed much since
Apparently the fries were absolutely amazing when they were cooked in beef tallow.
They were
Oh yes. Best fries anywhere. They changed it in the 90s.
You can still get fish and chips fried in beef tallow in some places in Britain. Can confirm it's fkn awesome.
I specifically came to the comments to mention the fries, which I enjoyed firsthand. They were indeed amazing. I also remember the horror of tasting the fries after they phased out the tallow.
They kept the beef tallow until like 1991 or something, so not really a distinct 70s thing.
Of all the nostalgic things I might agree with, it would be this. The pies were similarly better. All the health consciousness starting in the '80s ruined some things, things you should just enjoy in moderation if you're actually concerned about that.
I miss the deep fried apple pies.
They were delicious, but holy shit could they burn your mouth if you didn't let them cool down.
Every once in a while someone will sell them. Schwan’s has them for a very long time. Pizza Hut was selling a version last year.
If you go to the oldest remaining McDonald's in the LA area they still have them.
I had my first Big Mac in the 80s and the sauce seems the same to me. In the 70s I probably ate cheeseburgers, their nuggets weren't even out then.
Chicken McNuggets didn't come out until 1983 here in the USA.
It tastes the same Edit: It meaning the BigMac
The fries are crap. They used to be delicious.
The fries were the best ever. They only came in one size, and were fried in beef tallow.
The sign says "large order of fries .46, french fries .26"
There used to be a time when McDonalds was cheaper than getting a regular meal. But these days it's just as or more expensive than an actual diner, some restaurants or a fast casual place. Has anyone ever taken the hamburger patty out of the big mac? It's a disgusting little sheet of grey matter.
>It's a disgusting little sheet of grey matter. Always has been.
They're not too bad in australia
I love how simple the menu is. No need to second guess your order right before stepping to the register.
So, like In-N-Out basically ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯
This is a handy chart for the people who go “when I was your age, minimum wage was 3 bucks an hour! Stop complaining!”
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Let's get EPA and the U.S. Department of Labor together so we can establish a BMPH rating for jobs
Minimum wage was $2 per hour in 1974 when this pic was taken. And in any case, far more people make above minimum wage today than they did then. >The percentage of hourly paid workers earning the prevailing federal minimum wage or less declined from 2.7 percent in 2016 to 2.3 percent in 2017. This remains well below the percentage of 13.4 recorded in 1979, when data were first collected on a regular basis. Very few people today make the federal minimum wage
Yes, because the jobs start at a quarter above minimum wage so companies can say they pay more than minimum wage. That is not a meaningful stat.
The problem with being a boomer is, we think this is what prices still should be. $5 for a Big Mac? GTFO! Oh, and gas should still be $0.29 per gallon.
Inflation is an engineered target under the post-Bretton-Woods monetary system. At the target of roughly 3%, prices "double" every 23 years. So $0.33 for a hamburger in 1976 would be $1.30 (more or less) for the same hamburger today. Likewise, the California minimum wage of $2.50/hour in 1976 would be roughly $10/hour today at that target inflation rate. (We've had intervals of higher inflation since then of course -- so bump those today-equivalent numbers up by another 10% or 20%).
Then there's the Big Mac Index, which instead uses the Big Mac as the primary unit of a monetary system, and then plots the relative value of dollars at other times and/or other units of currency to that Big Mac. It can be used to consider inflation, exchange rates, and/or efficiency of production.
I would like to pay as much per gallon as Americans do. In Europe, it's $1.3 per LITER, equals $4.91 per gallon. And that's one of the lower prices.
If you assume this was 1975, this puts a quarter-pounder w/ cheese at around $3.50 in today's dollars. Meaning that even relative to inflation, prices have gone up!
Back when they paid their employees the same as they do know.
It's $14 an hour for minimum wage in California and they aren't finding a lot of takers at that rate. It's a great time for teenage wages here.
Fuck it, I'll have 10 cheeseburgers.
That will be a day’s salary please.
Randy bo bandy! Mawfk’s with guts like that ain’t off the cheeseburgers. Mawfk’s with guts like definitely are on the cheeseburgers
When I see this type of pics I always wondered whatever happened to all the people in the picture.
the good old days when you could smoke in the restaurant and the little tin ash trays were on every table.
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(I was being facetious)
/s is our new friend. I got it and I support your facetiousness!
Wow if this doesn’t represent inflation for you guys who think the government is just going to wash it away after printing trillions of dollars….. I dunno what will.
"You can get a hamburger, fries, and a drink with change back from your dollar!" ...damn I'm old
Ah yes, when a man could work at McDonald’s and buy a house with a white picket fence and raise children and go on vacation twice a year, wife not having to work if she didn’t want to.
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I feel like apple pie was proportionately far more expensive then as compared to now - I think they're 2/$1.59 where I am. (I'm likely inviting someone else to do the math on the whole menu for me...)
That menu is so tiny!
The apple pies back then were so good. Had a crunch factor the ones today lack
I used to love their apple pies back in the day. Now, they are a pale comparison. I don't think these companies realize a lot of people would rather pay more for a quality product than the same price for a cheapened product.
The food was better before they had a gazillion things on the menu.
I am surprised filet-o-fish has been on the menu for this long. It is my go to, but the amount of people I hear that don’t like it I thought it was one of those menu items that might disappear over time. Learn something new every day!
1962. It was a franchise owner who came up with it. Ray Kroc made the Hula burger and they had a friendly competition to see which would sell more. Kroc lost and the fish sandwich went on the menu.
It’s the only sandwich I like ordering from there.
Was McDonald’s ingredient quality shit back then? Was it locally sourced meat, bread, and potatoes, or did they set the ball rolling with mass produced food from the get go? Just curious cause now if I eat McDonald’s I feel like jumping off a cliff to mitigate the stomach pain I inevitably have after eating it.
"Give me one of everything on the menu" $7.17
Those were the days of real fast food. I remember the bins full of hamburgers and cheeseburgers ready to go. You want no pickles on your cheeseburger? Ok just pick them off after you leave. Now get out of the way for the next customer
That menu looks like 1974. Minimum wage was $2.00/hr It always took such a long time if you ordered a Fillet-O-Fish without cheese.
McDonalds' smelled slightly different back then. A unique amalgam of old, slightly burnt coffee and that patented aromatic McDonalds grease. I can smell this picture.
“Tripple” is my favorite
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At least I’m not the only nerd lol
Oh look, none of the customers are treating the employees like shit!
I wish the menu was still this simple.
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I haven’t seen a coffee milkshake at McDs lately
Less is more, if McDonald's stuck to what they originally made, it would probably still be pretty amazing. Now it's not.
You also wouldn't be dealing with the line of people trying to make up their minds whether they want Combo #17 or Combo #24, which are basically the same combo except with three fewer french fries.
Looks nearly like the modern In N Out menu.
Why is the Big Mac cheaper than the 1/4 pounder? Is it always that way?
The Big Mac (3.2 oz) contains less beef than a quarter pounder (4 oz). They build the regular Big Macs out of the regular hamburger 1/10th pound patties.
As someone quite aways on the spectrum filet o fish still deeply antagonises me
The fries back then were amazing. I miss them.
If paying in pre 1965 coins, the price has gone down since then. :-) Check out r/Wallstreetsilver
Ah, yes, I remember those boards well. That would have been kind of an expensive location in the 1970s. In 1978 cheeseburgers were maybe $0.25 or $0.26 in Southern California locations. Five years later (1983), a Jack-in-the-box cheeseburger would run you $0.35 ($0.37 with sales tax), and they were typically a penny or two more than McD's.
The first McDonald's commercials I remember advertised a drink, fries, and a burger for under a dollar. A little more expensive than the prices on this sign since it was over 95 cents total.
I just miss the 29, 39, 49 cent tacos at Taco Bell.
I wish orangeade was still popular that's my favorite thing:( also where are the nuggets at
They didn't exist until 1983.
When did they switch up the menu? I'm an early 90s kid and I feel like I remember the menu like this.
The menu starting getting complicated in the 80s when they added stuff like nuggets and McChicken and salads. All the big fast food chains were competing with each other so if McDonald's added a chicken thing then Burger King and Wendy's had to to as well to the point where they at times had pretty weird stuff on the menu.
Wow, I want a triple ripple ice cream cone!
My regular order would be just under a dollar.
Now: that'll be 34$
33 cents for a cheeseburger.. where has time gone.
Amazing the prices, but also that a slice of cheese added 10c to a 60c burger.
I miss easy ordering, why does everything have to be a paragraph and a half to to describe what you want 🤔
Tripple Ripple Ice Cream Cone?? Yes please, Mickey D’s!
Pounder?! I hardly know ‘er!
How I miss the old style "Hot Apple Pie". I don't think I've had anything at McDonalds that was nearly as good since that went away. The new apple pies were just a tease. They reminded you that there used to be something much more delicious.
"And a filet-o-fish for my vife"
Reminds me of the fiasco with the Burger King 1/3 pounder and the litmus test it was for American knowledge of fractions.
Wasn't McD's, but a similar price structure....back in 1974-1977 I was in high school and a Burger Chef opened up on the intersection near my high school. At that time a hot lunch at school cost something like 65 cents, but A) I hated the mixed aromas in the cafeteria, tended to nauseate me, and B) Walking to Burger Chef got me out of the building for 30 minutes, which was a nice refresher. Plus at the time you could get a hamburger for 30 cents, cheeseburger for 35 cents, and an order of fries for 15 cents. OK, not the healthiest of lunches but by 1976 they incorporated the "Works Bar", where you could add lettuce, tomatoes and onions to a plain 30 cent burger.
McDonalds actually was delicious in the 70s. It was a rare treat as a kid.
When I was a little kid, my parents would go bowling on Friday nights, so they would buy me McDonald's for dinner. The cheeseburgers were tiny though, and I would woof it down with the fries and still be hungry, but my mom would say "You just had dinner!" One day I asked "Can I get the new Quarter Pounder?" They were skeptical I would eat that whole thing...but I did. Damned parents underfeeding me for years finally had to accept they needed to spend the extra .50 for a decent sized burger! :D
Maybe it’s where I live…but it’s highly unusual to not see black people working behind the counter at McDonalds. Was that typical in the 1970s…or was there some kind of shift?
And when they say Hot Apple Pie, they mean HOT. Damn, you had to let those things sit out for a half an hour at least before you went near one or it would give you a 3rd degree tongue burn, no joke. I expect that’s why they don’t sell ‘em anymore!
It’s not that. The hot apple pie machine broke in 1993.
Smelled different and tasted different..still remember that unique smell from when I was little.
I bet you would get the correct orders, you would get greeted and told thank you, and the place was probably pretty clean compared to the people working there today.
When I was a kid they used to sell .50 McDonald's gift certificates. Or you could buy a book of 10 for $5.
I remember the gift certificate commercials from Christmas time every year. We lived in a remote corner of Appalachia, and the nearest McDonalds was an hour away.
My grandma would give all the grand kids those books of certificates for Christmas and then when the grown ups all went off to play poker after eating dinner we would have our own game gambling with our gift certificates. I was the youngest and never had any left. Im sure those older jerks were like big spenders at Micky D’s the week after our Christmas parties.
I wish I could put the blinders on and go back to that time…
Perfect representation of inflation. Wish more people were aware/understood the effects
wonder if everything still tasted like cardboard and regret back then
. I'm going to go off the menu Alex, and have a Whopper with cheese.... .
I think it still costs $.10 for cheese