The last few weeks, it seems like every where I go on the Internet I’m being assaulted with reviews of the new McDonald’s Big Arch. In case you’ve somehow missed all the hype, the Big Arch is a double burger topped with three cheese slices, lettuce, onions, pickles and Big Arch sauce, which the marketing department describes as ‘tangy, creamy, with the perfect balance of mustard, pickle and sweet tomato flavors.’
Depending where you live the Big Arch will cost you anywhere from $7.46 to $12.99. The even bigger price is the number of calories it contains, which comes in at a whopping 1020.
I’ve posted an article in the past about how much I hate McDonald’s. Their food is lackluster compared to the competition, their fries, which once set the standard by which all fries should be judged, were destroyed once they capitulated to the woke crowd (why would you listen to people who have no intention of ever eating your products?). I also believe that their management team doesn’t deserve the salary they get, since they’re just caretakers, not innovators. Year to year, they serve up the same old products with no improvements and just rely on good locations and inertia to keep them going.
Anyway back to the main topic. Since the reviews are everywhere and pretty much 100% positive, I have to believe that this is part of a marketing campaign, and so called ‘influencers’ are either getting free food, McDonalds swag or cash to create a ‘viral’ campaign. I have no direct evidence for this, just a hunch and my hunches are usually pretty good, since I’ve been around a long time and seen just about everything.
This sort of thing is not uncommon, camera manufacturers will fly ‘influencers’ to exotic locations, pay for their logging and food and give them access to the latest and greatest cameras so they can shoot the location. Most of the reviews end up being positive and I’m sure the reviews, even if they’re trying to be honest, have it in the back of their mind, that if they give a negative review, they won’t be included in the next excursion.
From what I’ve seen the only person online that doesn’t like the Big Arch is the McDonald’s CEO who released a video of himself trying out the new burger but barely biting into it and looking like he was being held hostage and forced to eat it. He also couldn’t get himself to refer to it as a burger, instead calling it ‘the product’ throughout the video. To be fair, the guy has the look of someone that’s probably a vegetarian, so eating meat might have been way out of his comfort zone. It’s pretty amazing the marketing department released it since it’s so uncomfortable to watch.
While I might try a Big Arch, it certainly won’t become a staple in my diet since the 1020 calorie count is way too high for my tastes. I also have to wonder why they didn’t release a Little Arch (single patty, one slice of cheese) alongside the Big Arch since I suspect they’d have a lot more takers. But that would require some forward thinking, something that the McDonald’s management appears to be incapable of.
