Soft drinks are a loss leader for fast food, which is why judging McDos on the price of a single item like soda or mcmuffin is a bit oversimplified. Pricing strategy fluctuates (sometimes) independently of supply costs.
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I like discussions about inflation though because everyone brings up a particular item from their own budget. For instance, have you priced Little Debbie Zebra Cake Rolls lately? Did you even know they exist? It's like a mixture of a Swiss Roll and a Zebra Cake and they are completely awesome and I'm pretty sure the government is ignoring the 50 percent inflation I've been seeing on them lately. I don't know if this is incompetence or reactionary arrogance ("We'll stick with the hexagonal cakes they serve at Quadrangle Club thank you.") but I know the whole program is broken.
Wait, nevermind you're right about that.
Not really. There's this myth that it only costs a few pennies to fill a cup with soda.
I was a manager at a Subway from 2006 to 2012, so I got to see the costs of all our food. I did the math and found it cost about 1.7 cents per ounce dispensed, so a 32 oz soda cost 54.4 cents to fill assuming no ice. The cup/lid/straw cost us about 12 cents. At the time, we charged $1.69 for the soda, giving a margin of about 60%. This margin of course went up if they used ice, but went down if they refilled it.
About 20% of revenue went to labor. I'm sure you're thinking, "But if you can make a sub in under a minute, and you pay $10/hr, shouldn't it be less?", but there's a lot of time spent not making sandwiches, such as cleaning, baking bread, and other food prep. Sure, the lettuce came pre-shredded in bags, olives and jalapenos are pre-sliced, but we had to slice the tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, and green peppers.
And then of course, there's the cost of rent and utilities, plus franchising fees. Overall, our profit margin was under 10%.
I'm sorry, what? People drink a whole litre of soda with their lunch? I don't understand this on multiple levels. Who would buy this, why would anyone sell it, and should that even be legal?
We Americans love our soda far more than our friends around the world.
I had sticker shock when I went to Italy a couple weeks ago and if I ordered a soda at a restaurant, I'd pay 3-4 euros and get a tiny 8 oz can.
In America, at a restaurant, if you order a soda, it's $2-4, and you'll usually get a 12 or 16 oz cup and get free refills.
At least I stick to the Diet/Zero-Sugar varieties so I'm keeping the calories down.