Shh. Don’t talk about how no one wants to buy this burger.
The marketing campaign began back in May, as part of a push to assure Americans that McDonald’s really does use actual food in its menu items. Along with the Third-Pounder sirloin burger, they also offered an Artisan Grilled Chicken sandwich, continuing marketers’ efforts to drain all meaning from the word “artisan.”
A McDonald’s spokesperson told Bloomberg Business that the “didn’t meet [the company’s] expectations,” but we haven’t heard whether the company has freezers packed full of ground steak, like what happened when their Mighty Wings venture failed to take flight. The burger was always intended as a temporary menu item, though, and the McD’s spokesperson points out that the people who they were able to coax into restaurants to try the burger liked it. “Seventy-six percent of customers who tried the sirloin burger said their opinion of McDonald’s beef improved,” she points out, though the poll doesn’t specify where their opinion of McDonald’s beef started out.
The fast-foodery is still finding their way with this campaign: around the time the Hamburglar returned, they posted signs that sounded more like a threat to hamburgle customers’ pantries. As part of an effort to assure customers that they are no longer using bricks of ammonia-blasted beef trimmings, or “pink slime,” the company somehow thought that a callback to pink slime on its placemats was a good idea.
Hamburglar Generates Buzz But Not Burger Sales for McDonald’s [Bloomberg Business]
by Laura Northrup via Consumerist
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