Hold the Sauce: McDonald’s and the Condiment Racket

If you like condiments with your burger and fries, it may cost extra at some McDonald’s locations. The last few years have seen extra condiment fees become a standard practice at most of the company’s franchises. As far back as 2008, unhappy McDonald’s customers would take to the Internet to rant about fees being attached to simple condiments at McDonald’s locations across the country. First the fees were attached primarily to cups of barbecue sauce, honey mustard, and other dipping sauces. Now it appears customers are also expected to pay almost 17 times the wholesale cost to receive extra packets of ketchup at some of McDonald’s 14,000 locations.

The policy of charging for condiments can be a sore subject for regular patrons of the restaurant with the golden arches. Those golden french fries they serve may not be nearly as alluring to some if not accompanied by complimentary dipping sauce that one would reasonably expect to receive. And as extra value meals are extra expensive and only seem to get more so, it is simply rubbing salt in the wound (or an epidemic of greed and avarice) to expect customers to pay even more for condiments with which to enjoy their pricey meal.

McDonald’s miserly strategy of charging for condiments seems to have done nothing positive for the company’s stock value, where stagnant profits and sales have placed it well behind competitors who do not charge the extra fees. The fee policy was probably not adopted with the specific intent of affecting the company’s share prices; an extra 25-50 cents per customer for extra condiments likely does more to line the pockets of individual franchise owners than to affect the entire chain’s bottom line. And the extra cost of condiments is not the only sticking point for customers.

The policy of charging for condiments is bad customer relations. It is a regular opportunity to enrage the customer base and invite conflicts with management, and allows for extra animus when the customer is charged for a condiment which then is accidentally not included in the bag. It would be a similar insult to charge customers for seating or renting tableware. It would be a better policy to encourage patrons to return unused, unopened condiments to prevent waste, if waste was truly an underlying catalyst for these policies as is often argued. Simply providing customers with a basket so they could leave unused sauces for other customers would empower customers to help cut down on waste without robbing them by charging exponentially more than the true expense of the packaged condiments.

Greed is undeniably contagious, and reports of other restaurants such as Burger King and Pizza Hut charging for their condiments have become more frequent. Customers of McDonald’s and other restaurants with these policies can often avoid the fees by asking for their condiments after the purchase has been completed. Employees are often unwilling to continue holding up the line or drive-thru by ringing up the condiments separately after the initial purchase, although managers have occasionally been known to be downright rude to customers to protect their condiment fees. And if you think condiment fees are ridiculous, one author has found that some McDonald’s franchises charge for tap water.

Bottom Line

Some McDonald’s franchises charge customers for condiments in addition to their meals. Do you have a story or opinion on the condiment policies of your local McDonald’s? Feel free to add your input to the comments section.