If you've read Eric Buscemi's Battle of the Brands post: McDonald's vs. Burger King, you know the Big Mac and Whopper do not fall in the category of "healthy" foods. Add in fries and a drink and you've already clogged your first artery. But Arby's takes it one step further: they give you your pick of five fast-food items on a special menu -- two more than the standard value meal at McDonald's (NYSE: MCD) or Burger King (NYSE: BKC).
I went to Arby's for lunch today to pick my "5 for 5.95" and I must say it's overwhelming.
I decided upon an Arby's Melt sandwich with medium curly fries, a medium drink (sounds like the standard fast-food value meal so far but I had two more choices) mozzarella sticks with marinara sauce and a small jamocha shake.
Needless to say, I couldn't finish everything. I sat at my table staring at my unfinished meal thinking of Thomas Aquinas and what he said about gluttony in his SUMMA THEOLOGIÆ, "Gluttony denotes, not any desire of eating and drinking, but an inordinate desire ... leaving the order of reason, wherein the good of moral virtue consists."
This was just too much food, I thought. It defies all reason. How bad is this for you?
After a quick scan on their website, I nearly choked: all five items at Arby's added to 1763 calories, 78 grams of fat and 236 grams of carbs.
Take a look at the caloric intake of McDonald's and Burger King's famous "value-meals."
McDonald's: A Big Mac, medium fries and a medium drink contained 1,140 calories, 49 grams of fat and 150 grams of carbs.
Burger King: A Whopper, medium drink and fries with salt contained 1,230 calories, 59 grams of fat and 145 grams of carbs.
Burger King's marketing is more geared towards the hungry man in comparison to the healthier image McDonald's tries to show. With all three "value meals" around the same price, I'd like to see what marketing plan Burger King will counter with.
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Reader Comments (Page 2 of 2)
5-30-2007 @ 1:51AM
Linda said...
I have two children working at McDonald's and my daughter in law is a store manager with them. No one has their arm twisted to eat with McDonald's. I eat with them almost every day and for everyone's information, I have lost 40 pounds in a little over a year. Don't feed me the bunk about crap at McDonald's. Who knows what the same people eat at home. No one bothers to share that information. Another thing for all of you hypocrites. If it wasn't for McDonald's hiring the young people in our area, that would not be one thing for them to do. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.
5-30-2007 @ 3:30AM
chris said...
When did America or the drug companies think about creating or making a "cure?" They always do treatment. It's money.
7-19-2007 @ 11:14PM
Josh Greer said...
I happen to work at Arby's as and asst. Manager and I must say that 7 out of 10 people who order pick 5's are buying it for their family. The other 3 out of 10 sit there and eat the whole thing to themselves, and yes they are usually overweight. The marketing people had FAMILYS in mind when they came up with the pick 5. But there are those people who unfortunately eat it all themselves.
For instance we have this one family of 3 who orders 15 arby's melts,3 drinks,3 curly fries,and 4 mozarella sticks.Thats 5 sandwhiches each!They even did the same thing back when regular roast beefs were still on the pick 5 menu! And they eat it all in one sitting,when they leave arbys nothing is left. Its a mother a father and their teenage son. The mother is easily 400lbs,the father about 350lbs,and the the kid is pushing about 325lbs easy. I feel so disgusted every time I see them.