McDonalds Drive-Thru Kiosks
During recent COVID months, Evoke Creative and McDonalds self-serve has been busy developing and manufacturing over 2,000 new drive-thru car side kiosks and digital order confirmation screens for McDonald’s self-serve kiosks for customers.
With drive-thru seeing an obvious surge in popularity, is this now the blueprint for all out of town QSRs?
Fantastic to be working again with McDonalds on their latest Drive-Thru deployment. A huge part of their future business strategy and a massive benefit for their customers during this past year. — Dean Ward Founder of Evoke Creative
More on McDonalds Drive Thru
Excerpt from Wired The Future of McDonald’s Is in the Drive-Thru Lane
Today at the company’s first investor update in three years, McDonald’s CEO Chris Kempczinski detailed a new long-term growth strategy that hinges in large part on machine learning and mobile software. That might sound strange for a company known more for its burgers than its bitrates. But given its recent investments—including its $300 million acquisition of “decision engine” Dynamic Yield last year—the Golden Arches can lay a convincing claim that it’s as much a tech company as anything else. And given its quick-service ubiquity, where it goes the whole industry will likely follow.
The dramatic changes wrought by the Covid-19 pandemic have made that transformation all the more critical. By mid-April, 97 percent of restaurants in the United States weren’t permitted to host in-person dining, according to market research company NPD Group. That makes the drive-thru—where 70 percent of McDonald’s sales have taken place during the Covid-19 pandemic globally in top markets—existentially important.
It’s no surprise that at McDonald’s, we’ve got a thing for Drive Thru. After all, that’s what happens when you have over 25,000 of them worldwide—the most of any restaurant company in the world. And when you know Drive Thru like we do, you can’t help but ask yourself: what should the future look like?
Already, we’re welcoming a new generation of customers. One that expects more features and convenience than ever before. Lucky for us, we know our strengths, and as we step toward the future we’re doubling down on each of them.
Because what our customers love about McDonald’s isn’t just the food or coffee with a smile on the side, it’s the speed, simplicity and consistency of their entire experience. Our desire to innovate starts here: By using new technologies to revolutionize the way customers pick up their food.
Here are some amazing Drive Thru concepts and initiatives we’re excited to be testing:
• Easy Ordering and Payment ID: We’ve been cooking up ways to make the ordering process easier and more streamlined with automated ordering and payments made by identifying customers at the display screen.
• Express Pick Up: New technology will alert crew to prep orders when customers are nearby, while dedicated parking spaces ensure fast pick up.
• Express Drive Thru: A new lane lets customers using the app skip the line and get their food even faster (that means less time waiting and more time enjoying delicious, hotter food).
• On-the-Go: A smaller restaurant footprint would focus exclusively on efficiency, featuring Drive Thru, takeaway, and delivery with limited or no dine-in seating.
Growth comes through innovation. After looking at both the landscape and our customer, we’re once leaping even further ahead by obsessing over what works best for everyday McDonald’s customers: speed, convenience, and ease.
Put it all together and you’ve got a McDonald’s experience made with the future in mind. One we hope reaches more than 10,000 restaurants worldwide and offers countless more opportunities for customers to have the experiences they know and love. Experiences we believe could be truly transformative.
At McDonald’s, we’ve been setting the standard for Drive Thrus for more than 45 years. We’re always testing new ideas, learning what our customers love, and exploring ideas that make the McDonald’s Drive Thru experience faster and easier for everyone. Stay tuned.