McDonald’s Snack Wraps have outsold the company’s projections. | Photo courtesy of McDonald’s.
McDonald’s knew its Snack Wrap would be popular. It just didn’t realize exactly how much.
The company underestimated early demand for the $2.99 product by at least 70%, according to multiple sources, which prompted shortages of ingredients—such as shredded lettuce—used to make the item.
It also frustrated franchisees eager to reverse the chain’s worst sales slide in a decade. “It’s not a good thing by any stretch,” one franchisee said. “This was one of the most highly demanded product returns in our history.”
McDonald’s said that shortages of product were largely local and that any shortages were brief. There was an adequate supply of lettuce on a nationwide basis.
The company also said that it followed its typical process in projecting how much supply would be needed across restaurants, which included working with its franchisees.
But McDonald’s also acknowledged modern reality: It’s really hard to figure out just what can go viral right now.
“After nine years of pent-up demand, fans showed up in full force to celebrate the return of the Snack Wrap,” McDonald’s said in a statement. “We’ve been blown away by the response, from packed restaurants with lines out the door to nonstop social buzz.”
This is not the first time that the popularity of a product led to shortages at McDonald’s—or other chains, for that matter. Social media popularity can sometimes fuel supercharged demand for certain items, which can stress restaurant teams and put pressure on supply chain executives.
Demand for new Seafood Boils at Red Lobster led to some temporary shortages at some locations. Popeyes in 2019 sold so many chicken sandwiches initially that it ran out of supply in two weeks and needed months to reconfigure its supply chain and train restaurant teams for their reintroduction. A similar situation happened in 2022 when Taco Bell brought back its Mexican Pizza. That same year, Wingstop ran out of chicken sandwiches shortly after their introduction.
But McDonald’s has long prided itself on the strength of its supply chain and its analytical capabilities. Yet social media-fueled demand has tested even those capabilities.
In April, McDonald’s introduced the Minecraft Movie meal, both for children and adults. Figurines used for the adult meal ran out in less than two weeks.
In 2020, McDonald’s introduced a Travis Scott meal featuring a Quarter Pounder with cheese, bacon and lettuce that proved so popular it drove shortages of many ingredients.
Snack Wraps outperformed Travis Scott. One operator said some locations sold as many as 700 a day and that nobody could have estimated that kind of demand. “We have never sold so many of one item in a day before,” the operator said.
Social media has been fueling calls for the Snack Wrap for years, feeding demand and giving the product an almost-legendary status—to the point that several other chains like Burger King, KFC and Popeyes have added similar products to their menus. All that for a product that was left on the cutting room floor in 2016 when the company sought to simplify operations.
McDonald’s did know Snack Wraps would be a hit. The company took the rare step of announcing its upcoming return during a December appearance on the ABC news program Good Morning America by Joe Erlinger, McDonald’s U.S. president. That came in the aftermath of an E. coli outbreak that hurt sales last November.
The fast-food chain also pushed the development of its McCrispy Strips at least in part to give operators something to put in the wraps without chopping up an existing filet like McChicken or McCrispy.
And, priced at $2.99, the Snack Wraps have given the company a lower-priced item at a time when consumers are demanding more value from their fast-food chains. All that has fueled intense demand that appears to have generated strong traffic.
“The launch of our Snack Wrap has been met with incredible excitement from our customers,” Tyler Gamble, a McDonald’s operator and chair of the National Supply Leadership Council, said in a statement. “From day one, in the face of overwhelming success and traffic into our restaurants, I’ve seen all three legs of the stool—suppliers, employees and franchisees—work together quickly to plan and adapt.
“This close collaboration has enabled us to be nimble with our supply and keep up with that customer demand. What we’ve experienced was an awesome problem to have.”
The question for McDonald’s is whether it can keep the sales the product is generating right now. At least one survey gives the company some good news: According to the data firm Numerator, 90% of consumers who bought a Snack Wrap would buy one again in the future.
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