Fast Food Speeds up the Pace

By Richard Zoglin

Four-year-old Kevin White of Richmond, Calif., is enjoying that all-American event, a birthday party at McDonald's. Wearing a Ronald McDonald birthday hat and clutching a fistful of French fries, he gets ready to whisk down the slide in the restaurant's kiddy playground, while his mother Cynthia stands by with envy. "One day I hope that Kevin will appreciate my cooking," she says. "But for now, I can't even compete with a Big Mac and fries."

She may not be able to compete, but a burgeoning number of entrepreneurs think they can. Americans are eating out more than ever, and more than ever they are eating fast food. Since Ray Kroc opened his first McDonald's in a Chicago suburb back in 1955 (burgers: 15-c-), fast food has grown to a $45 billion business. The increase from ten years ago is nearly fourfold. From burgers to fried chicken to pizza, fast food has become the quintessentially American dining experience: a perfect expression of those bedrock values of efficiency, thriftiness and speed.

But the fast-food business is changing, trying to overcome its traditional junk-food image. It is vying for a place in the dining mainstream. Menus are expanding and restaurants are sprucing up to attract a more upscale crowd. "A few years ago, fast-food places looked like a mess hall with booths all lined up in a row," says Jeff Campbell, chairman of Burger King, the nation's second largest chain. "People want more these days."

What they seem to want, more than anything, is to get out of the house for dinner. Nothing is more American today than avoiding a home-cooked meal. According to figures compiled by the National Restaurant Association, the average family spent 39.5% of its food dollar on restaurants in 1983, up from 33.1% in 1970. The typical American now eats out 3.7 times a week. From the trendy bistros of Manhattan's East Side to the ubiquitous "franchise row" that lines the main drag on the outskirts of Anytown, U.S.A., eating out is in.

Changing life-styles have contributed to the eating-out boom. There are more one-parent households, more working mothers, more fast-tracking singles who have little time or inclination for an evening over a hot stove. "People eat out more because they are out of the house more," says Carl DeBiase, a partner in the research firm Restaurant Trends. For city dwellers, many of whom live alone in cramped apartments, restaurants have become a place to escape and socialize. "As rents skyrocket and the amount of space per person dwindles, the American kitchen has lost priority in urban centers," says Peter DuPre, general manager of Amsterdam's Bar and Rotisserie, one of Manhattan's hot new restaurants. "We are starting to experience the first generation brought up on restaurant food."

Dining out is often less a culinary experience than a social one. Restaurants have become a form of entertainment, a place to meet friends, a chic locale to see and be seen in. Why else would hungry customers endure the noise, crowds and 90-minute waits, all for the privilege of sitting at cramped tables and eating disappointing fare? "I would rather eat mediocre food in a fabulous room than sit somewhere dull and boring and eat fabulous food," says Christine Bastoni, a New York advertising executive and five-night-a-week restaurantgoer. "I'm looking for decor, scale, theatrics, a lot going on." Says Betty Cook, food critic of the Dallas Morning News: "The food doesn't have to be good for the lines to wind out a restaurant door and onto the sidewalk. They all rush in, even if the food is miserable, just so they can be seen."

Fast-food restaurants hardly offer that sort of satisfaction. But they are increasingly trying to provide more appealing settings for a meal out. Sterile, homogenized buildings are being replaced, in at least a few locations, by more distinctive decor. The new McDonald's on Calle Ocho in Miami's Little Havana has downplayed the golden arches in favor of a Spanish-style roof, blue mosaic tiles and a hacienda atmosphere. Another McDonald's, in Freeport, Me., resembles a quaint New England inn, complete with giltframed paintings on the walls. In the next year, Kentucky Fried Chicken will replace the red-and-white color scheme of all its restaurants with warmer earth tones and will start serving the Colonel's favorite recipe on plates instead of in paper boxes.

The food is growing more sophisticated too. Reflecting the currents in gourmet American cuisine, fast-food chains are stressing lighter, more healthful fare. Wendy's, the nation's third largest burger chain, expanded its menu in 1979 by introducing its highly successful salad bar. This year it has added a new "light menu," featuring an array of fruits at the salad bar, reduced-calorie dressings and a multigrain hamburger bun. The restaurant that once asked, "Where's the beef?" now does less than one-fourth of its business in hamburgers.

The trend toward more healthful fare and more natural ingredients is spreading. Arby's, the roast beef sandwich chain, has launched a new advertising campaign emphasizing the nutritional value of its "lean" roast beef. It is also test-marketing a roast chicken breast and a frozen yogurt dessert. Fuddruckers, a San Antonio-based gourmet burger chain with 85 outlets, puts all its ingredients on display for the customers: sides of beef hang in the adjoining butcher shop, while customers dress their own burgers from bins of fresh produce. Health consciousness has even spawned a low-cal chain, Atlanta-based D'Lites of America. Lean hamburgers are served on multigrain, high-fiber buns; the cheese and tar-tar sauce are low in fat and cholesterol. Says D'Lites Spokesman Rex Totty: "There's a growing insistence out there for more nutritious food, because the bottom line is that people want to eat right."

Fast-food restaurants specializing in ethnic and regional fare--like the California-based New Meiji chain of Oriental food--are adding to the diversity. "The earlier cycle of fast foods was primarily concerned with supplying sustenance in a cheap, quick manner," says Lamar Berry, a spokesman for Popeyes, a growing chain specializing in spicy, Cajun-style fried chicken. "Now you can get convenience everywhere. People want to get the ethnic experience and titillate their taste buds."

The industry's top dogs, McDonald's and Burger King, are also moving to expand their menus, though more cautiously. "Our menu is meat and potatoes. That's been the staple of the American diet for two centuries," says Ed Rensi, chief operations officer of McDonald's, which serves 6% of the American population every day. Yet McDonald's has given nonbeef eaters a break with its popular Chicken McNuggets, which have been widely imitated, and the company is testmarketing a prepackaged salad.

McDonald's has also staked out the newest fast-food battleground: breakfast. Since introducing its Egg McMuffin (a muffin sandwich containing eggs, Canadian bacon and cheese) in 1976, the chain has seen its breakfast business grow to 19.5% of total sales. Last March Burger King introduced a competitor, the Croissan'wich, and promoted it with a saturation TV ad campaign. Most other chains have now added at least some breakfast items, from French-toast sticks at Arby's to an all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet at some generous Roy Rogers outlets.

Fast-food executives see breakfast as a lucrative area for expansion. Mornings are a time when Americans are usually in a rush. "I hate cooking in the morning," says John McKinley, a San Francisco security guard who eats breakfast at a nearby Jack-in-the-Box. "This place is right on my way to work." The half-hour saved, he says, "is well spent sleeping."

Not all the regular customers are so thrilled with the new menu items, especially the suddenly chic salad bar. "I think it's ridiculous to serve anything green in a junk-food spot," says Johnny Weber, 17, a Burger King devotee in Berkeley. "Before long they'll be dividing the place into meat-eating and nonmeat-eating sections." Argues Louise Adams, a student at Philadelphia's Temple University, who sticks to Whoppers at her local Burger King: "You can always bake a potato or throw a salad together at home."

Too much diversity on the menu can backfire, according to industry executives. McDonald's had a notable flop with its McRib sandwich a couple of years ago, and other chains have hurt their service and lost customers by adding too many new items. "A lot of restaurants make the mistake of adding haphazardly until no one knows what they are," says Pizza Hut Spokesman Mike Jenkins. "We try not to forget that we are a pizza restaurant." Maintaining an identity is important, especially since most analysts regard the field as overcrowded and predict a shakeout in the next few years.

Nevertheless, fast food has entrenched itself as part of the American diet. "It's not as good as home cooking, but it is convenient and fast," says Ray Dearmas, a Miami police officer and McDonald's frequenter. For Barb Santoro, 34, a separated parent in Milwaukee, fast food helps her manage a hectic schedule. "Sometimes I work nine or ten hours a day, so it's nice to stop and get the kids something. Frankly," she adds with a laugh, "they might not get anything to eat some days if it weren't for fast-food restaurants." It may not be gourmet eating, but Americans have grown accustomed to the pace. --By Richard Zoglin. Reported by Barbara Dolan/Chicago and Jon D. Hull/San Francisco, with other bureaus

With reporting by Reported by Barbara Dolan/Chicago, Jon D. Hull/San Francisco, with other bureaus