New McDonald's Chicken Nuggets Deal Fails to Impress Customers who Blame Wage Hikes for Prices

At a time when food prices are rising, people are looking for more deals on meals when they are out eating at a restaurant or fast food chain. Among them McDonald's has just dropped the new deal on Chicken McNuggests, after it failed to make the customers happy. According to TikTok user @Shannon_Motipaya, the brand new 40-piece Chicken McNugget meal bundle includes two large orders of fries. But the meal bundle which includes two large fries and 40 chicken McNuggets costs close to $25.39 and with sales tax, the total is around $27.

"OK, so it’s $25.39f or 40-piece nuggets and two large fries," she said in the TikTok video."You couldn’t even throw in the Sprite? You couldn’t even throw in, like, a medium Sprite in there? Holy crap!" 

As per a recent study by FinanceBuzz McDonald's prices have increased by more than 100% this year. In 2014, the average price of a 10-piece Chicken McNugget meal, which included 10 Chicken McNuggets, a medium order of fries, and a medium fountain drink was $5.99. That price has grown and become somewhere around $11 today. However, the company said that this report does not accurately represent its restaurant prices and said the listed 2024 average prices are significantly inflated. 

Shannon's video now has more than 2 million viewers and upwards of 5,000 comments, and many people took to the comment section to talk about the exorbitant prices. "Remember when 40 pieces of nuggets were $5 and a large drink was $1," a user named miss.007 wrote. Another user CentralXXX wrote, "And it's only going to get worse. Welcome to California!"

Many users in the comment section seemed to blame California's wage increase for the price hikes. However, one user writes, "To the people blaming it on California...I'm in Utah, the state minimum is still $7.25, and this meal costs $25.56 here." Back in November, the CEO of McDonald's, Chris Kempczinski said that the company was planning to increase prices in the wake of the wage increase. They also planned to cut restaurant costs and improve productivity.

"There will certainly be a hit in the short-term to franchisee cash flow in California," Kempczinski said. "Tough to know exactly what that hit will be because of some of the mitigation efforts. But there will be a hit."

The fast food chain has been the subject of many viral videos where social media users have complained about the high cost of eating there. But it's not just McDonald's that is currently raising prices. Back in November, Chipotle also raised prices by a "mid-to-high single-digit" in California. Chipotle CEO Brian Niccol said, "The [Chipotle] brand is very strong and the value proposition is very strong, and we have that pricing power to use," Niccol told investors during the call. As per price data tool Pricelisto, fast food menu prices have jumped about 13% in 2022.

For more such content follow @Shannon_Motipaya on TikTok.