"#19 Pickleball Club and #33 Teriyaki Blitz"

July 5, 2023 8:12 AM

Subway to switch to freshly-sliced meats (Today). The largest sandwich chain in the US (Nation's Restaurant News), which is also rolling out new sandwiches (CNN, Food Network), is currently for sale (Reuters). No changes have been announced to the 'bread.'
posted by box (97 comments total)

What the food industry calls the “fixed stomach problem“ is that the number customers is only growing at the rate of population increase, which is not a large enough percentage for a company to be viable under capitalism. Therefore, they have to continually “value-add” to justify increasing the prices enough to maintain profitability. The social value of having a place where someone can get a decently cheap sandwich even if the meat is pre-sliced is not a thing the market i is concerned with.
posted by Jon_Evil at 8:25 AM on July 5, 2023 [25 favorites]

"John Oliver Tonight" on Subway.
posted by Marky at 8:26 AM on July 5, 2023 [12 favorites]

Lisa Hanawalt's Hot Dog Taste Test has forever broken my association with Subway:
Subway: Eat a tube of food.
Subway: Smell bread.
posted by MengerSponge at 8:27 AM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

Ah Subway. I dated a sandwich artist in college. Walking into the place always smelled like someone had just washed a loaf of bread in the dishwasher.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 8:28 AM on July 5, 2023 [20 favorites]

I can’t believe people are still trotting out the chemophobic “yoga mat chemical” thing from almost 10 years ago, as in the final link. It was tendentious then and it’s extra tendentious now. They don’t even use it any more!

NPR: Almost 500 foods contain the yoga mat compound: Should we care?
posted by chrchr at 8:34 AM on July 5, 2023 [19 favorites]

I haven't been to a Subway for years, I'm blessed with a few good Dell's near me.

But I remember the lousy bread, wilted lettuce, and delightful rainbow sheen on the ham and roast beef. not-Yum.
posted by Marky at 8:36 AM on July 5, 2023

Is the slicing done to order, I wonder, or in the back? My Subway strategy was to limit my exposure to anything prepped in the back. (I also haven't been to one in years.)

Sliced meat that only got touched when it was pulled out of the bag and placed on the bread was just fine.
posted by mersen at 8:40 AM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

I'll eat at Subway on a road trip, since it is often the least-worst option of the terrible choices at a highway off-ramp. But locally, there are better options (including much better sandwich chains) and I am doubtful that the proposed improvements would be enough to change that.
posted by Dip Flash at 8:41 AM on July 5, 2023 [2 favorites]

Enh, it's easy to razz on Subway (with good reason), but often when you're on the road it's the least-gross vaguely-healthy fast food option.

I'm not concerned about fresh slicing there, but as long as it doesn't slow me down and I can keep on going, sure.
posted by Capt. Renault at 8:43 AM on July 5, 2023 [20 favorites]

i used to go to a subway sandwich place a couple of blocks from my old apartment a lot, since their veggie sandwiches were at the sweet spot:

1. proximate
2. cheap
3. involved no direct consumption of the lunchmeats that had been sitting out for n hours

i liked having that place nearby and was sad that it closed, though its closure did bring me a source of lasting joy: i could ask people "how is [neighborhood] like staten island now?" and they'd say "huh?" and i'd say "no subway."
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 8:46 AM on July 5, 2023 [7 favorites]

I'll eat at Subway on a road trip, since it is often the least-worst option of the terrible choices at a highway off-ramp.

Not to excuse how generally mediocre (if that) Subway is, but I think that was kind of their draw when they first started showing up everywhere in the late 80s/early 90s - a place where you could get a decently healthy sandwich at fast food prices and speed with bread baked on site instead of brought in on a truck from a distribution center? Amazing! Especially for roadside stops or people way out in the 'burbs that didn't have decent delis close at hand. But back then they were basically competing against burger joints, while now there's a whole sandwich market where Jersey Mike's and Jimmy Johns are coming for them.
posted by LionIndex at 8:46 AM on July 5, 2023 [4 favorites]

I worked for subway in their early days and we always fresh-sliced everything... meat, veggies etc. and my scarred fingers can prove it. Cleaning the slicer was scary.

Since I don't go there any more I had no idea that changed.
posted by I_Love_Bananas at 8:47 AM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

20 years ago I worked for a startup with a investor/financial advisor dude that owned 6% of Doctor's Associates, the I guess soon to be former parent company of Subway. He used to get so mad when he came into our office and saw that a few of my coworkers had Quiznos cups at their desk, lol.

I haven't been to a Subway in many years, but a few times a week I drive past a Subway Cafe concept restaurant, just in case you want espresso-based drinks to go with your sandwiches I guess. It's right on top of Chapman University, which indirectly gave us both Stranger Things and Jan 6th coup plotter John Eastman, so maybe it's weird enough to fit in.

But, the number one reason I stopped going was the "get it your way" process is already slow as hell. Adding sliced to order meats is going to make that take even longer.
posted by Back At It Again At Krispy Kreme at 8:51 AM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

I'm one of the few people who has largely positive associations with Subway. I went there almost daily back in college. It's true, Blimpie (if you can find one) beats their beef pretty handily. One of the nice things about Subway though is there aren't many secrets. You see in front of you the toppings that'll go on your sandwich. If they look sketchy, you can order different toppings, or go to a different Subway. They're not rare, in the US at least.

Other places like Jimmy John's or Larry's Giant Subs generally have better food, but can also be much more expensive. A nearby Larrys once tried the strategy of outright lying on their menu board, listing prices that were like three dollars less than would appear upon ringing them up. (Around here, at least, this is happening rather more often, in multiple places, and one has to be alert that the price in "the computer" matches that on the signage.)
posted by JHarris at 8:53 AM on July 5, 2023 [3 favorites]

When I ate sandwiches, and before I discovered banh mi, Subway was the go-to. I really liked the idea of them pulling out a pre-cut wallet of meat and laying it down and then putting fresh stuff on top of it. Reasonably assured to be safe food-wise, reduced time and handling, consistency. What's not to love there. I guess capitalism hates it though. Then we discovered banh mi and never went back. Smaller, more reasonable portions, much cheaper, great flavour, perfect. Then ... [bell tolls] ... gluten insensitivity. Ahh well.
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:56 AM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

Not to excuse how generally mediocre (if that) Subway is, but I think that was kind of their draw when they first started showing up everywhere in the late 80s/early 90s - a place where you could get a decently healthy sandwich at fast food prices and speed with bread baked on site instead of brought in on a truck from a distribution center? Amazing!

The other reason Subway has always been a good option is that there are choices there for vegetarians, and they don't bat an eye at picky-eater requests.
posted by Dip Flash at 8:59 AM on July 5, 2023 [16 favorites]

Is the slicing done to order, I wonder, or in the back?

IIRC from the news bits I skimmed this morning & can't be bothered to search for now, it's going to be done to order with the slicers in front, visible to patrons, if there's room for it in the space.

I'm assuming they're feeling some market pressure from Jersey Mike's, which I think has been expanding rapidly and is running a gazillion TV commercials with Danny DeVito extolling the wonder and glory of watching your meat sliced right in front of you.
posted by soundguy99 at 9:03 AM on July 5, 2023 [3 favorites]

My stepmother used to get a Subway sandwich, open it up, tear out as much of the innards of the white "bread" as possible, leaving just the crust, reassemble and eat. I've seen other people do this as well. I guess this adds gourmet points?
posted by beagle at 9:12 AM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

I love a good sub sandwich. And sadly Subway makes better sandwiches than about half the local joints near me. Slicing to order is quite a remarkable thing for a fast food place to be doing; I don't think a single sub shop I go to does that. It takes so much time!

Is there some guide online to making good sub sandwiches at home? I've tried a few times and just don't understand. Partly it's getting the right bread, that's tricky. But also prepping the ingredients (so much prep) and the structural engineering of the sandwich itself.
posted by Nelson at 9:15 AM on July 5, 2023

I don’t have strong feelings about Subway except they have some of the better vegetarian options for a fast
food chain and would normally be on my rotating list of convenience meals. I’ve been avoiding them for the past year+ because they were highlighted a lot in the news for still supporting their Russian franchisees despite the Ukraine War. I’m not sure if that’s changed tbh and it seems like there are other chains with the same problem/excuses?
posted by Skwirl at 9:21 AM on July 5, 2023

JHarris : (Around here, at least, this is happening rather more often, in multiple places, and one has to be alert that the price in "the computer" matches that on the signage.)

Seems like this would be something a local Consumer Affairs reporter would be interested in, as there are laws against those practices. Somewhat related, I don't think I want to live in a world where the price board at Jimmy John's refers to "Market Price" for a sandwich.
posted by AirSpencer at 9:26 AM on July 5, 2023 [2 favorites]

Enh, it's easy to razz on Subway (with good reason), but often when you're on the road it's the least-gross vaguely-healthy fast food option.

I'm not concerned about fresh slicing there, but as long as it doesn't slow me down and I can keep on going, sure.

Glad you said this. I get that Subway is not the corner deli that has been in business for 100+ years (not that there are many of these left) but in a sea of other terrible fast food options that are bad for my body, it's the least bad of those options in many ways. And its also one of the more veggie friendly options when it comes to just needing something quick and easy but not particularly greasy or gross.
posted by Fizz at 9:32 AM on July 5, 2023 [5 favorites]

hopefully this doesn't lead to a ton of additional meat-slicer injuries. those things are very dangerous!

Might lead to a new category: finger food
posted by chavenet at 9:34 AM on July 5, 2023 [2 favorites]

The CNN article makes it sound like the slicing is done in batches, not to-order.

"Around 80% of stores will display the $6,000 slicers prominently (space permitting) near the deli counter with most of the meat sliced several times a day, including turkey, pepperoni, roast beef, ham and salami. That’s a major shift from Subway’s previous method of slicing meat at its factories and delivering it to stores." (emphasis added)
posted by AndrewInDC at 9:36 AM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

I worked on a project for a Subway equipment supplier and it was well understood that the bread sucked. One of the core problems (other than being really cheap stuff) is that Subway employees were expected to proof the bread (let it thaw and rise in a 100 degree humid chamber) and then transfer the dough to bake it in a separate oven.

Timing and temperature was critical and, as you might expect, steps are missed and/or forgotten. So improving the bread wasn't really going to work ingredient-wise if the dough couldn't be baked property. Other chains like Potbelly figured out a different solution by par-baking the bread offsite and then finishing it in the broiler, which is why all Potbelly sandwiches go through the broiler (actually an 'impingment oven" but who's counting?)

The Subway equipment change involved a single chamber oven that could proof with humidity and then blow out the moisture and switch to baking in a dry cavity. It worked, but it was also expensive. And the way Subway works is that every franchise owner is on the hook to buy new equipment when required. Corporate doesn't buy a damned thing. I don't know if the rollout ever was implemented fully.
posted by JoeZydeco at 9:36 AM on July 5, 2023 [10 favorites]

And then there was the butcher who backed into a meat slicer and got a little behind in his work
posted by Mister Moofoo at 9:39 AM on July 5, 2023 [19 favorites]

I was reading the Irish Times when the report came across that Ireland's Supreme Court ruled that Subway bread was not bread:

[snip]
Ireland's Supreme Court Rules Subway Bread Is Not Technically Bread : Ireland's Supreme Court ruled that, for tax purposes, Subway bread had too much sugar to qualify as bread.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/01/irish-court-rules-subway-bread-is-not-bread
posted by aleph at 9:48 AM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

I can't eat Subway because the bread is so terrible. Sweet and terrible. Even walking by a store is unappetising due to the smell.

Cheap, good eats to me means shawarma more often than not in Ottawa. Real food, in real bread, prepared and cooked on site by people who have significant skill in doing so. Happy to pay a local guy running a family store than a big investment vehicle for some doctors anyway.
posted by bonehead at 9:54 AM on July 5, 2023 [2 favorites]

The other reason Subway has always been a good option is that there are choices there for vegetarians, and they don't bat an eye at picky-eater requests.

I think these days Taco Bell is the winner in both the vegetarian and customization categories. Both the app and the in-store touchscreens allow for easy selection of options and crystal-clear indication of vegetarian choices.
posted by mr_roboto at 9:57 AM on July 5, 2023

Whoa, they put garlic in the aoli sauce? That's next-level shit right there.

There was a time when I ate Subway for dinner almost every night, as there was one about halfway between the newspaper where I worked and my apartment in a different town, but I don't think I could choke one down now.
posted by emelenjr at 9:58 AM on July 5, 2023

What the food industry calls the “fixed stomach problem“ is that the number customers is only growing at the rate of population increase, which is not a large enough percentage for a company to be viable under capitalism.

Over the last 5 years I've noticed more and more that capitalist enterprises (across multiple industries) have become conspicuously less concerned with providing a useful/necessary service to a sustainable number of customers, and more concerned with simply playing a numbers game where basically every aspect of a given business (from quality of materials to workforce turnover to simple straightforward functionality) is fully negotiable/compromisable in exchange for some questionable concept of shareholder value as long as "line goes up."
posted by Strange Interlude at 9:58 AM on July 5, 2023 [6 favorites]

New deli slicers that should be fully cleaned every four hours? I'll have to add this restaurant to my Listeria!

It must be a weird market preference thing. I'm seeing more supermarkets selling pre-packaged deli meat in paper wrappers to signal that it was sliced with more verisimilitude.
posted by credulous at 10:00 AM on July 5, 2023 [2 favorites]

Jimmy John's utterly failed to convince me that cold subs are even eatable.

Fortunately, Jersey Mike's convinced me that cold subs are not only eatable, but they're also delicious.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 10:01 AM on July 5, 2023 [4 favorites]

Subway should have never sold the Suburpia name back to Will Foley.
posted by rough ashlar at 10:16 AM on July 5, 2023

I'll eat at Subway on a road trip, since it is often the least-worst option of the terrible choices at a highway off-ramp.

I resemble this comment. In fact, I recall a road trip from not too long ago. On the way south, we always tried to NOT eat at a recognizable franchise and pretty much always had a crap meal. On the way back north, it was Subway if it was anywhere, but in general we'd wised up and were making our own sandwiches and whatnot as best we could, because there are grocery stores in most towns, and most of them have deli counters.
posted by philip-random at 10:18 AM on July 5, 2023

NPR: Almost 500 foods contain the yoga mat compound: Should we care?
posted by chrchr at 8:34 AM on July 5 [+] [!]

There could scarcely be a better example than that linked article of how corrupted and completely captured by corporate interests NPR has become, not to mention lazy, anti-science and stupid.

Here's what Wikipedia has to say about azidocarbonamide:

In a 1999 report, the World Health Organization has linked exposure to azodicarbonamide at workplaces where it is manufactured or handled in raw form to "respiratory issues, allergies and asthma". The available data are restricted to these occupational environments. Exposure of the general public to azodicarbonamide could not be evaluated because of the lack of available data.[10] The WHO concluded, "The level of risk is uncertain; hence, exposure levels should be reduced as much as possible".

In the UK, the Health and Safety Executive has identified azodicarbonamide as a respiratory sensitizer (a possible cause of asthma) in workplace settings and determined that containers of it should be labeled with "May cause sensitisation by inhalation."[11] Azodicarbonamide was added to the REACH Regulation candidate Substances of Very High Concern list in 2012, for its respiratory sensitizing properties.[12]

posted by jamjam at 10:18 AM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

So the Pickleball Club sandwich isn't a club sandwich, and doesn't have pickles? How is this okay
posted by oulipian at 10:29 AM on July 5, 2023 [11 favorites]

I like soundguy99's theory that this is, in some small part, due to Danny DeVito: from a customer at the original Jersey Mike's back in the day (hence his role as company pitchman) to helping bring about a modestly seismic change in the fast-deli-sandwich market.

Recently, I was thinking aloud about all this as I drove past a Jersey Mike's billboard featuring DeVito and his freshly sliced meats. My train of thought was interrupted by Theo Jr. bawling out from the backseat: "Hey, Reiger! I got a sub, and you don't!" LOL
posted by Theophrastus Johnson at 10:30 AM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

I wonder how someone who keeps even mildly kosher or halal would feel about ordering roast beef or turkey that was sliced on the same slicer as the ham, and perhaps inexpertly cleaned in between.
posted by indexy at 10:39 AM on July 5, 2023 [2 favorites]

Maybe? I've had friends who were fine eating at places that did meat and dairy, they just wouldn't order cheese on their burgers and didn't keep separate plates and utensils at home. I was more thinking of cross-contamination of pork products, but would be curious to hear from folks who do observe more strictly.
posted by indexy at 10:53 AM on July 5, 2023

The whole Subway cultural/social capital curve has been very strange. It was really really beloved and was growing by leaps and bound and then ALL OF A SUDDEN just feel off the cliff as far as public perception goes.

I wonder if this can be tied at all to the discovery of Jared Fogle's crimes in mid 2015-ish. IIRC Subway dropped him as a spokesperson almost instantly, but I have to assume that it must have had some kind of effect on sales.
posted by Strange Interlude at 10:54 AM on July 5, 2023 [7 favorites]

If you're in the Herndon area of Northern VA, there is one and only one sandwich place to regard - The Deli. It is able to be named The Deli, legally, because it is the Platonic Ideal of all delis, and serves a variety of subs which are the metric against all other sammich foods are judged and found wanting. It used to be a spot where people would say 'twelve dollars for a footlong sub? They're out of their ding-dang minds!' and then they'd get the sub and realize that 12 dollars was in fact a STEAL for the sandwich sacrament they received. Now in our inflationary times, the prices are even more reasonable in comparison.

There's also one in Fairfax on Lee Hwy which is fantastic, but the Herndon one is the absolute pinnacle.
posted by FatherDagon at 11:01 AM on July 5, 2023 [2 favorites]

And then there was the butcher who backed into a meat slicer and got a little behind in his work

Well, that's better than the guy who was trying to lean forward and got a head in his work.
posted by loquacious at 11:24 AM on July 5, 2023

"I wonder how someone who keeps even mildly kosher or halal would feel about ordering roast beef or turkey that was sliced on the same slicer as the ham, and perhaps inexpertly cleaned in between."

Everyone I know who keeps kosher doesn't order those meats anywhere where they would have to worry about cross-contamination, and just orders the veggie sub.
posted by FritoKAL at 11:33 AM on July 5, 2023

I clearly remember the day I stopped eating Subway. I was in college and there was a Subway across the street from campus where I'd go to get a cheap sandwich from time to time. One day I was sitting there eating my sandwich and I just remember it tasted like nothing. It wasn't bad but it also wasn't good. It was just nothing at all. That was almost 20 years ago now and I haven't eaten it again ever since.
posted by downtohisturtles at 11:35 AM on July 5, 2023 [5 favorites]

I used to eat Subway a lot in the 90's and stopped going after they changed the way they cut the bread on their subs. When I lived in Japan there was one close to one of my workplaces so I started going there fairly regularly again. There's both a Subway and Mr. Sub pretty close to my work but I only go to the Mr. Sub now because I find their subs to be much better, which is kind of weird because back in the 90's Subway had the much better sub.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 11:44 AM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

Japan’s bbq pork cutlet sub was a damn tasty sandwich lemme tell ya
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 11:46 AM on July 5, 2023

I have to assume that it must have had some kind of effect on sales.

The 2015 date is compelling but I always assumed it was a trailing indicator of the $5 Footlong going away in 2012

https://thehustle.co/the-rise-and-demise-of-subways-5-footlong-promotion/
posted by Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug at 11:59 AM on July 5, 2023 [4 favorites]

"These preparations included reorganizing its supply chain and installing a deli meat slicer in 20,000 Subway restaurants, which meant that for nine months, a slicer was being installed about once every five minutes."

There's something about this that makes me go

:-O
posted by Gorgik at 12:00 PM on July 5, 2023

I moved into my place 19 years ago and there is a Subway very close by. I have eaten there way too much over the years though the love/hate has been tipping towards hate for a long time.
The weird way they stack their subs, meat on top of veggies on top of condiments kind of really annoys, though it shouldn't. I think about Subways way, way too much when I order from them.
A Vietnamese sandwich shop opened even closer than the Subways a few years back but I have out eaten my enjoyment of that place.
Yes, I do eat a lot of sandwiches, why do you ask?
But, whomever buys the Subway is going to load it up with debt, and that means drastic cost cutting all across the board which means the franchisees will have it even harder and the quality is going to go down even further, if that's possible.
posted by Phlegmco(tm) at 12:01 PM on July 5, 2023

I think these days Taco Bell is the winner in both the vegetarian and customization categories.

Chipotle has entered the chat.
posted by box at 12:01 PM on July 5, 2023 [3 favorites]

But, whomever buys the Subway is going to load it up with debt, and that means drastic cost cutting all across the board which means the franchisees will have it even harder and the quality is going to go down even further, if that's possible.

Any company that sells quality goods or services at a decent price is just leaving money on the table and the venture capital MBAs are eventually gonna fix that.
posted by straight at 12:06 PM on July 5, 2023 [2 favorites]

(Upon reflection, I should have looked for some franchisees' perspectives on all this, because Subway has been one of the worst restaurant franchises to own for a long time (e.g. NYT, 2019). Well, here's John Oliver.)
posted by box at 12:07 PM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

I rarely eat at Subway now because there's one in the student union at the campus I work at, so I got tired of them after a while. I do occasionally get a meatball sub.

Slicing the meat makes me think of Francie's mom in A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, insisting that you see the meat sliced in front of you. I think I may have internalized that a bit because the meat at our supermarket deli is pre-sliced and I always sneer at it a tiny bit when I walk past.
posted by PussKillian at 12:09 PM on July 5, 2023 [2 favorites]

There could scarcely be a better example than that linked article of how corrupted and completely captured by corporate interests NPR has become, not to mention lazy, anti-science and stupid. Here's what Wikipedia has to say about azidocarbonamide:

Meanwhile, the 'bread' article is stupid in the other direction: It's true that Subway stopped using azidocarbonamide back in 2014, but the fact is other companies still use it. So Subway's bread is bad because they fixed it but didn't fix the bread other companies sell.
posted by straight at 12:10 PM on July 5, 2023 [2 favorites]

My stepmother used to get a Subway sandwich, open it up, tear out as much of the innards of the white "bread" as possible, leaving just the crust, reassemble and eat. I've seen other people do this as well. I guess this adds gourmet points?

Alas, I can nearly guarantee this is diet culture bullshit and not about improving the taste of the sandwich. Hence Potbelly's "skinny" sandwiches, and I knew of women who did this with bagels (!!! the tragedy of it all), thanks to the "carbs are bad/bread is just extra calories" movement that continues to this day. I recently saw something from a woman who was talking about how, on another video of hers where she prepares and eats 2 slices of toast, half the comments were aghast that she eats two pieces of bread in one meal.
posted by misskaz at 12:18 PM on July 5, 2023 [6 favorites]

have definitely lived in times & places where Subway was one of the better-quality accessible food options & consequently ate a lot of chicken bacon ranch on honey oat

hard to tell if they've been decreasing in quality objectively or just relatively to the sandwiches I have access to now, but if I'm gonna get a sandwich here in the Phoenix East Valley it's gonna be a banh mi from Lee's (they bake the bread in-house in a weird little storefront & make you pay cash, unless they've stopped) or a sub from the marijuana-themed sandwich franchise Cheba Hut
posted by taquito sunrise at 12:20 PM on July 5, 2023

Japan’s bbq pork cutlet sub was a damn tasty sandwich lemme tell ya

I think I always just got the roast beef because it was nice to have a normal tasting sandwich without the surprise WTF is this in here for? ingredients that would show up if I got a sandwich anywhere else.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:25 PM on July 5, 2023

Slicing the meat makes me think of Francie's mom in A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, insisting that you see the meat sliced in front of you.

Jersey Mike makes 'this nitrate filled meat slurry from over 100 animals and congealed into a dimensionally uniform loaf is sliced in front of you' as part of the marketing. It was enough of an issue on Subway's radar at one time corporate had a video up on youtube about how slicing not in front of you didn't matter and pre-slicing was a cost benefit to you, the consumer.

Deli meat sliced in front/not in front doesn't change the nature of industrial meat processing.

Pre-sliced and placed on paper lead to a local place to having under 2 min order-to-sandwich time. If fast service is the goal, pre-sliced on paper that will be tossed out is gonna be how one runs the place. If you are concerned about the waste - not buying paper is obvious.


With the attempt to find a buyer - how much of this is moving away from 'as a franchisee you order the pre-cut meat from our owned processing plant to you doing it is a market demand' VS 'cut the cost of what corporate owns with getting rid of central processing'.

The overall cash corporate can rake in is less with such a change but if no central processing plant of theirs can be profitable due to its volume VS regulations *jazz hands* CAPITALISM! *jazz hands*.
posted by rough ashlar at 12:31 PM on July 5, 2023 [2 favorites]

Subway's food feels a little too expensive for what it is. The ingredients feel like they were carefully selected to just meet some standard of freshness and quality. And the restaurants are often unpleasant compared to other fast food outlets.

I don't remember that always being the case: I think they were generally nicer maybe in the '90s and early 2000s, when they were still decorated with NY Subway iconography? I found this one picture on imgur of a Subway from that era, and it looks like a lunch spot you might actually want to sit and have a meal in.

It may be that they also used to be in bigger, better lit spaces, and they're now often in kind of awkward, small, cheap to rent boxes.
posted by smelendez at 12:34 PM on July 5, 2023

Jimmy Johns is a bunch of pre-made sandwich recipes and when I last ordered from them, admittedly years ago, there was no customization with them available at all. I'm sure that pre-made recipe thing is how they do the "we're so fast" thing that they advertise.

Haven't been a regular at a chain sandwich shop in a long time but I recently eat at a a JJ's with my mother. There were the canned recipe combinations but each of us was asked for how we'd like to customize the end result (removing any of the core ingredients or optionally adding vegetables or sauces).

It was a perfectly fine sandwich but it was absolutely a slow process and we were there at a dead time. I can't imagine that place during a lunch rush.
posted by mmascolino at 12:37 PM on July 5, 2023

I can walk into any Jimmy Johns and say "Number 5 - no onion" and they get it right every time. Customization is fine to some degree I guess.
posted by JoeZydeco at 12:39 PM on July 5, 2023 [2 favorites]

Yeah, Jimmy John's definitely allows at least mild customizing. The speed must depend on the location; like with Subway, I mostly go to JJ's on road trips and the ones I've been in were really fast.
posted by Dip Flash at 12:43 PM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

I’ve been to Subway recently and the process has been streamlined. Prior to the changes the “artists” would not make the type of sandwich you ordered - everything was custom build it yourself or something and you had to tell them every ingredient, but now they follow their own recipes with custom omissions or additions.
posted by Selena777 at 12:48 PM on July 5, 2023

if you're keeping mildly kosher, would you eat food prepped in the same place where meat and dairy was being combined regularly?

Maybe?

A cursory scan of the /r/Subway subreddit reveals that a lot of Muslim families do go to Subway and are known to make special requests about food handling for halal purposes.

(It's also has an encouraging amount of pro-labor agitation.)
posted by snuffleupagus at 1:03 PM on July 5, 2023

Subway's food feels a little too expensive for what it is. The ingredients feel like they were carefully selected to just meet some standard of freshness and quality.

In my long and varied experience eating at restaurant chains big and small, I think this is something that happens somewhere between when you hit a double-digit number of locations and when you hit a triple-digit one, and I think it might be inevitable.

Operating at that kind of scale is more about logistics and standardization than it is deliciousness :|
posted by box at 1:50 PM on July 5, 2023

I still appreciate Subway because once it comes to vegetables and sauces you can still get an 'everything'. All the vegetables, all the sauces. And compared to many other restaurants or general smells, I think the bread smells fine, as long as you aren't smelling it all the time.
posted by The_Vegetables at 1:54 PM on July 5, 2023

It may be that they also used to be in bigger, better lit spaces, and they're now often in kind of awkward, small, cheap to rent boxes.

Maybe the design standards changed at some point, but in my experience, they were always in little strip mall spaces, and that was part of the appeal as a franchise owner - supposedly the franchise fee was really low and you didn't have to provide your own building with a drive-thru and parking and all that, so by 1993 they were the second-largest franchise chain in the country behind McDonalds.
posted by LionIndex at 2:10 PM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

The franchise fee itself is low too. $10-15K vs $45K plus for McDonald's, before other heightened financial requirements.
posted by snuffleupagus at 2:15 PM on July 5, 2023

Subway insists on holding all the leases through Subway Real Estate, LLC. The franchisee gets a sublease, but has to pay for the buildout. Links to further info on the page are broken, haven't checked for any archived info.
posted by snuffleupagus at 2:39 PM on July 5, 2023 [3 favorites]

I think often those little 3 or 4 unit strip malls were built by the Subway franchise owner looking toward getting rent to supplement their restaurant income.

It's possible, but having worked in retail construction, not likely. If strip malls that are on the boards don't have some tenants signed up before actually being built, they tend to not get built, so the Subway franchise was probably on board during the design of the building and moved in upon completion of the shell, but probably not the instigator of the strip mall in the first place. I don't know how many shopping centers I worked on where we were making alterations to suit Starbucks or Panda Express before they ever broke ground, but the development was always headed by financial real estate development guys, not those companies.
posted by LionIndex at 2:40 PM on July 5, 2023 [3 favorites]

The franchise fee itself is low too.

The John Oliver segment notes that 1) the low franchise fee and 2) Subway's right to open new franchises very close to yours, amd 3) Subway's refusal to give potential franchisees any financial data about the performance of stores in their area, along with 4) much lower profits per store compared to other chains like McDonald's, as well as 5) Subway taking 12.5% of gross sales rather than the 8% that McDonald's franchisees have to pay, not to mention 6) the "development agents" who inspect franchises, and can then buy low-scoring franchises themselves at a discount, all make for a very exploitative situation overall. Seems clear they're dangling the low startup fee to families, many of them immigrants, with a fuckload of highly exploitative practices on the back end.

Seriously, the section from 11:55 to 21:10 in that John Oliver video linked above is essential viewing here.
posted by mediareport at 3:05 PM on July 5, 2023 [5 favorites]

No Subway thread is complete without Tom Green's video of ordering ALL the fixins back in 1994.

https://youtu.be/bnyVE1go2vs
posted by jeremias at 3:13 PM on July 5, 2023

I really got burned out / bummed out by Subway in the 90s/early 2000s and stopped going. Not every store, but several stores just smell like some kind of industrial solvent or something and the bread wasn't good.

Last year while my dad was in a hospital near Atlanta, there was a Subway downstairs and lunch was either that or a vending machine. The staff was super crabby and requests for customization of any kind were denied with extreme prejudice, but the food was a lot better than I remember, and I'd willingly choose to eat it if there was one convenient to my regular routine.
posted by Foosnark at 3:23 PM on July 5, 2023 [2 favorites]

> One day I was sitting there eating my sandwich and I just remember it tasted like nothing.

this is what subway is good for. like, sometimes i need to get some food in me because i've remembered that humans need food to live, but nevertheless i have no particular desire to think very hard about that food. enter: the veggie delite.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 3:26 PM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

I would like to read more about the "fixed stomach problem" but it's hard to find because Google thinks I want my stomach problem to be fixed. Anyone have a nice essay or explainer?
posted by look upon my works progress administration at 3:31 PM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

I'm really enjoying the discussion here surrounding franchises and how they vary across different axis. I find myself wishing there was a website where I could easily compare all the different franchises against each other and possibly rates their level of exploitation etc..
posted by some loser at 3:37 PM on July 5, 2023

Not every store, but several stores just smell like some kind of industrial solvent

Simple Green.

I've noticed this from time to time; not just at Subway, but enough there for it have stuck with me.

The fixed stomach thing is known to most people from The Omnivore's Dilemma, and so I am instinctively skeptical of its explanatory power.

"If people want more fries," Kroc told him,"they can buy two bags." Wallerstein patiently explained that McDonald's customers did want more but were reluctant to buy a second bag."They don't want to look like gluttons."

Kroc remained skeptical, so Wallerstein went looking for proof. He began staking out McDonald's outlets in and around Chicago, observing how people ate. He saw customers noisily draining their sodas, and digging infinitesimal bits of salt and burnt spud out of their little bags of French fries. After Wallerstein presented his findings, Kroc relented, approved supersized portions, and the dramatic spike in sales confirmed the marketer's hunch. Deep cultural taboos against gluttony -- one of the seven deadly sins, after all -- had been holding us back. Wallerstein's dubious achievement was to devise the dietary equivalent of a papal dispensation: Supersize it! He had discovered the secret to expanding the (supposedly) fixed human stomach.

posted by snuffleupagus at 3:55 PM on July 5, 2023

Adding automated spinning blades to a workplace staffed by people making minimum wage? Sure, why not? I wonder about the level of automation, and when these machines inevitably break down in the middle of a lunch rush, will the company have trained technicians on standby who can fix the problem and get the meat flowing again? At the end of service, when the machines need to be cleaned and sanitized, will there be trained staff to do that work?

Of course not. Whoever is on the line will be pressured to do things they are in no way trained or compensated for. But hey, customers get to see the meat machine go brrr.
posted by Ghidorah at 4:08 PM on July 5, 2023 [3 favorites]

I don't disagree, but it's not exactly new for deli or the supermarket 'butcher counter' (or, more honestly, the 'meat department.')

I've said "nevermind" to market workers when I ask them for something thin sliced and they get this particular look on their face. I have a mandoline, that's scary enough. Can't imagine being compelled to use a commercial machine I'm not properly trained on just to get through the day.
posted by snuffleupagus at 4:09 PM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

a website where I could easily compare all the different franchises against each other and possibly rates their level of exploitation

For me, a key bit of info was when I found out how many of these sandwich shops/fast food places were forcing non-compete clauses onto their employees; here's a story from 2014 about Jimmy John's, which had a 2-year non-compete for "any business which derives more than 10% of its revenue from selling submarine, hero-type, deli-style, pita and/or wrapped or rolled sandwiches" at "any such other Jimmy John's Sandwich Shop," which the article notes covers "a 6,000-square mile blackout area in each of 44 states and Washington, D.C."

Insane levels of exploitation and power-tripping there.

Most of the major chains routinely used a similar clause before then. Particularly egregious were "no-poach" agreements that prevented workers from working at other franchises within the same chain. Most stopped the no-poach stuff when multiple state Attorneys General opened an investigation into the practice in 2018, but Quiznos and Jersey Mike's refused until one AG sued them into settling, finally agreeing to stop the no-poach stuff across the country.

Once I read about all that, I could never bring myself to go to Jersey Mike's or Quiznos again (the 2nd one's kinda moot since they've shrunk operations so much, but still).

Anyway, I go to Subway a couple times a year when a "buy one footlong get one free" coupon comes in one of those Valpacks in my mailbox - hard to resist 3-4 meals for 10 bucks - but that John Oliver video is making me think even that may be too often.
posted by mediareport at 4:53 PM on July 5, 2023 [3 favorites]

I've always thought (and still do think) that the smell of Subway is the smell of shredded iceberg lettuce. And sadness.
posted by jferg at 4:54 PM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

My standard order at Subway used to be a Veggie Delite on wheat, pepper jack, whatever dressing caught my eye, and everything except lettuce and tomato. It seemed weird, considering that they were probably the two most popular veggies, that they were usually the two saddest-looking ones in the store.
posted by box at 4:59 PM on July 5, 2023

Our Subway is in a standalone building with a drive thru. It's been a better choice than the other fast food options in town. Husband won't eat Taco Bell anymore, Long John Silver's has to hand catch the fish (or the cow if you want an A&W's burger) [I am being hyperbolic, they are very slow at the restaurant ], Burger King is also slow, and he eats McD's a lot on the way to work, so it's Pizza Hut, Sonic, or Subway if I'm not cooking. Or if he wants something to eat when he's coming home from work, so I can do a pickup order at Subway with his preferred sandwich + mine, and he'll pick it up on his way home. Now, if Sonic didn't require the app to pickup, I could order him something to snack on his way into work.

They have the slicer up on the small counter where they have the microwave + oven, so it's going to be a bit crowded I think. I used to get an oven roasted chicken breast on white, toasted with honey mustard, provolone, lettuce, tomato & pickle, and I could eat that even cold. Now it's a steak & cheese (provolone cheese) with either mayo or the aioli with lettuce & green peppers, toasted on white.

At least the Subway app does not require Chrome to login anymore, and now lets me use my fingerprint.
posted by tlwright at 6:49 PM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

I was more thinking of cross-contamination of pork products, but would be curious to hear from folks who do observe more strictly.

On the kosher thing (can't speak to halal, I don't know enough about it), at least for some values of Conservative Judaism*, if you're keeping kosher, that means you don't eat meat unless it's been certified kosher. In practice, that means, when you eat out, you're essentially pescatarian. In my experience, if you're eating turkey from subway, you're not likely to be all that hung up on the ham being cut with the same machine, even if you wouldn't personally eat ham.

Source: I was raised in conservative Judaism, and kept kosher (or tried) for much of my childhood, only finally having a bacon cheeseburger for the first time at 18, because it was the only thing sitting under the heat lamps, and I needed to take my break while working at a Burger King, and I was starving. It was very good.

My sister still keeps kosher, though. That means separate plates, does not eat meat when dining out unless it is from a kosher restaurant. The only thing she would ever get at a subway would be the tuna sub, and she would do her best to ignore that it was being prepared on the same surface as the subs with ham.

*Obviously, being raised conservative has greatly colored my views of the whole thing, though I have tried to be as objective as possible. I can't speak to Reform or Reconstructionist, or Orthodox Jews and how they would approach the situation, or what they would do.
posted by Ghidorah at 6:52 PM on July 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

I'm Reform (in theory, really I'm just not observant); and in my milieu the very small number of Reform Jews who have tried to keep some form of Kosher mostly confine it to their home, beyond not ordering anything obviously wrong. (Like a cheeseburger.)

So far as halal goes, my loose understanding is that it's not a violation if you had no idea what you were consuming.

I would assume the appeal for people trying to keep some kind of dietary law, is that you can watch the food being prepared and ask for gloves to be swapped, things to be packaged more separately than usual, etc.

Knife-wiping is a particular focus, if that subreddit is to be credited. By both the observant and the otherwise fastidious.
posted by snuffleupagus at 7:03 PM on July 5, 2023

Weird, this is making me want to try one of the many subway locations in Hong Kong. I bet they are different somenow.
posted by pwinn at 11:25 PM on July 5, 2023

I had Subway 2-3 days a week for lunch for a few years when I worked in the Caymans. Wearing a suit to work in 90f / near 100% humidity meant the closest place to walk mostly bet out any other lunch option. I can’t remember how they tasted at all - at best the words “filling and inoffensive” come to mind. Looking back I should have eaten more local jerked chicken.

And before I read this thread I visited my first Jersey Mike’s yesterday while road tripping through New Mexico (my first chain sub shop in years). It was….ok I guess. i’m trying to be vegetarian now and the veggie sandwich was….well….filling and inoffensive.
posted by inflatablekiwi at 6:08 AM on July 6, 2023

I would like to read more about the "fixed stomach problem" but it's hard to find because Google thinks I want my stomach problem to be fixed. Anyone have a nice essay or explainer?

IANA Economist, but: My read is that "fixed stomach problem" is just a specialized food-industry phrase for a saturated market, i.e. when things reach a point that everybody who wants/needs a thing already has their needs met. At a certain point, Subway just can't cram more sandwiches into the number of stomachs that exist, even allowing for natural population growth.
posted by Strange Interlude at 7:50 AM on July 6, 2023

The sandwiches that haunt my dreams all entail the same process, typically only available at pizza places and diners, whereby the preparer first toasts/grills the interior sides of the bread, then adds the ingredients, and finally toasts/grills the outer sides of the bread to melt the cheese, warm the meat and add additional toasty goodness; I'm agnostic about when to add the veggies. You might think I frequented Quiznos, which the founder claimed replicated the baked sandwiches he enjoyed in NYC, but I didn't like the obligatory combinations and drippy calorie-laden sauces. Moreover, I loathed--to the point where I refused to fork over money to the company-- the unbearably annoying Spongmonkeys.

So I rejoiced when Subway added toasting ovens, around 2005, when they also (thankfully, in my view) switched from Pepsi to Coke products. Was it as good as a grinder fresh from a pizza oven? No, but I liked the infinite customization possibilities and, as a road warrior, I appreciated the predictability while travelling. Subway also provided detailed nutritional information before their competitors. RIP.
posted by carmicha at 8:00 AM on July 6, 2023 [1 favorite]

I am not ashamed for my love of Subway. We have many better sandwich places nearby that I use a lot more regularly. But sometimes you want a subway, fake bread and all. Last time, though, they put mayo on my BMT (counter to my instructions), so I've lost a little trust in them. That's just wrong.
posted by nixxon at 2:38 PM on July 6, 2023

The discussion here about the relative freshness and healthiness of Subway reminds me of my new favorite fast food, Mixt. Mostly large salads with enough protein to be a meal, a few sandwiches too. The key is the ingredients are really good; ripe avocados, crunchy fresh vegetables, decent lettuce. They customize and fill your bowl while you watch.

Downside is it ain't cheap. List price is $13.75 for a salad, compare $9 for a Subway foot long. And by the time I pay all the taxes, fees, delivery charge, and tip it's like $28 for a lunch salad delivered to my home. I assume their market is mostly businesses ordering lunch in for workers.
posted by Nelson at 2:53 PM on July 6, 2023

I miss the little Subway pizzas. They were several steps up from 7-11 pizza and a nice change from sandwiches. I used to work at a place where it was basically the only option for a 30-minute lunch break that didn't include eating while walking.
posted by blnkfrnk at 4:49 PM on July 6, 2023 [1 favorite]

Subway in Japan has a bit of a rocky history. When it first opened it had the same menu as the US shops and it didn't do very well. They changed up the menu which led to the birth of the ebi (shrimp) avocado sub (that can be found in other parts of Asia now, apparently) and the death of the meatball sub (amongst others) in Japan. The bread is also different from the US shops. Also, fries and not potato chips.
posted by LostInUbe at 7:00 AM on July 7, 2023 [2 favorites]

blnkfrnk I was just at a Subway an hour ago and its menu still had the pizzas! Maybe they might still be in a store near you?
posted by JHarris at 4:13 PM on July 7, 2023 [1 favorite]

Not here! I think it might depend on the local franchisee. Maybe next time I'll ask if they can do it off-menu.

Otherwise I get a footlong veggie delite, no cheese, cold, all the vegetables extra peppers, mustard and mayo.
posted by blnkfrnk at 11:29 PM on July 7, 2023 [1 favorite]

I had a grad-school classmate who had herself worked in a Subway once and had strong notions of how the sandwiches should be prepared, notions which were evidently not shared by the workers at our student-food-hall Subway. She would occasionally buy a Subway sandwich, carefully separate it into its constituent components at her desk, and reassemble it according to her own standards. I always felt like this process contained some sort of intrinsic inefficiency, but I was never quite able to articulate to her the notion that either assembling sandwiches from not-already-assembled raw materials, or convincing the Subway sandwich artisans to make them to her specifications, would be a better use of everyone's time.
posted by jackbishop at 9:14 AM on July 10, 2023