Is the McRib—that heavenly handful of sticky, porky goodness—just an arbitrage strategy on the part of McDonald’s? That certainly explains it elusiveness, argues Willy Staley.
“At both ends of the product pipeline,” he writes, “you have a good being traded at such large volume that we might as well forget that one end of the pipeline is hogs and corn and the other end is a sandwich. McDonald’s likely doesn’t think in these terms, and neither should you.”
Something else I hadn’t thought of: When the article was written—10 years ago—the McRib was “the only pork-centric non-breakfast item at maybe any American fast food chain.” In other words, if pork sandwiches were profitable, everyone would be selling ’em. Year-round.
Staley may be on to something.
