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Wendy’s gets your fast food faster, study says

Posted at 8:08 AM, Oct 09, 2012
and last updated 2012-10-09 08:08:25-04

RICHMOND, Va. (WTVR) – A 2012 QSR Drive-Thru Study, is taking a closer look at which fast food drive-thru gets you the grub the quickest.

The study found Wendy’s worthy of the crown, the chain’s drive-thru service was the fastest at 129.75 seconds.

Burger King came in last, with a whopping 201.33 seconds. Taco Bell came in second place at 149.69, Bojangles’ third at 171.61, Krystal fourth at 175.94, McDonald’s fifth at 188.83, and Chick-fil-A sixth at 190.06. 

When it comes to customer satisfaction though, drivers expect fast service, so customers probably won’t notice much if McDonald’s shaves another millisecond off its overall average turnaround time, but they will notice if it starts to lag.

The annually published survey armed secret researchers across the country with stopwatches and clipboards and sent them through the drive-thru’s at the nation’s top quick service restaurants, performing 2,053 different visits and 4,071 time studies.
 
Order accuracy was another key factor in the study. Wendy’s came out on top again, followed by Chik-fil-A, Taco Bell, and Krystal.
 
For the friendliest service, go to Chick-fil-A. They ranked first in the “very friendly” quotient at 57.4 percent. 
 
So what’s in store for the future of fast food?
 
Experts say you can expect more chains to add lane-splitting to their drive-thrus so you can make an order from one of two speakers, then remerge back into one lane for order pickup.