What is a Quick Service Restaurant? A quick service restaurant (QSR) is a specific type of restaurant characterized both by cuisine and table seating. Food served in these restaurants characteristically caters to a “meat-sweet diet” and is offered from a limited menu, cooked in bulk in advance and kept hot, finished and packaged to order, and is usually available ready to take away, though seating may be provided. These restaurants are typically part of a restaurant chain or franchise, which supplies standardized ingredients and partially prepared foods to each restaurant through controlled supply channels. American-founded quick service restaurants such as McDonald’s and Starbucks are multinational corporations with outlets across the globe.
Quick Service Restaurants Influence the Global Economy.
The quick service restaurant industry operates in the hundreds of billions, with steady growth year over year. The branding leader right now is McDonald’s…by a long shot. Statistics show the brand value of the most valuable QSR brands worldwide in 2014. In that year, the brand value of Starbucks amounted to 25.78 billion U.S. dollars. McDonald’s was the most valuable QSR brand in the world with an estimated brand value of about 85.71 billion U.S. dollars. McDonald’s is still the leading quick-service restaurant (QSR) chain in the United States. In 2013, the company generated close to 36 billion U.S. dollars; about 23 billion U.S. dollars more than its closest rival, Subway.
What Is Driving Consumer Demand In Quick Service Restaurants?
Demand is driven by consumer tastes and personal income. The profitability of individual companies depends on efficient operations and effective marketing. Large companies have advantages in purchasing, finance, and marketing whereas small companies can compete effectively by offering superior food or service. Despite the 2008 recession and the resulting decrease in consumer confidence across the globe, average consumer QSR spending has increased due to convenience and low-cost. Consumers are still looking for the convenience of eating out, but are drawn to the low prices of quick service restaurants over table-service restaurants. Most QSR chains have capitalized upon the recession by introducing new deals in addition to their already low-priced menus.
What Is the Most Important Factor for Choosing a QSR?
Taste is the most important factor when it comes to restaurant experiences according to 94 percent of U.S. consumers. Health, on the other hand, is less of a consideration as the nutritional quality of the meals offered is lower than most dining alternatives. That said, nearly 83 percent of U.S. consumers dine at quick-service restaurants at least once a week.
QSR Leaders Choose CTI for Product Testing.
Only CTI has its own field sites across the United States and Canada. Contract Testing Inc. conducts extensive sensory and consumer product testing for the quick service restaurant industry. There is a lot at stake and that means you must rely on a partner who will meet your controlled testing needs at any place and at any time with complete location accountability. CTI offers the complete scope of product research services, oriented toward one specific goal: making superior products. This is vital for the QSR industry as never before.
A Top 10 QSR Director of Brand Marketing recently said, “CTI has nailed the process for delivering meaningful, quality product research we can act on.”
This article is free information from Contract Testing Inc., an established leader in sensory product research and consumer product research for the food, beverage, and (QSR) quick service restaurant industries throughout the United States and Canada. To learn more about the complete scope of product research services, please call 1-905-456-0783 or visit us online ContractTesting.com.