http://www.iphonehacks.com/2017/03/mcdonalds-mobile-app-ordering-make-use-geo-fencing-testing-underway.html

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mcdonalds-mobile-idUSKBN16L2RM

To avoid serving cold food to their customers, McDonald’s app will make use of geo-fencing to detect when the user is near a store so that their order can start being prepared. This will also ensure that the orders are served on a timely basis to customers who order through the mobile app. It will also helo McDonald’s reduce transaction time and cost and free up workers to do other things like delivering food to tables or in cars for drive-thru customers.

“We can’t impact the speed or the quality of our food,” Jim Sappington, McDonald’s executive vice president of operations, digital and technology, told Reuters in an interview at a temporary warehouse space in Chicago’s West Loop where the company has built a new high tech restaurant. It features a redesigned kitchen to speed order flow and show off its technology initiatives.

If its famous french fries are served cold or if mobile customers have to wait for orders, “you get a question of ‘Why did I use the app?’,” Sappington said. “Our focus is to make the overall experience clearly better.”

For now, McDonald’s is testing mobile app ordering in 29 of its outlets in Monterey and Salinas, California, with the program set to expand to 51 additional outlets in Washington by March 20. The food chain will start a wider rollout across all its restaurants in the United States by the end of 2017, with the expansion also set to include Canada, Australia, China, Germany, and the U.K.

McDonald’s take on mobile ordering definitely seems unique and different than the method employed by Starbucks, Domino’s and other food chains. However, it remains to be seen how properly the idea is executed and how it works in real life. If it works as McDonald’s intend it to, mobile app ordering might just go through a revolution of its own in the coming year or two.