Here's an article about the looming battle between In-N-Out and Five Guys for the Southern California area. For what it's worth, Five Guys already has my vote, partly because their food is so good and partly because my last few visits to an In-N-Out have been so disappointing. I don't know if my tastes have changed or their burgers have but they got me to wondering what I ever liked about them. I'm suspecting that deep down, I always liked the idea of In-N-Out more than I liked their cuisine. If you were going the fast food route, you always felt much classier at an In-N-Out than at, say, a McDonald's or Burger King.
I noted back here that a Five Guys was due to open in Culver City (a 'burb not all that far from where I dwell) by mid-May. The linked article says mid-April…and hey, it's just about mid-April now. I would still give them a few weeks to get their act together before I got judgmental about what they serve there.
A friend in that industry once told me that part of the success of In-N-Out was that a lot of the young employees they hire do not regard it as temp work until they begin their real careers. There's a fair amount of history of someone starting at In-N-Out peeling potatoes and steadily working their way up until they snag a well-paying managerial position. Ergo, they attract employees who take the job more seriously and extend themselves beyond merely dressing burgers with minimal interest, then getting the check and going home. The early days of McDonald's were apparently a lot like that, too.
But, this person told me, McDonald's ain't like that no mo. First off, in many areas they've expanded about as much as they're likely to expand, so if you're salting fries at one, it's hard to envision working your way up to managing a new one locally. Secondly, he said, corporate management became less interested in promoting from within and more interested in stealing away the good people from the competition. So fewer kids who get work at a McDonald's feel there's a chance of it leading to a lifelong, decent-paying profession. I must admit that when I go to a Five Guys or an In-N-Out, the employees sure seem to be happier working there and more attentive to my order than whenever I'm at a McDonald's. Which I try not to patronize too often.