Nah I think it’s far more that they’ve developed a reputation as cheap, everywhere, and mediocre then they raised the prices massively. I don’t know anyone who thinks “you know what I’m craving? Subway”. They used to have other niches but sub shops are common and I can get a better vegetarian option elsewhere and for cheaper.
I don’t think they can pull out of this tailspin unless they slash prices to the bone
Subway spent a long time and a lot of marketing money training their customers that a sandwich should cost $5 and taste fine. Not great, but fine. But then the doubled the cost and halved the quality. They spent years teaching customers to avoid the sandwich they now serve.
Little Caesars had a similar problem, but instead of doubling the price, they raised it $1. Cheap pizza for $5 is fine, and cheap pizza for $6 still feels fine.
My local Little Caesars sells the basic pizzas for $9.97 now. Crazy Bread went from $1.99 to $4.99.
Absolutely.
Look all around you and what you see in pretty much all domains is large corporations wringing every drop of brand value they can from accumulated customer brand awareness and loyalty, from enshittification of pretty much everything Internet and of electronics from brands which were previously seen as a good quality-price balance, to forced subscriptions (hi, Adobe) and even as in this case, store chains with well known brands in everything from consumer goods to fast food pushing prices up and/or quantity and quality low.
Sure, for many if not most this will trash those companies’ brands, but as the C-suite at those places have been taught in their MBAs, “by the time it blows up, I’ll be long gone and laughing all the way to the bank to visit all that money I made from bonuses and a golden umbrella”
Yeah they seem to think of “brand value” as loyalty akin to what people feel for a local sports team, and some brands do have that “hometown favorite” value. I know my hometown brand of potato chips definitely does taste like home. But also, they need to be thinking of it in a term that business ghouls can understand: professional reputation.
The organization of subway has a bad professional reputation. Its customers are unimpressed by its services in their transactions with it, they feel it offers a bad value proposition.
Businesses have gotten accustomed to the brand treadmill rather than just doing something well and being ok with the margins that provides. And if it isn’t an investment in growth a business should be able to reach that point where it finds stability and maintains it, providing stable profits.
