Did you know there’s a McDonald’s float-thru in Germany where customers can pick up their food by kayak?
There are almost 40,000 McDonald’s stores across the globe, most of them with a drive-thru station—but did you know there’s one in the world where customers can pick up their orders by boat?
A YouTube vlogger featured the fast-food chain’s one and only float-thru, which is situated on the Elbe River in Hamburg, Germany. “Just to manage your expectations, this is not a McDonald’s with a moat around it where there’s a queue of kayaks lining up for each window in turn,” said content creator Tom Scott.
While it seems new to most, the McBoat has been there since 2015. Instead of the usual microphone and speaker system, foodies can place their orders via a smartphone app. “We can see your order on the screen and we make your food ready. One person goes and brings the bag out and wishes them a good ‘Enjoy your meal!’ and a happy ‘Good day!’” restaurant manager Adrian Dudziak explained.
Even the items on the menu are quite distinct from other McDo branches across the globe. Scott opted for a vegan burger, Kartoffel-Dippers with Heatwave sauce, and a mango-pineapple smoothie during his visit. "One of the things I've learned over the years I've been making videos is that people like a combination of novelty and familiarity," he said. "If everything changes, people don't like it and they move to other things. But if nothing changes, people get bored and they move to other things."
"In the same way, I think it's fascinating to find something that's very close to what you already know but changes it in one or two interesting ways. Seeing small reinventions of that formula can be fascinating," Scott concluded.
