This is hardly an original observation, but nonetheless remarkable: KFC is more expensive than 95% of all restaurants in China. Perhaps in Shanghai nowadays this ratio is closer to 60%, but in smaller cities (like Lianyungang, where I lived long ago) KFC was the most expensive restaurant in a city of 700,000 people.
In America, KFC is the most forgettable of the main fast food chains. McDonalds at least has the novelty of being first, as well as having the most publicity. Burger King wins by virtue of being slightly less disgusting than McDonalds*. Wendy’s has the square burgers, Taco Bell the distinction of serving Mexican food (sort of), and Jack in the Box the novelty items like Teriyaki bowls. KFC is just, well, there; it seems to exist only as a last resort on long road trips, or a guilty pleasure after a couple of bong rips.
The elitist Bay Area effetes I dearly refer to as my friends** wouldn’t dream of eating at KFC. And, who can blame them? Fried chicken isn’t the healthiest of foods in any form, but KFC buckets are lethal. I defy anyone to eat four chicken breasts, a pound of mashed potatoes, and a couple of buttered rolls and walk out of there without a raging stomach ache. If you’re prepared for the stomach onslaught, at the very least you can go to an authentic country-fried joint where you can at least pretend to be open-minded.
My friends (and parents, siblings, etc.) will spend a fortune getting “real food”. This I define as items from the Whole Foods supermarket chain, or from farmer’s markets. Everyone knows good restaurants buy everything fresh, and everyone is suspicious of places with long lists of items on the menu.
And yet- this is what average restaurants in China offer. Near my office is a restaurant called “country cooking”, or something like that. As you walk past in the morning, you see the staff sitting outside dicing and preparing fresh vegetables bought an hour or two earlier. These vegetables are organized into large bowls and placed beside the meat, tofu, and spices that complement the meal. As I wait for my food, I watch the restaurant chef frantically throwing everything around in a oversized wok, bringing it out to my plate in less than ten minutes. I eat. It is delicious. And I walk out, paying around half of what I would pay for a “value meal” at KFC.
Today, I thought, this is the sort of meal people would pay a fortune for in the Bay Area. All natural ingredients (don’t forget MSG is naturally occurring), freshly brought, instantly prepared, and delicious. In China, KFC is a fancy joint; clean, smoke-free, orderly, efficient, and foreign. In China, there are farmer’s markets. Nobody thinks they’re anything special, nobody would plan a Sunday morning around them if they didn’t have to. In fact, these markets are how the vast majority of the country- hundreds of millions of people- feed themselves on a daily basis.
I suppose none of this is particularly remarkable. But it’s amazing how a restaurant like KFC- whose whole business plan is to replicate the same experience in every one of its franchises throughout the world- is perceived totally differently in different parts of the world.
*My grandparents spent a lifetime preparing and eating delicious, homemade food. But when they reached their eighties, they would actually drive a half-hour on the freeway just to eat at a particular Burger King, which they swore was better than the dozens of outlets closer to their house.
**This is of course the subculture I would belong to had I not left home for China
***A stray footnote here- I realize the Bay Area doesn’t represent America as a whole. But it’s the America I’m most familiar with, so with apologies I’m using it as a proxy in this post.
Comments 6
In defense of an “elitist Bay Area effetes I dearly refer to as my friends”:
American fast food stinks and is a major source of the health problems in this country. Granted it may be elitist, but when you have the means to avoid fast food, why ever eat it? Is it worth it to weigh 130 kilos like many of my Texan brethren? Clearly, there are much better restaurants around, and usually it is an extra dollar or two more just to go from crap to decent. So long as you don’t go out every meal, it’s not exactly hitting your wallet very hard. Or people could actually cook, which is by far the most affordable, especially if you have a family. And there are even places cheaper than fast food, like the Mexican taco shops that I frequent on a regular basis, that may not be too healthy, but sure as hell beat Taco Bell in taste (and probably still health).
And then the next step up from the classic fast food (the Applebee’s, the Chili’s, the Fuddruckers) all seem to be more expensive and infinitely worse than their authentic counterparts. I recently went to an Applebees (actually this was the first meal I had when I was back from travelling in China and I told my friend I wanted good American food. Mistake.) and was astounded by how bad the food was… and it cost me 10 bucks! I could get the equivalent meal, yet better tasting, at the local sandwich shop by my house for 6 bucks. Why the hell should I go to Applebees? For the crappy fries that came with it?
As for the freshness of food… it is a serious problem here in the States. I am envious of your ability to get amazing produce everywhere you go. Especially in the middle of this country, produce blows. Everytime I go to Mexico or anywhere out of the States, I am reminded what a banana or a tomato tastes like… its just so different its almost like a different food object. Whatever mass production scheme they have here, it takes away the taste (and not just slightly). And actually the best produce by far here is the Whole Foods (Whole Paycheck), but I don’t shop there because of the prices. But even Whole Foods can’t compare to any tiny little market in most any other country I’ve been to.
To actually talk about your topic: why the Chinese spend a lot of money to eat at KFC. My ill-informed opinion is that it is a similar reason as to why the Chinese also drink Budweiser.
-a snooty Bay Area Californian.
Posted 16 Sep 2008 at 9:49 pm ¶That stray footnote is needed, my fellow Matt S. KFC is pretty damn popular when you move to the fat belt/Midwest and the Bible Belt. If KFC seems stomach-boggling, consider this: back at Florida State (and at John Pasden’s neighboring UF boo hiss) the locals went KFC one step more with Guthrie’s, a fried chicken tenders place with a mayo-based spicy sauce that made KFC look like health food. Such is life in the South.
The bigger point to take from your post and our experiences may be that Yum! Foods has taken two downscale brands in America, Pizza Hut and KFC, and sold them as high-class establishments to the Chinese, which has to perplex those of us who get over here and wonder why KFC and Pizza Hut are hot dating places, party venues, or where you go to show you have le cash.
One further point: KFC can leverage its immense popularity into higher prices in China because the Colonel rarely follows his traditions in the Middle Kingdom. Yum! Foods is heavily localized, so unlike McDonald’s, which tastes like McDonald’s almost anywhere, KFC and the like are more geared to Chinese tastes.
Posted 16 Sep 2008 at 11:13 pm ¶There is no way KFC is more expensive than 95% or 60% of all restaurants in China. How much does a meal (Tao Can) cost at KFC? Around 20 RMB. A bucket of chicken, plus some corn bread and a bottle of coke costs about 50 RMB, and this is supposedly for two people. I have never been to Lianyungang, but most restaurants in China that I have dined charged more than 50 RMB for food for two people.
Posted 17 Sep 2008 at 4:20 am ¶Jascha,
Oh…I wasn’t attacking people for spending money on healthy food; I’d do the same if I lived at home and had the means to. But you’re right- I think a lot of the obesity epidemic can be explained by the fact that cheap food is almost always unhealthy.
Matthew,
Good point…KFC does have items like the Beijing burrito wrap (which is what I usually get when I go there) that caters to the local audience, and if I had to guess, I’d say portions are smaller than at KFC’s back home.
Pfeffer,
Posted 17 Sep 2008 at 7:06 am ¶Whereabouts have you spent a lot of your time in China? In Kunming, nice restaurants here are rarely, rarely more than 20 RMB per person unless it’s the sort of place bigshots go to impress their business clients.
I agree with your last comment…here in Xinjiang a meal rarely costs my wife and I more than 20 RMB together unless we splurge (although we don’t live in a big city). There’s no doubt that KFC, the only western restaurant in our city, is the most expensive. Sure makes not going there a lot easier.
As Matt Stinson wrote, I think another good example of all of this is Pizza Hut. Back in America I can count on one hand the amount of times I actually sat down in a pizza joint to eat pizza – we’d always order out. Every place I’ve been in China, including Urumqi, the Pizza Hut is an UPSCALE restaurant! In my own form of protest, the two times I went there I refused to use my fork and knife. People looked at me funny for using my hands, but I figure that if they want to eat at a western restaurant they better learn how we do it.
Posted 17 Sep 2008 at 8:22 am ¶kfc was nice when i first got here since they have a fairly convincing mexican wrap. then i found mexican restaurants in town.
ironically enough, my grandparents drive a ways to a specific chinese place they say is better than all the other chinese buffets in west colorado.
who said fuddruckers? gross.
Posted 17 Sep 2008 at 10:39 am ¶Post a Comment