It’s safe to say that most fast food places have menus that are basically the same. Places like McDonald’s, Burger King, and Wendy’s all offer the fast food basics: Burgers, French fries, chicken sandwiches, chicken nuggets, some kind of ice cream dessert, salads that have more calories than the burgers, and a variation of potatoes. Places like Taco Bell and Del Taco offer up tacos, burritos, enchiladas, and the like. Popeye’s and KFC are also not that different when it comes to the food they’re selling.
But at the same time, every fast food place has at least one menu item that seems kind of unique to them.
Think McDonald’s and the McRib, Wendy’s and their infamous chili, Taco Bell and their Doritos Locos Tacos. Stuff like that. So when a fast food place does come out with something kind of unique, and then another place ends up coming out with something almost exactly like that… it seems a little shady.
Sometimes it seems so weird that people call them out on it, and it starts a little mini fast food war, which is actually pretty fun to watch.
This time around, it’s McDonald’s vs. Dunkin’, because McDonald’s is getting called out for copying Dunkin’s fries.
Dunkin’ (formerly known as Dunkin’ Donuts) recently took to Twitter to call out McDonald’s for potentially copying their donut fries.
What a weird coincidence... @McDonalds came out with Donut Sticks, and we just released the blueprints to our new donut packaging... pic.twitter.com/u2pHWx9yOe
— Dunkin' (@dunkindonuts) March 4, 2019
The image shows Dunkin’ packaging that looks mysteriously similar to classic McDonald’s packaging. It’s basically their way of saying that McDonald’s copied them.
It was a pretty serious burn. Fans noticed immediately, obviously:
What happened to cause this tweet? In February, McDonald’s launched their brand new Donut Sticks after Business Insider leaked information on them. The Donut Sticks hit stores on February 20th.
For the record, they look very delicious. And fans seem really into them as well:
I’m addicted to McDonald’s Donut Sticks
— Charlie St Cloud (@Charles_Swain) March 6, 2019
So what’s the problem?
Well, it was impossible not to notice that these new Donut Sticks seemed very similar to Dunkin’s Donut Fries, which were released as a limited-time offering in June 2018.
Dunkin’ Brands CEO David Hoffman said that the Donut Fries “quickly became one of the best-performing limited-time offer bakery items in recent brand history.”
It’s not that shocking that McDonald’s decided to swoop in there and make their own version to capitalize on that success.
And, admittedly, they do look extremely similar. The two seem like the same product, in almost the same packaging, just with a different color box and label.
We don’t know if Dunkin’ was planning on bringing their Donut Fries back or not, but they kind of don’t have to now that McDonald’s has their own best-selling version.
Yikes!
Think it was a smart move for McDonald’s to start the donut sticks since Dunkin Donuts stops selling them #McDonalds
— seasalt (@e1125w) March 6, 2019
But don’t worry: Dunkin’ isn’t really copying McDonald’s packaging as they inferred in their tweet.
A Dunkin’ representative told Business Insider, “This was just for fun in reaction to competitors imitating our success with Donut Fries; a good-natured reminder that America runs on Dunkin’ coffee and donuts.” Ouch! A subtle burn!
It’s almost too much fast food drama to handle!
McDonald’s, so far, has not responded. We kind of hope they continue on with this little social media spat.
The Twitter reactions are great. Some people are picking sides, like opting for McDonald’s.
To be fair though, those donut sticks are incredible and put the dunks ones to shame. 😂💁🏻♀️
— Stephanie Marie* (@SMHill91) March 4, 2019
And other people are all about Dunkin’. Loyalty!
I wouldn't go to McDonald's for burgers, nevermind donut sticks!
— Del 🇺🇸 (@del66giudice) March 4, 2019
And then some people are not about either of the versions. We get it.
That's okay, @krispykreme is better than both y'all anyway
— Dakota Britt (@dakota_britt) March 4, 2019
Food Insider even managed to taste-test them against each other! Check out the winner:
We compared McDonald's Donut Sticks to Dunkin's Donut Fries 🍟 pic.twitter.com/hFALjrKwlJ
— Insider Food (@insiderfood) February 20, 2019
Whatever the case, we can’t lie. We want to try these. They look good!
In the meantime, we’ll be sticking around to see if McDonald’s responds to this.
Hopefully they do!
