The rise (and fall) of ghost kitchens is somewhat of a spooky tale in and of itself. Built on a shaky foundation, ghost kitchens exploded in popularity, especially during lockdown. Basically, unidentifiable kitchens cooked food that delivery services brought to millions of doorsteps. But who were these so called ‘Ghost Kitchens’? How were each of these ‘ghost kitchen’s rated for food prep safety? Questions like these went out the window as the pandemic took hold, as many people were all too happy to just have tasty food delivered when they couldn’t leave their homes. They even put up with the ‘wrong orders’, smashed food, and inflated price tags. But when lockdown ended, the business model struggled to keep up with ‘normal’. Even Youtubers such as MrBeast seem to be regretting getting into the ‘Ghost Kitchen’ game!
#ghostkitchen #mrbeast #weirdhistoryfood
45 Comments
I started hating on ghost kitchens when I ordered a mr beast burger and it was amazing smash burger. The second and third time tho? Run of the mill plain ol burger. Then I found out it totally depends on the restruant making the burger. Sucks cause its not often you can get a legit smash burger.
It's really the outsourcing of delivery to the apps that made the whole thing unworkable. The problem is that traditional restaurants had already figured out all the rules for successful delivery (limit it to a very small radius, only offer it if your food travels well, make the customer spend a minimum dollar amount to qualify, use your own employees so they can be held accountable, etc.) and these self-proclaimed market disrupters thought they could just break them all.
I cooked for a ghost kitchen at work before. The meat was so spoiled it made me wanna vomit, but management said send it. That is the standard for restaurants all across America.
Wrong narrator!
Maybe if the food was actually good, MrBeast, then people would eat your product.
After watching Eddie Burback's video i started looking up the address on Doordash restaurants before ordering. Turns out the "Burger Den" I had been ordering from was actually Denny's
My partner and I were so pissed when we ordered from what we thought was a new Italian place that turned out to just be Chili’s. 🤮
Kinda sucks bc Mr beast burger was actually pretty good like 2 years ago when it first popped ip
This narrator’s delivery of jokes sucks
When I drove a semi, I delivered fixtures for Little Ceasars. I once had a 3 stop load that went to 3 separate ghost kitchens. Each place had between 20 and 40 restaurants inside it from wendys and Arby's to Dave's bbq and outback
I keep hearing "Rick & Morty" every time you say "brick & mortar". Also, does anyone else think Mr. Beast has the world's most punchable face?
We have one in Fresno, CA called My Guy Market. The owner is a really cool NYC transplant who makes insanely good chopped cheeses. It’s basically a hybrid between a ghost kitchen and a traditional restaurant. You can only order on his app but the prices are pretty good, especially if you go pick it up yourself. #TYMG
ive been a food delivery driver for several years and i always feel bad when people order from the dennys virtual restaurant The Meltdown, they serve tiny little portions and it feels like the bag of food weighs nothing
This can still work if that way still standal and get rid of Uber eat. Damn pass saving to customer
0:48 man this is some Peggy Hill level of pronunciation
This makes sense. I've used Door Dash a few times and I've seen some of these outfits like Wow Bao and others mentioned. I was never tempted to order because all have low ratings.
The actual problem is now none of these restaurants are affordable any more. So it is over, unless they drop their prices which is unlikely.
Up until today, I've never heard of a ghost kitchen.
I wish ghost kitchens are actually kitchen where ghost cook that would be a fun place
Datamining farms masquerading as restaurants? Jesus Christ…
Ghost Kitchen or Virtual Kitchen is a bad name. The kitchen is there; it’s the restaurant that is virtual or ‘ghost’.
This is why I don't get delivery, it's hard enough to get good food at a restaurant because any moron can open one and the staff are so poorly paid you get the bottom of the barrel, but ghost kitchens are a lower level of hell. Why would I pay so much for garbage food made in some sketchy shell company staffed by felons and druggies? At that point I'd rather just cook. I dont understand how people can care so little about where their prepared meals come from. Enjoy your roaches and food poisoning.
Cooking has never been easier. If you don't know how, just watch a youtube video and follow along. But there are still so many dumb lazy people who can't manage even that much? Especially gamer bros. Which is why they're all permanently single, because no woman wants to deal with lazy incompetent males who can't even make scrambled eggs. Women are looking for a partner, not a slave owner. Nothing makes me dryer than a man acting like a toddler.
Even worse than ghost kitchens during the pandemic I can't tell you how many times I would get a delivery order through the Uber eats app and then the directions would send me to someone's apartment complex turns out it wasn't even a real kitchen it was someone in their apartment kitchen cooking food and pretending to be a restaurant on the app it got so bad that Uber eats even introduced a reporting button that you could report a fake restaurants now I think they have a better vetting process as they remove the button and I have not since the pandemic received a delivery order going to someone's apartment complex or home so I think they really improve their vetting process to ensure that it's an actual business a real restaurant offering a menu on their app
My favorite ghost kitchen story is the time that I received a delivery order to go pick up a vegan meal from a "vegan restaurant" when I showed up to the "vegan restaurant" it was a ghost kitchen inside of a (get this) southern barbecue restaurant!!! That's right they were claiming to cook vegan food inside of a freaking barbecue kitchen now I had a vegan friend a few years ago and I know that if you are eating a vegan diet you can get sick if your food is crossed contaminated with meat or animal products there's no way in hell of barbecue restaurant could not cross contaminate vegan food cooking in the same kitchen so I actually called the customer and told them that this was not a "certified vegan restaurant" that it was a ghost kitchen inside of a barbecue restaurant The customer about lost their mind and explained to me that if their food had been contaminated it would make them sick so they canceled the order and reported the restaurant because again the restaurant was claiming they were a certified vegan restaurant which was a lie you cannot cook vegan food in the same kitchen with the same mixers bowls and utensils where meat is prepared and cooked!!
Ive been to a ghost kitchen with a regular front end counter its just a place to pick up your food. The way this is explained is so confusing.
Should’ve saved this episode for Halloween 👻
There was a ghost kitchen in my town during the pandemic, and when the pandemic ended, they opened into a new physical restaurant and called it Ghost Kitchen lol. Quite ironic.
Kudos to the food industry for the rebranding attempt… But my Czech grandma did this in the '50's out of our family's gas station… breakfast abd lunch to go, unheard of back then.
food: $12.46
food + delivery: $65.26
fees + taxes: $39.99
meal total: $105.25
Whomever came up with this idea is going straight to the boiler room down in hell
the reason why ghost kitchens died its because the UN declared the pandemic is over
Bro, im hurt, i though super mega dilla was a new spot. I been looking for the actual restaurant. We get it all the time😂😂😂
Mr. Beast is responsible for the mess we’re in with Ghost Kitchens being everywhere and wiping out wallets out while committing fraud and taking us for fools –
Beast Burger… what a scam.
Slinging that out of rundown Chinese restaurants alongside the Krab Rangoon…
I worked in the store front of a building that has apartments above it and some guy in the building started selling schnitzel out of his apartment but because the store and the apartments have the same address for weeks people and delivery drivers came into the store and asked for their schnitzel we finally had to track the man down and tell him he needs to specify his apartment on the app
I worked in a ghost kitchen for 3 months, the conditions were ghoulish.
My problem is the ghost kitchens don't tell you what company was running it. There's a bao place from a subpar American Mexican place in my town. And if I wouldn't go to IHOP, I wouldn't want what ghost kitchen is run out of them either.
True Story. This was only made possible b/c of Covid. It would've failed quicker had everyone not been forced to get delivery. I worked for a breakfast/typical diner food place and we had TONS of ghost restaurants. I think like 23 or something? This is the problem with that- you'll never get any consistency b/c you have no way to ensure it. This was a tool used to capitalize on lost dine-in business and nothing else. Most of our GK's weren't very good and then our cooks weren't very good at cooking any of it. My Burrito is THE only one to survive and they still do decent business with it but all the others failed. You have to pay for a GK 'company''s stuff/ concept/ marketing bs/ all the paper togo's and stuff. Then, the price of it is reflected in a huge markup from the delivery place. We had a wing joint we HAd to stop selling from b/c we lost money on every single sale, after all of the players got their cut. Personally, I thought it stupid and that none of the food from any of them was very good- wasn't surprising at all. Think you own a BK. You open a wing joint virtually. With the mark-up, how much better is a place that doesn't normally sell wings going to be compared to one that does. Oh, and it's going to cost more? Yeah, that's bound to fail. My place went out of business/ or bought a franchise of a different place to be exact, but it's menu was huge. Most of it wasn't very good. The trend has been and will continue to be small menu- great food- affordably priced. My favorite Vietnamese joint DT sells 4 things. 4. And they are ALL AWESOME. There's a book called the Paradox of Choice. When you give people too many options= they become dissatisfied. A small amount is best. Once people stop trying to be everything for everyone the quality of food will be better and everyone will make what they do. Cool vid, thanks.
The Mr. Beast burger was gross. The burger patty was dry as hell and the sandwich was covered in random clashing ingredients.
I bet ghost kitchens are also affecting true smaller restaurants. I like to look for new places to order from but I've been duped enough by ghost kitchens that I avoid restaurants that I haven't heard of.
“Let’s just lie to people, what’s the worst that could happen?”
Apps have ruined food service. Delivery wasn’t hard or expensive for the business. And the apps came along for the lazy and up charged everything
I only order from places i know where it comes from… And I stop the wife often when we order out. Door Dash and Uber prices add bank to the menu items, it should be illegal. Adding extra to the order is fine, but when an item costs 2 to 3 dollars more plus the % they hit your for.. ill just call in and pick it up and save 20 to 30 dollars…
It's a solid idea, but it was definitely executed in a lazy way to maximize profit during the pandemic.
Excise the ghost, not *exercise*.
I ordered from Mr Beast Burger during lockdown. I ordered a burger and cheese fries, and they sent me a double order of regular fries instead. Never again.