Subway adds new sandwiches one year after menu refresh, Chick-fil-A is still America’s favorite restaurant

Yahoo Finance food reporter Brooke DiPalma joins the Live show to detail Subway's latest menu additions, in addition to survey reports finding Chik-fil-A to be American consumers' favorite fast-food brand.

Video transcript

RACHELLE AKUFFO: All right, well, checking in on the fast food sector, and Subway is stepping up its game with a menu makeover and a giveaway. Yahoo Finance's Brooke DiPalma is with us. Now we know that Subway had an Eat Fresh Refresh in 2021. What are they trying to do this year?

BROOKE DIPALMA: That's right, Rachelle. July 13 will mark one year since Subway debuted that Eat Fresh Refresh campaign. And now this year, Subway hoping to hit a home run with their new Subway Series, they're calling it. It's 12 new senior sandwiches that are rolling out starting today. And those include offerings like chicken cheesesteak, Italian sandwiches. No crispy sandwiches worth noting of, but of course, those will come in either the 6-inch or foot-long.

Now, the company said that it spent more than one year and tested hundreds of recipes to come up with these top 12 sandwiches. But of course, the success of this rollout here will be whether or not franchisees can adopt this quickly and successfully, and whether or not customers will respond.

DAVE BRIGGS: All right, so the other fast food story-- and this is not cool because I'm really hungry late in the day. We should not emphasize food stories at 4:30 Eastern time. Chick-fil-A, though, staying on top. It's kind of a broken record with them and customer satisfaction, which appears their signature.

BROOKE DIPALMA: That's right. Despite being-- the fact that they're closed on Sundays, it appears that customer satisfaction is through the roof. I mean, it didn't increase year over year, but according to this new survey out from American Customer Satisfaction Index-- that's a restaurant study that's conducted annually-- they're coming in on top of the scale of 83% satisfaction.

Now, of course, we see here, if you've been to Chick-filA drive-thru, you can easily see how much customers enjoy those-- that sort of food, those chicken sandwiches. But of course, some others making the top of this list also include KFC, Chipotle also unchanged. Of course, over this past year, we've really seen Chipotle increase their innovation, increase their digital offerings, as we saw with so many, including Panera Bread, Pizza Hut, Domino's, Starbucks.

McDonald's, Taco Bell, and Popeyes, worth noting that they all went down 3%. Another one that went down, Starbucks-- worth noting there. Of course, we've seen so many unionization efforts, as well as just overflow of customers and a lack of staff willing to-- or able to really fulfill the demand there.

DAVE BRIGGS: But eight straight years, Chick-fil-A--

BROOKE DIPALMA: Eight straight years.

DAVE BRIGGS: --is number one. And it is. It's the joke was, they should do COVID testing because the drive-thru just operated around the clock, despite the fact that thousands of cars lined up for those delicious sandwiches.

BROOKE DIPALMA: That's right, and it really has to do with accuracy of food and labor, as well as the quality of the food. And so, really, what they looked at there really just showed that customers, despite the-- like I said, being closed on Sunday, they still adhere to just the kind, polite staff that Chick-fil-A fills its restaurants with. And I guess, that chicken sandwich coming out on top.

DAVE BRIGGS: I'm glad you brought up Sundays. Every Sunday, my son asks me, can we get Chick-fil-A? Every Sunday.

BROOKE DIPALMA: [INAUDIBLE].

DAVE BRIGGS: That does say a lot about their customer service. Brooke, thank you. Great stuff. Appreciate it.