Having 40+ cars reaching down the block is unacceptable, maybe Chick-fil-A's should hire more workers plus make an extra (or two) drive-thru to make things easier and less sloppy.
You can't compare restaurants against fast food because the quality of food is completely different so it's understandable, fast food is supposed to be fast. If each customer is waiting 5+mins for their food that makes the other customers wait time even longer.
I’m comparing the concept, which is applicable across the service industry. Fast Food and Formal Dining are just close cousins I used to make it more easily understood.
Once again, there will always be a point where it that is unavoidable. Adding more workers doesn’t always equal productivity. In fact, there is a point where it decreases productivity.
This is why they have people outside taking orders and delivering food to the cars. So even if there are 40 cars, the customer still doesn’t have to wait too long. The fact that there are 40 cars is irrelevant if the time it takes to move a single customer through the line is relatively short. And that is the reason you would even see 40 cars in line in the first place... because customers realize the wait will still be relatively short. The only time you’ll see lines that long at other restaurants is when it’s the only option. And that’s because that wait would be 10+ minutes at most other fast food restaurants.
And I don’t think it’s sloppy at all. That’s yours and article writer’s opinion. I’ve never once got an incorrect order or even called the wrong name when going through their drive thru. Not once. Seems like they’ve got it figured out to me