From automats to postwar fast food

The rise of fast food in post-war America is the growth of mass-produced food designed for commercial resale, with a strong priority placed on speed of service. Fast food was created as a commercial strategy to accommodate large numbers of busy commuters, travelers and wage workers.

2 articles, 1 video, 1 book · about 42 min of reading and viewing

The reading path

1. Read
   

   The Automated Future, and Past, of Fast Food - JSTOR Daily · JSTOR Daily · 2 min read

   Horn & Hardart, an automat chain, prefigured McDonald's by setting recipes and preparation methods down to the size of the bacon square placed on baked beans. After World War II, many corporate headquarters moved out of Manhattan, and many New Yorkers adopted a suburban, car-based lifestyle. Horn & Hardart tried to follow its customers into the suburbs with conventional restaurants and mail-order and supermarket food sales, then found a solution that stuck: Burger King, opening the franchise's first New York City location and expanding from there.

2. Read
   

   the rise of fast food in post-war america · Wikipedia · 26 min read

   Fast food outlets promise quick service as take-away or take-out providers, often letting customers order and pick up food from their vehicles through a drive-through. Fast food spending in the United States rose from $6 billion in 1970 to $160 billion in 2012. Fast food has been losing market share to fast casual dining restaurants, which offer more robust and expensive cuisines, and fast food giants have seen dramatic drops in their sales.

3. Watch
   

   The McRecession - Has Fast Food Cooked Itself? · YouTube · 14 min watch

   Fast food chains have become more expensive, slower and less reliable, and industry sales have plummeted. The video connects these changes to bigger problems in the wider economy.

4. Book
   Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal · Bookshop.org

   Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser focuses in "The American Way" on the fast-food business's beginnings in post-World War II America, opening with pioneers Carl N. Karcher and the McDonald brothers in southern California.

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