new York
CNN
—
It’s not $5, but Subway is bringing back cheap burgers and joining the fast food menu wars.
Starting Aug. 26, Subway will sell all footlong sandwiches for $6.99, a steep discount considering that some footlong sandwiches can cost as much as $14 in some cities. It’s the privately held chain’s latest attempt to recapture customers who balk at rising fast-food prices and spend less when they go out.
The deal has one catch: it’s only available via the app or website with the code “699FL” and ends on September 8.
Subway is owned by a private equity firm and doesn’t often disclose its sales like its publicly traded competitors. But its sales and traffic struggles, according to trade magazine Restaurant Business, mirror the problems McDonald’s, Burger King and Starbucks have faced this year.
“Today, restaurants are looking for an affordable meal more than ever, which often means compromising on quality, variety or flavor,” Doug Fry, president of Subway North America, said in a press release. “Our menu is full of sandwiches for every budget, and this new offering means our guests can get the sandwiches they crave at a great price.”
Subway has also diversified its menu as its sandwich prices increase. The chain recently began selling $3 Dippers sandwiches and Sidekick snacks priced between $2 and $5, to target money-conscious customers who may be turned off by the higher prices of its other items.
The addition of Sidekicks and Dippers “makes sense,” said David Henkes, a senior director at Technomic, who previously told CNN that Subway had to increase revenue somewhere as fast-food customers began to resist price increases due to inflation.
“They’ve been underperforming in the sandwich segment, so they need to change things up a little bit and drive some additional traffic,” Henkes said. Technomic data shows that Subway is also lagging behind its competitors in sales of side dishes and snacks.
In recent years, Subway has added customization features to its menu, increased its efforts to send orders to its app, increased its international presence and introduced freshly sliced meats — a major shift from Subway’s previous method of delivering pre-sliced deli meats.
Another major hurdle for Subway is its shrinking store count: The chain closed more than 400 restaurants in the United States in 2023, ending the year with its lowest number (20,133) since 2005.
