Subway The Needy Partner
July 16th 2008 09:23
I enjoy Subway as much as the next person, (as long as the next person isn’t a celiac or sufferer of severe salad allergies) as I then I think I would enjoy Subway grossly more than them. However, over time I am beginning to enjoy my Subway experience less and less. Subway you have turned into a needy partner. Subway, you are draining me with your endless questions, you force me to make all the decisions in this relationship, you are constantly implying that I am a fatty and most horridly, you are making me eat healthy lunches.
Here lies the question that has bugged me for some minutes, how do mutes order Subway? I am no mute, rather the reverse, however, I too, would appreciate fewer verbal interactions at Subway, surely there is an easier to way bypass the myriad of open ended questions pertaining to bread type, cheese, salad selection, sauce selection and salt and pepper?
My present project is to create a silent subway experience. Ahh imagine the bliss of teens and single mothers preparing sandwiches in silence. Delightful.
My proposal is this, rather than handing out loyalty cards, Subway should offer to create your most common Sub order on a flash card for you, so no speaking is required. This is what mine would say:
“Hello, I’m good thankyou
Italian herb and cheese
6 inch
Ham
No meal deals please
Old English cheese
Not toasted
No extra cheese or meats thanks
Mayonnaise
Salt and pepper please.
No drinks thanks
Thanks”
Or should you be a pensioner or other coarse individual with time to spare and a taste for fun, at the expense of lowly paid workers. A range of visual, individual food based flash cards could be used to elongate the experience with one for each item of meat and salad that you would like.
Imagine the bliss of handing that Subway order card over, and saving yourself 39 words each time you enter Subway. That 39 is a minimum estimate also, that doesn’t include what happens should you mishear a question and have to say “Excuse me” or “What” (if you are poorly schooled.) That is two extra words right there.
In addition, this word estimate does not include any verbal ambushes from other itinerant customers in the queue configuration with you. A lonely/crazed person in the queue once said unto me:
“I’m having turkey as well; it must be a popular choice”.
Although I had not engaged in a full qualitative study into the popularity of cold meat selection at Subway, I answered the brazen individual with some quick quantitative research and analysis I did on the spot. I answered the beast with:
“Yes, we two are consumers of turkey. This sharp spike in demand for Turkey could produce a shortage of Turkey, thus resulting in poor service for other, future consumers of turkey who would have to wait whilst more turkey is fetched from a cool room quite some steps away in order from them to procure it at this later time, let’s hope the staff are monitoring the situation and ordering the meats in to adequately meet these unpredicted peaks in demand”
This kind of analysis of the current economic situation, happening in Subway seemed to calm her; she purchased her bread based snack and departed with her underlings.
Yet another non verbal solution to the incessant verbal totem tennis at Subway would be to install a self check in screen, like they have at the airport.
This is my artist’s vision for how it would work. Whence you arrive at rear of the line of workers and women worried about their weight. You step up to the screen and press buttons on the touch screen to communicate your sandwich needs to the counter staff. Upon double checking your order one would press “submit” and the order would travel though the air with the help of electricity and owls to the staff who would read the sandwich request on their screen and commence the construction of this sandwich. No talking, no verbal questions just buttons to press. One would need to keep children and those members of society likely to misuse such a device away from it. This could be achieved simply by displacing pictures of monsters or foster homes, to deter the children. To deter the older scallywags, pictures of books, art, museums and literature could be displayed to send them running.
Another subway problem is the minimal cooking of bacon in the microwave for 30secs. Now I am no Gordon Ramsay, however, I conclude that 30sec is not enough time to fully cook the bacon and create a crisp texture. Surely a solution to this problem could be, Pre cooked bacon, grilled until crisp. Then the cooled bacon could be stored in the salad pigeon holes with the other ingredients until needed. Then, upon it being ordered this already cooked bacon could journey into the microwave, for 30secs of re-heating. I love bacon as much Keith Urban after a big night on the turps, however I don’t wish to risk eating poorly cooked bacon Should the measures I have outlined above be implemented, let me tell you reader, there would be more Bacon on The Lady of Nosh's sandwich than in Kirstie Alley’s handbag.
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