Faith Enokian is a senior at the University of South Alabama who loves drive-throughs. She visits them at least eight times a week, indulging in fast food and asking baristas at Starbucks to make their favorite drinks and posting the interactions on TikTok.
The drive-through became integral to America’s food culture in 1948 when the founders of In-N-Out Burger set up a two-way speaker. But it became even more important during the pandemic, as people sought the comforting isolation of their cars to get tested for Covid, celebrate birthdays, and even vote.
According to a report from the food service research firm Technomic, drive-through traffic rose 30 percent from 2019 to 2022 while the number of people eating inside fast-food restaurants fell by 47 percent. Drive-throughs now account for two-thirds of all fast-food purchases.
Fast-food industry giants like Popeyes, Taco Bell, and Chick-fil-A are leaning into the drive-through trend. They are reducing dining room sizes, eliminating them altogether in favor of more car lanes, and opening high-tech drive-throughs.
The experience of using drive-throughs has become faster and smoother, thanks to pandemic-driven upgrades including better mobile ordering, streamlined kitchens, and smarter traffic management. Cultural shifts are also contributing to the rise of drive-throughs, including the growing popularity of coffee shop drive-throughs among Generation Z and young millennials, pet ownership, and a decrease in people’s tolerance for interacting with strangers.
Now, the fast-food industry is taking advantage of a society that has less tolerance for interacting with strangers. Restaurants are tailoring mobile menus to individuals, experimenting with artificial intelligence to take orders, and building smaller, more efficient restaurants that cause fewer traffic snarls and fit better into neighborhoods.
In October, McDonald’s said in its quarterly earnings report that 40 percent of its sales came from customers ordering digitally and opened its first drive-through restaurant without a dining room late last year in Fort Worth.
The Gen Z customer, who loves to customize orders, expects speed, and wants an experience to post on TikTok, has prompted a revolution in drive-through culture. Fast-casual restaurants that once shunned the drive-through trend and targeted urban customers willing to pay more for fresher, less-processed ingredients have also joined the movement. For example, Shake Shack, which started as a hot-dog stand in Manhattan, now has more than 500 restaurants, some featuring drive-throughs. Sweetgreen, a company built on…