When you pay for something, you expect to get what you asked for. But one customer caught this fast food chain using an old trick to give customers less product.
However, some people pointed out that it might not be as malicious as it seems.
Soda is the drink of choice to be paired with fast food meals, from burgers to tacos to chicken fingers.
While we won’t debate whether someone should be drinking two water bottles worth of sugary soda, we can say that this beloved chicken chain shorted this customer.
Raising Cane’s called out over soda quantity
Raising Cane’s is a fast-food restaurant known for its limited but delicious menu, which focuses on one main dish: chicken tenders.
Part of the appeal is that while it only does chicken tenders (with a handful of sides), it does them well.
But in a viral video with more than 1.3 million views, TikToker Allie (@heyy_allie) doesn’t have anything to say about the tenders. It’s their soda she’s concerned with.
“Raising Canes is doing us dirty with the 32oz drinks,” Allie wrote in the text overlay.
In the clip, Allie holds a large drink in her hand but notices that it feels “super heavy with ice.”
So she embarks on a little experiment to see what the soda-to-ice ratio actually is.
With a strainer, her partner separates the ice and soda.
“That’s it?” she says.
To their surprise, despite being “full,” the large 32 oz cup only had 16oz of soda in it.
“Half your [expletive] soda is ice,” her partner comments.
“Raising Cane’s, please do better, “Allie says.
Why do fast food places give so much ice?
Raising Cane’s is far from the only fast-food place that does this, and people have a few theories as to why it’s such a prevalent practice.
The obvious one is that workers are trained to fill people up on ice since it’s cheaper than filling the cup with soda (which requires buying syrups and gas for carbonation).
“As a soda girlie, I was just taken back by how much ice was in my cup. I was hoping the soda to ice ratio would be a little better. Who needs all that ice?! There should be an ice disclaimer lol,” Allie told the Daily Dot in an Instagram direct message.
One Redditor pointed out that ice comes out from the machine faster, so it ends up filling up the cup, even if you only do a light tap.
“Ice came out fast. When I was in a hurry, I would just go with it,” the Reddit user noted.
Is fast food ice bad?
We won’t outright call it bad, but here are some things you should be aware of.
The ice that comes out of those machines isn’t all that clean and often contains more bacteria than toilet water, Mashed reported.
“The findings suggest that either poor quality water has been used to make the ice, or that contamination has occurred because of poor hygiene practices (such as staff failing to wash their hands before handling the water/ice),” UK Food Standards Agency spokesperson said.
Another reason it’s not as clean as it should be is the lack of consistent or proper machine cleaning. These machines can develop an array of mold issues if not cleaned thoroughly. While they should be cleaned and inspected weekly, there’s no guarantee that’s happening at every fast food spot you go to.
Even if it is, it’s possible the internal parts aren’t being deep cleaned as they should be.
While there are few recorded cases of people getting sick from ice machines, it’s possible and could lead to cholera, salmonella, E.coli, and norovirus, among other things. In 2016, there were two fatal cases of a form of pneumonia that were traced back to a hospital ice machine.
Commenters react
“Consuming 32oz of soda is crazy…,” a top comment read.
“Sadly that’s standards:( just ask no ice or light ice next time,” a person suggested.
“I always get drinks with no ice. they are always cold,” another shared.
@heyy_allie Prices are already so high and they just give you half of what you order… make it make sense #rasingcanes #fastfood #fyp #foodtheory ♬ original sound – heyy_allie
The Daily Dot reached out to Raising Cane’s via email.
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