Chipotle test confirms customers’ suspicions about portion sizes

Chipotle  (CMG) recently became a victim of a viral TikTok “hack,” where social media users claimed that they would get larger food portion sizes at the restaurant if they filmed their orders being fulfilled by employees. While Chipotle denied that this hack was true, and insisted that its portion sizes were “generous” at its restaurants, a new study that was conducted by a Wells Fargo analyst has confirmed what customers have suspected all along.

In a study done by Wells Fargo analyst Zachary Fadem, who had analysts visit eight restaurant locations in New York City and order 75 similar burrito-bowl orders, he found that proportion sizes at the Chipotle restaurants varied significantly, according to Barron’s, which obtained the research note.

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Out of all of the orders, the heaviest burrito bowl weighed at 26.8 ounces, and the lightest was 13.8 ounces, according to Fadem. The median weight of all the burrito bowls that were ordered weighed at around 21.5 ounces.

Fadem even said that some of the Chipotle locations served burrito bowls that weighed 33% more than what they received at others. Also, for orders that they made in-person, the heaviest bowls they received weighed 47% more than the lightest ones. For digital orders, the heaviest bowls weighed 87% more than the ones that were smaller.

“While throughput is improving, order consistency remains an opportunity,” said Fadem in the note.

Chipotle’s proportion sizes first started to face controversy in May after a video went viral on TikTok of a customer walking out of a Chipotle store while an employee was making his order due to the employee “skimping on ingredients.”

@holy_owen

chipotle is always skimping on the ingredients