Burgergate: Sneaky sandwich shots or fraudulent food photography?

The Eaten Path unwraps the evidence between the buns in this undercover investigative report in the wake of a class-action lawsuit against Burger King

Fast-food franchise executives across North America are no doubt carefully analyzing their burger marketing photos these days to compare them to the food coming out of drive-thru windows.

Anyone who eats fast food knows the pictures behind the counter are nothing like what gets unwrapped. But when it comes to sandwich photographic lies, it looks like Burger King has been telling the biggest Whopper of them all.

A recently certified class-action lawsuit filed against the King by honest fast-food-loving peasants in the U.S. for false advertising brings up an existential post-internet question for all of us: Is anything online really what it appears to be?

“Burger King’s advertisements for its burger and menu items are unfair and financially damaging consumers as they are receiving food that is much lower in value than what was promised,” that’s according to the class action complaint filed in the Southern District of Florida by Walter Coleman, Marco DiLeonardo, Matthew Fox, and Madelyn Salzman on behalf of themselves and disappointed Burger King customers everywhere.

Do your own research

Being disappointed at the appearance of a fast-food hamburger after first looking at the images on the menu board and then unwrapping it is nothing new. But is the fancy food photography fraudulent or is it just sneaky marketing? And is Burger King really the worst of the fast-food chains?

Well dear reader, I’m here to do the important investigative journalism required, and this lawsuit coincides perfectly with my project to do just that.

I compared signature burgers purchased at six of the major chains in Canada to the marketing photographs online so you don't have to: A&W, Burger King, Dairy Queen, McDonald’s, Triple O’s, and Wendy’s.

I'm well aware there are other fast-food burger chains as well as great independent eateries, but for now and for visual purposes, 12 burgers in one image make for a nice tidy square.

Looks aren’t everything

Here are the six burgers I purchased compared to the company's marketing photos, ranked from most accurate to least. Of course, looks aren’t everything and taste is subjective but we’ll get to that. 

1. Triple O’s

Canadian-owned White Spot's spinoff fast-food chain Triple O's wins the gold medal.

In fairness to accuracy, the pickle in my Triple O’s Original with Cheese was not sitting on top the way it is in my photo. I put it there. Still, this was the burger that most closely resembled its shiny marketing version. 

The meat looks about the same. The bun is as thick as it should be, if a little crinkled. The tomato, lettuce, and cheese are all visible. The cheese is melting over the side as it should, which brings up an important detail in these photographs: If you look at the cheese in marketing photos of burgers that have cheese, shouldn't it be melting? Unless that was a piece of gouda (and it most certainly is not) that’s a soft dairy product sitting on a cold burger. 

2. Dairy Queen

DQ’s Double Cheeseburger is that Tinder date who actually does look a lot like his/her photo online, but that’s not saying much. It’s the least appealing marketing photo of the six so isn’t too hard to match. Still, the bun in my photo was a little flaccid and you can't spot any pickles or ketchup. 

Since there are no other vegetables on this burger they couldn’t screw that up, but this is the only burger with cheese where the actual cheese appears to be melting in the marketing photo even if they obviously faked it. The best thing I can say is that the meat is as large in reality as it looks in the ad version.

A reluctant silver to DQ.

3. McDonald’s

Is there anything better than a Big Mac? Maybe I’m biased and it’s something from my teen years. It’s so bad but so good. 

As for the reality versus the marketing materials? Meh. The ad version is a towering creation the likes of which none of us has seen in reality. Still, I give this real version the bronze medal only because the standard to measure this all by is so low. 

Two thirds of the bun look OK, but that bottom piece was pancake-esque, something that might be inevitable because of the sheer mass of what’s above. That's not a reference to the skinny little Big Mac patties, the real weight comes from the sauce-soaked lettuce. The bottom piece of meat is invisible. You can see the lettuce, cheese and sauce so, well, it’s not too bad.

4. A&W

The Teen Burger has always been one of my favourites. I do find that while A&W spends a lot of time not-so-humbly bragging about the quality of their meat, it is really only one of these burgers that I don’t regret eating the second I’m done. 

The appearance of the real thing, however, is pretty terrible. The cheese is melting on my real version but so much so that it makes the burger patty look like a hockey puck wearing a 1970s sweater. The bun looks like a well-used hacky sack. The onions on the bottom look OK. The lettuce looks good, but that's about it.

5. Wendy’s

Dave’s Single, oh boy, ugh. This appears to have been pulled out of Dave’s back pocket, top bun taken off, tomato and onion plopped on top, wrapped up and pitched out the drive-thru window. 

The vegetables look OK, I guess. But there is something about that signature square patty that is just weird, and looks unappetizing in reality. At least it looks accurate size-wise.

But the bun? Come on. No packaging or transportation should make it look that bad. Did I mention it looked like it was pitched at me? Makes sense that the bun looks like an old catcher's mitt.

6. Burger King

This piece of crap not only looks the worst based on my subjective criteria, not only tastes the worst, but look closely and you will see why the company faces a class-action lawsuit for false advertising. 

This has the saddest lettuce, a wizened tomato, and no sign of onions or pickles. The top bun with its sesame seeds looks OK and that is indeed the only redeeming quality.

But look closely at the patty in my purchased Whopper and compare it to the meat in the marketing materials and that gets at the heart of the class-action lawsuit. Here's how lawyers worded the allegation: "Burger King advertises its burgers as large burgers compared to competitors and containing oversized meat patties and ingredients that overflow over the bun to make it appear that the burgers are approximately 35 per cent larger in size, and contain more than double the meat, than the actual burger."

Uh-oh, Burger King appears to be outright lying with this marketing material so we'll see how the lawsuit goes. The photo of an "actual" Whopper as provided in the lawsuit actually looks better than the one I bought and photographed and, unfortunately, ate.

Stay tuned for when I do something similar for signature chicken sandwiches and take a deeper look at six more burger chains. It's a hard job but someone's gotta do it.

May the fries be with you.

-30-

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Paul J. Henderson
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