Talk:McDonald's ice cream machine

Article topic

What is the article's topic? It should be stated in the first phrase. If it's about C602, that it should be moved to C602 if it is about the case, it should be mentioned its the case. Juandev (talk) 11:41, 30 April 2021 (UTC)

@Juandev: Other fastfood chains also use the Taylor C602, but this article is specifically about the McDonald's version that was modified to generate more profit. The current title is now used in the first phrase anyway. PhotographyEdits (talk) 13:39, 3 May 2021 (UTC)

Notability?

I personally do not think this article is notable as a separate article. Maybe put it somewhere in McDonald's? At the same time I'm not sure which section.--73.75.250.106 (talk) 03:08, 3 May 2021 (UTC)

Yes, this is surely a notable subject, the sources give significant coverage and are independent and reliable. PhotographyEdits (talk) 13:37, 3 May 2021 (UTC)

It might be a notable subject, but it should be covered as part of the recently created Taylor Company (which should probably be moved to Taylor (company)?). You wouldn't make an article about the make of a car without an article on the car maker, and a less notable car maker's article might well include a list of their cars in their article. Any objections to a merge? There'd be no content loss... SnowFire (talk) 21:50, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

@SnowFire: I guess I'm fine with the merge, but my main objection is that the primary subject of all (except some routine coverage) the sources is the ice cream machine and not Taylor Company. Google does not like sections in articles, so when someone searches for the McDonald's ice cream machine the result for Taylor Company will be rather low. But I guess we'll keep it there now. PhotographyEdits (talk) 14:16, 5 June 2021 (UTC)

@PhotographyEdits: I suppose, but that sounds like Google's problem not ours. The other concern is accuracy. All of the Kytch stories were specifically about the Taylor version of the machine - they don't apply to Carpigiani machines, but those are still clearly "McDonald's ice cream machines." Hence, in the name of accuracy, best to make clear what the sources in the article are talking about - specifically the Taylor version. As far as I know, we have very little talking about older McD ice cream machines nor Carpigiani machines - if that changes, we can always resurrect this article. SnowFire (talk) 19:30, 5 June 2021 (UTC)

Usage to make shakes?

The operating manual calls the Taylor C602 a "combination shake and soft serve freezer". Is it used to make milkshakes shakes as well as ice cream? (crossed-out word since apparently they aren't officially called "milkshakes" at McDonald's for legal reasons) This article seems to say they are. However, it seems like there is a lot of coverage about not being able to order ice cream due to reliability problems, but I don't recall any mention of not being able to order shakes, and shakes seem more fundamental to McDonald's business than ice cream. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 05:05, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

Follow-up: According to the guy who made me a shake at a McDonald's yesterday, yes, they use the same machine to make shakes. It's surprising to me, as I don't see that mentioned in the cited sources other than the equipment manual. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 00:52, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Luckily it's at least mentioned in the equipment manual, otherwise you'd be doing WP:OR here ;-) PhotographyEdits (talk) 13:44, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

The video shown here, at the 16-minute mark, shows Taylor "C602 Operator Training Module" material that includes estimated costs for machine downtime, which total $120/day, consisting of $70/day for shakes and $50/day for ice cream. That appears to confirm not only that the machine makes shakes as well as ice cream, but that shakes are a more important source of revenue than ice cream. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 22:53, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Requested move 4 September 2023

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Not moved  — Amakuru (talk) 00:01, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

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McDonald's ice cream machine → Taylor C602 – Vague title. elijahpepe@wikipedia (he/him) 03:34, 30 August 2023 (UTC) This is a contested technical request (permalink). elijahpepe@wikipedia (he/him) 19:38, 4 September 2023 (UTC) — Relisting. — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 14:23, 12 September 2023 (UTC) — Relisting. Edward-Woodrow • talk 19:52, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose move. The brand name is far less common, and in theory this article discusses multiple models of the machine. O.N.R. ^(talk) 00:23, 5 September 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose per O.N.R. I also disagree that the title is vague. It is about the ice cream machine used by McDdonald's, how much more clear can you get it? A type number would be far more vague for the general audience, which is our target audience. PhotographyEdits (talk) 10:24, 5 September 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose. The McDonalds ice cream machine has achieved a type of cultural status that makes this title appropriate. Rreagan007 (talk) 04:12, 8 September 2023 (UTC)
• Support. I think the RMTM comments got left off? Didn't realize this went to a full debate. The article currently only discusses the Taylor C602. COMMONNAME doesn't matter when it's not an accurate description of the topic. See Boeing 737 MAX groundings for example... even if Boeing sold exclusively to one airline, that would still be the valid title of the article, especially if said airline had non-MAX planes in their fleet (i.e. "United Airlines fleet groundings" would be deeply misleading). There is no indication of any problems with the Carpigiani machines (nor are they particularly notable enough for a section), which are clearly McDonald's ice cream machines. These are obscure companies so I can see people saying "who cares", but that makes it more important to be accurate, IMO. SnowFire (talk) 18:37, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

  I could potentially support moving to "McDonald's ice cream machine controversy" to make it exclusively about the controversy surrounding the Taylor C602 and not including the non-controversial alternatives. PhotographyEdits (talk) 19:25, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

  Wikipedia discourages using "[Something] controversy" titles (although I don't recall where that discouragement is expressed). Also, there isn't a lot of controversy about this topic. The machines are highly unreliable, and McDonald's agrees that they are highly unreliable. That's a problem but not a controversy. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 00:40, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

  Fair enough, agreed. Maybe McDonald's ice cream machine reliability issues or something in that sense? PhotographyEdits (talk) 07:43, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

  That seems OK to me. Incidentally, I found WP:NOCRIT#Separate articles devoted to controversies, which may have been the commentary I was thinking of. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 01:17, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

• Support McD's has had several different machines, and different ones in different countries. This is about the one that is borked -- 67.70.25.175 (talk) 08:26, 11 September 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose: People don't ask for Taylor C602 ice cream; they ask for McDonald's ice cream when they go to a McDonald's. Lots of people know that a lot of McDonald's ice cream machines are borked. Very few people know the name of the manufacturer and the model number of the machines that are primarily causing the problem, and most of them don't care about those details. People just want to know whether the McDonald's ice cream machines are working or not and whether McDonald's is ever going to fix the problem. The website that tracks their reliability is called McBroken, not TayBroken or C602Broken. The problem was caused by McDonald's and it is entirely under the control and responsibility of McDonald's to fix it. They can fix it (or at least improve the situation) in several different ways – such as by replacing Taylor C602s with different McDonald's ice cream machines, improving the training and professionalism of the McDonald's employees who clean and operate the machines, adding rapid repair requirements to their contract with Taylor, renegotiating the contract to allow others to rapidly fix them, hiring a bevy of devoted ninja monks to fly around fixing them, or installing extra machines so when one of them is not working there is a better chance of having another one that works. Also, see the above comment by PhotographyEdits. It says that the Taylor C602 machines produced for McDonald's are not the same as those produced for other companies; this article is specifically about the ones produced for McDonald's. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 02:19, 13 September 2023 (UTC)
  • That could be solved with McDonald's Taylor C602 ice cream machine which also solves the scope and specificity and ambiguity. -- 67.70.25.175 (talk) 19:16, 13 September 2023 (UTC)
    • I don't think anyone refers to any ice cream machines as "McDonald's Taylor C602" machines. That term also seems to imply a "McDonald's Taylor" company or partnership for their production and/or use, when in fact they are designed and made (and repaired) by Taylor and only purchased and operated by McDonald's (franchise operators). —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 03:23, 14 September 2023 (UTC)
• Support - this article isn't about the ice cream machines used by McDonald's in general, it's about the Taylor C602 specifically, and presumably McDonalds hasn't used the same model since they first made a deal with Taylor in 1956. If content were going to be added about other McDonalds ice cream machines, it would need to be fundamentally rewritten. The article title should describe its content; it doesn't describe any others, except for two sentences describing the Taylor C709 paired with a reference which describes the C709 as "fundamentally identical" to the C602, and half a sentence indicating the company allows franchisees to use Carpigiani machines, which doesn't describe those machines at all but does demonstrate that the C602 is not the only McDonald's ice cream machine even now. It's not necessary to have anything else in the title, since this machine is exclusively manufactured for McDonalds; people aren't going to search for the Taylor C602 they saw at Target, nor the Dairy Queen Taylor C602, because those don't exist. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 20:49, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

  That last aspect has me a bit confused. Are there any Taylor C602 machines that are used anywhere that is not a McDonald's restaurant? PhotographyEdits said there are, and says that the Taylor C602 machines used by McDonald's restaurants differ in some way from those used elsewhere, but I haven't seen any sources that clearly say either of those things (although I haven't seen what some of the sources say, due to paywall obstructions that I haven't bothered to find a way around). I am also confused about whether the Taylor C602 machines are the only source of reliability problems at McDonald's restaurants. Sources say there are about 13,000 McDonald's restaurants that use Taylor C602 machines, and there are about 40,000 McDonald's restaurants total (both being estimates from 2021). Basic math says that means that only about 1/3 of McDonald's restaurants are using those machines. Does that mean 2/3 of the McDonald's restaurants are using Carpigiani machines? If not, what machines are those other ones using? Do those other machines ever break down or require being shut down for cleaning and maintenance? —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 03:35, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

  I was going by claims in the article, although I see that some are poorly sourced. Taylor definitely manufactures other ice cream machines, but it seems reasonable to me that they would produce a unique model for one of the world's largest fast food chains, and that that model would be so customized for use by McDonalds that it would have no other commercial applications. The manual linked in the article says it's manufactured exclusively for McDonalds, and while that's a primary source we don't have a source that says otherwise, except PhotographyEdits saying so. The C602 uses McDonalds ingredients to output McDonalds products, there's probably licensing agreements that would prevent anyone else using the machine for any practical purpose. It also would be reasonable that the chain would mandate that this particular machine is used by all of its outlets, but we have sources that say that's not the case (the Carpigiani machines, and supposedly other Taylor models). The Carpigianis are not evidently known for reliability issues, but for long delays obtaining parts from the much smaller Italian company when they do break down. All of that said, it's true that when a source writes about McDonalds ice cream machines they're almost always writing about the well-known reliability issues with the C602, but this is still an article about the C602. The article should carry that title (the machine itself is notable) with the "McDonald's ice cream machine" title redirecting here, with a {{R with possibilities}} tag in case someone finds sources and wants to write about other McDonalds ice cream machines. Here are a few sources I found on Carpigiani, including the company scooping (pun intended) a McDonalds executive ([1]), being awarded a McDonalds reliability award ([2], [3]), and various sources from around 2017 saying McDonalds is officially switching to the Carpigiani machines ([4], [5]), but I haven't found much of anything actually about the machines. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:04, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

  >except PhotographyEdits saying so.

  I don't remember where I read this exactly, but it could have been the manual as well, or another news article that used the manual. Don't take my word for it, I don't have access to magical sources that are not listed in the article. PhotographyEdits (talk) 13:23, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

  One of those new sources says Carpigiani received "the McDonald's innovation award in 2015" and quotes McDonald's saying in 2017 that "This company has a reputation for strongly recognizing the importance of reliability to McDonald's and their customers. ... They have maintained their reliability scores under McDonald's required threshold consistently for more than 7 years." That makes me doubt the statement in the article that McDonald's didn't let their franchises buy Carpigiani machines until 2017. That statement cites a 2017 Wall Street Journal article (also linked above) that is paywalled. Perhaps what happened in 2017 was a decision (or plan, possibly later reversed) to phase out the Taylor machines, not a decision to start allowing the Carpigiani machines. I also wonder if there is some relevant difference between the U.S. and the rest of the world involved. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 01:32, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose Not the common name. If it's not about all ice cream machines at McDonalds, maybe it should be. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ) 15:40, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

  Yes, it should be. I think that is the intent, but it's hard to find much information about the other ice cream machines used by McDonald's. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 15:45, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

  The other ice cream machine models don't seem to be covered in media, though. Happy to be proven wrong but this seems a tough ask. SnowFire (talk) 03:34, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. Let's make it as easy as we can for readers to find the article they want. I know that if I was searching for this topic I would be searching for something generic, the chances that I would know the specific model of machine is almost nil, and if it was at that title it would make me hesitate that I had found what I wanted. Jenks24 (talk) 13:13, 27 September 2023 (UTC)
  • To be clear, I'm not opposed to McDonald's ice cream machine being a primary redirect. It won't be any harder to find the article. I'm a fan of meeting reader expectations too, but accuracy wins out, especially when the main reason the device is in the news is criticism & controversy. Like, if this were a negative information about BLPs case, it'd be open-and-shut - we'd use the most precise term possible. Machines can't have their feelings hurt in the same way, but the cost for being precise is trivial when there's a primary redirect. SnowFire (talk) 03:34, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.