According to an analysis of online Wendy's menus conducted by financial firm Stephens, around 1,000 locations, or 18% of Wendy's 5,500 US restaurants, are not serving any hamburgers or other meat-based menu items. Other locations are reportedly limiting customers to single-patty burgers.
This is due to meatpacking plant closures, which have happened as a result of COVID-19 sweeping through facilities and endangering employees — so much so that experts are calling these plants the new "coronavirus hotspot."
McDonald's, on the other hand, does not share the same concerns over meat shortages.
"For us, really what's been incredible is just through this entire pandemic we haven't had a supply chain break anywhere in all 40,000 restaurants around the globe," McDonald's CEO Chris Kempczinski said in an interview with Good Morning America in early May.
"That said, in the US And North America ... we're watching very closely this meat supply issue," he added. "It's particularly an issue with beef. Right now we feel good about our situation, but it really is a day-to-day status and we're monitoring it."