Experts say there's one thing behind rise in McDonald's sales

Even in cash-strapped times, fast food joints tend to weather the storm pretty well.

Quick, affordable meals, often without the sugar, salt or calorie hits you would have expected 20 years ago, are practically recession-proof.

With a cost of living crisis spanning most of the developed world, you could forgive the execs at McDonald’s for missing the memo. On 6 August 2025, McDonald’s US reported that it has beaten analysts’ predictions with a year-on-year, same-store sales increase averaging 3.8%.

Analysts – or ‘chumps’ as they may well be known at McDonald’s HQ right now – predicted a 2.5% increase.

The earnings call was good news for McDonald's shareholders (NurPhoto / Contributor/Getty Images)

This is McDonald’s biggest year-on-year sales jump in almost two years, with last year’s sales taking a hit after an E. coli outbreak was linked to onions used in its Quarter Pounder burgers.

As to why McDonald’s has managed to beat analyst expectation, experts believe it’s most likely down to its back-to-basics line of $5 meals.

It also introduced a buy one, add one for $1 option to US customers.

In cash-strapped times, these kinds of offers were all-but-guaranteed to win back some lapsed fans and perhaps increase the rate at which regular customers pay a visit to their local franchise.

Speaking on a conference call with analysts, McDonald’s CEO Chris Kempczinski said ‘reengaging the low-income consumer is critical, as they typically visit our restaurants more frequently than middle- and high-income consumers’.

Zak Stambor, an analyst at eMarketer, told the New York Post: "While rivals like Yum Brands and Chipotle struggled with consumer pullback, McDonald's played to its strengths by leaning into value, nostalgia and limited-time promotions."

The earnings call saw McDonald’s shares jump by 2%, with its reported Q2 income hitting $2.25 billion (£1.7bn).

While the picture looks solid in the US, McDonald’s is doing even better in its international markets.

McDonald's has modified its menu strategy to win low-income customers back (Bloomberg / Contributor/Getty Images)

Same-store sales internationally leapt by 5.6% compared with 2024, proving there’s still a tonne of life in the world’s biggest fast food company.

Attempts to win back low-income customers, an exceedingly important customer segment in the fast food business, haven’t been wholly successful, however. Kempczinski admitted in the earnings call that Q2 saw a ‘double digits’ fall in low-income customers compared with Q1 2025, signalling that more can be done to convince the cash-strapped to pay a visit.

The $2.99 Snack Wrap, reintroduced to McDonald’s US menus after a near-decade hiatus, is one of the flagship strategies in this arena, along with the $5 menu and $1 add-on offer.