The CEO of fast-food restaurant Jack in the Box said “it just makes sense” to replace cashiers with robots due to the minimum wage increase in California.
“As we see the rising costs of labor, it just makes sense” to swap cashiers with kiosks where customers can order their food themselves, CEO Leonard Comma said Tuesday at the ICR Conference in Orlando, Florida, Business Insider reported.
However, Comma said that while his fast-food restaurant has tested products with technological advances at their establishments, he has decided to not go forward with the kiosks.
California, where Jack in the Box is based, will raise its minimum wage to $11 in 2018 and again in 2023 to $15. California and 18 other states have proposed to raise their respective minimum wages, Grub Street reported.
Jack in the Box was not the only fast-food joint to consider using robots in replacement for cashiers. Wendy’s said it would be installing the kiosks in the next year and McDonald’s also announced it was planning to install the kiosks in 2,500 restaurants. However, McDonald’s vowed it would not be swapping cashiers for the self-automated machines.
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Smaller fast-food chains such as CaliBurger and Eatsa have already started making the entire restaurant automated, Business Insider reported.
As a way to cut costs before the minimum wage increase, Red Robin announced Tuesday it would be cutting bus boys from 570 restaurants in order to save the company money.
This Fox News piece is used by permission.
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(photo credit, homepage image: Jack in the Box, CC BY-SA 4.0, by Famartin)
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