Whatever Happened To McDonald's Pizza?

The Golden Arches are known for many things, like its classic (at times shady) McDonaldland characters, its superior soda taste, and the unique makeup of its fries. Yet, for as many hits as there have been on McDonald's menu record, there have also been plenty of misses in the fast food chain's past. One of those misses came in the form of pizza.

Yes, for a brief and confusing period of time, McDonald's attempted to venture into a new food segment by selling McPizza. The brand's pizza debuted in the mid-1980s, but by 2000 it was like the McPizza never existed as the brand had eliminated it from almost all of its restaurant menus. Doling out hot, fresh pizza with the same speed and efficiency as its already modulated system for burgers and fries was a challenge McDonald's just couldn't overcome.

As out of the ordinary as McDonald's selling pizza sounds now, in the '80s and '90s it was just as surprising. When the fresh pie first appeared on the menu, it was because McDonald's was trying to get more customers into its restaurants for dinnertime, with items like grilled cod also appearing on the menu.

Existing fast food pizza chains like Pizza Hut took the opportunity to make fun of the golden arches for even attempting to encroach on their territory. In 1989, Pizza Hut ran an ad campaign taking digs at the quality of the McPizza, calling it "McFrozen." Despite the criticism, the McPizza started as a family-sized pie that would be brought to the table. But even that had to change as McDonald's tried to make its slices more fast food friendly.

Fast food has to be fast, it's literally the name of the game. But try as it might, McDonald's could not get pizza in its restaurants to be fast enough. Trying to make pizza work was not only a time commitment but a major financial investment for McDonald's.

The company spent years developing a quick-cook pizza oven that could gets its crust to crispy in under six minutes. Making room for this patented oven and other pizza-making equipment meant McDonald's had to remodel the kitchen of many of its restaurants just during the testing phase and some drive-thru windows were widened just so they could fit a pizza box through them. Some of McDonald's leadership also wanted a window where customers could see the pizzas being made, which meant franchisees would have to get behind even more renovations.

Eventually, McDonald's scaled down its large, family-sized pizza to a personal-sized one, but the 11- to 16-minute overall cook time was still too far off the mark from the brand's reputation for fast service. Similar issues were cited as the reason for the rise and fall of McDonald's McWrap in the mid-2010s. After expanding its testing of the pizza to over 500 locations in 1991, by 2000 McDonald's had scrapped the idea almost completely.

While you won't find a pizza oven or anything resembling a pizza in 99.9% of McDonald's restaurants in the U.S., there is one location that has held onto this slice of history well past its demise. In Orlando, Florida there is one mega McDonald's restaurant where you can get your hands on a Golden Arches pizza.

The Orlando location is actually the world's largest McDonald's sitting at a premium 19,000 square feet, and it's known for as much. But it's not just the size that makes this McDonald's location stand out. This massive McDonald's also serves Belgian waffles, pasta, and even spaghetti.

As previously mentioned, efficiency has been the downfall of more than one of McDonald's experimentations with products outside of burgers and fries. However, if we've learned anything from the brand's hints at an impending Snack Wrap comeback, it's that it may take some time, but McDonald's can figure out a way to make it work.