Subway - The Topic

[Gifted Gourmet]

item here in Promo Magazine

Subway restaurants is breaking into new territory with a new dinnertime-theme campaign and online vignettes geared to get consumers thinking about the chain beyond the lunch hour.... showcases Subway's Italian Trio menu offerings, including its Meatball Marinara, Chicken Parmesan and Italian BMT sandwiches. Each sandwich is heated (to invoke a dinnertime feel) and made fresh. The company also expanded its bread options, adding toasted garlic bread to its menu choices.

The big thing with the Subway chain was that they offered low calorie meats and the sandwiches had a Weight Watcher's value for each item ... and many people remembered that their spokesperson was one Jason Fogel who lost over a hundred pounds on their sandwiches over the period of a year ... now, it appears, the chain is trying to break into the dinnertime meal options as well.. they have even hired John Lovitz (of SNL fame) ... and are heating up their sandwiches (a la Quizno's) ...

So the question du jour: do you see Subway as:

low calorie?

only a lunchtime option?

Now a dinnertime offering?

the new dinnertime theatre website .... seems that you can contribute to this theatre as well ...

[Daniel Rogov]

Melissa, Hi...

In the name of both sanity and good taste, I will refrain from commenting about Subway. I'm afraid that when it comes to sandwiches my heart still belongs to a place known affectionately to the students of Stuyvesant High School (in its incarnation of East 15th Street) as "Ptomaine Joe's" where the ideal hero sandwich consisted of a bread somewhere about 300 grams in weight, that sliced in half lengthwise, half coated generously with the mustard that was once known as "New York Deli mustard" and filled with (in my case) about eight slices of ham, five of Emmenthal or Gruyere cheese, on that a few scattered anchovies, a generous amount of Romaine lettuce, an equally generous amount of tomatoes, and all of that sprinkled over with Joe's (his real name was Giuseppe) special spicy vinaigrette sauce.

To the best of my knowledge at least five people who later won Nobel prizes dined at Ptomaine Joe's. Not to mention several of the major civil rights leaders, a few future senators. Oh yes....and not a few mafiosi.

Apologies if off topic for the thread, but the idea of real sandwiches triggered old memories.

[Radio7]

Low Calorie? Only if you just have some veggies and no dressing.

Lunchtime? In a pinch, also I went when they had those punchcards. The bread is terrible - soft and not much flavour. Quiznos is toasted - and tastes better. Subway's toasting just makes the bread less wet. Quiznos is more expensive though.

Dinnertime? Er no. I'd like real, soul-satisfying food in the evening. The thing is, even their veggie and meat options taste bland to me.

[Rebecca263]

When I think of Subway I think of my 10 year old niece who harbors a not so secret fetish for the Subway small turkey sandwich, lettuce and tomato, nothing else. She LOVES their bread. Mommy doesn't take her there anymore, SO... she begs her very accomodating Aunt Rebecca to. I get my chip fix (2 bags!) every time we go, which is about once every school semester.

Honestly, it isn't terrible, especially since they always have great chips to try, and ten year old niece thinks that it just the best junk food in the world! How easy for me, 10 bucks once every few months, a junkie snack with great company, and I'm the sub-versively fun aunt.

That said, I wouldn't want to go there for dinner. It's strictly a lunch place, to me. Maybe because I like chips for lunch. If I can't have ice cream for lunch, which is my five year old niece's food fetish, and is an entirely different thread.

[Kim Shook]

I have never understood how this place stays in business, even in places that don't have REAL sub shops (like all over the South). I think 7-11 has the same quality subs as Subway. Luckily, Richmond, VA has Jersey Mike's now, which aren't perfect, but so much better than Subway! When ever I pass a Subway, I want to go in and ask the patrons if they know that there is a Jersey Mike's just down the street. Lunch is awful, dinner unimaginiable and breakfast (yep, some of them have breakfast) is truly a disgusting nightmare of a meal.

[MarketStEl]

I have never understood how this place stays in business, even in places that don't have REAL sub shops (like all over the South).  I think 7-11 has the same quality subs as Subway.  Luckily, Richmond, VA has Jersey Mike's now, which aren't perfect, but so much better than Subway!  When ever I pass a Subway, I want to go in and ask the patrons if they know that there is a Jersey Mike's just down the street.  Lunch is awful, dinner unimaginiable and breakfast (yep, some of them have breakfast) is truly a disgusting nightmare of a meal.

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You would be appalled, then, to find out that there are dozens of Subway locations throughout metropolitan Philadelphia, where you'd think we'd know better.

Truth is, we do. But sometimes, we're lazy. I know I've sometimes patronized a Subway when the price was right.

[tejon]

I've always considered Subway to be the very bottom of the submarine sandwich barrel. Not horriffic, but not particularly good, either. There is pretty much always somewhere else that has a better sandwich, usually not far away. Certainly not a place I'd go for dinner.

[Blanche Davidian]

Ugh, I think I've had all the Subway I can stand in one lifetime. I used sling meat for them in high school, and my law school had one in the student commons, filling the school with the smell of baking bread. It was a lot less appetizing than it sounds! I can forgive the law students because they were hostages (the bad parking situation made it untenable to leave over the lunch hour), but the Subway I worked at was PACKED for lunch AND dinner.

The grossest sandwich I ever made: pepperoni and fake crab meat salad.

2nd place: Footlong double-meat double-cheese meatball subs (12 per sandwich) with no vegetables and quadruple mayonnaise.

Subway also used to sell a "pizza sub" which was pepperoni and salami with cheese and marinara sauce scraped out of the meatball bin. I think it wins "worst menu item" over even the seafood salad.

[MissAmy]

For me, Subway is one of those will-do-in-a-pinch kind of places, where I go when I can't find anything else. I mean, at least it's better than McDonald's. Back in college, the Subway near school offered a Sunday special that was TWO footlong subs for SIX DOLLARS. Three of us would go in there, fork over two dollars each and split the subs. I had a job once where I only had thirty minutes for lunch and the closest things near by were a Subway and a Taco Bell, so I ended up eating A LOT of Subway. The Mediterranean Chicken Sub isn't half bad. Grilled chicken, olives, cukes, tomatoes, lettuce, feta, and feta dressing. But would I choose to go there for dinner? Hells no.

[Daniel]

When I think of Subway, I think of that amazingly annoying guy Jarrod.. And how puzzled I am that we make these people role models... Like he figured out some sort of magical formula.. You know, if you went to your local deli and order a turkey sandwich you would lose weight too!

I also think of that weird bread baking smell I can spot from several blocks away.. I have never eaten at one, and short of being paid or starving, I never will..

Edited April 20, 2006 by Daniel (log)

[Parmhero]

Subway is dreck, like McDonalds. My daughter and her friends love them both.

[kumquatmay]

Subway for me equals portion control. If I go to a good sandwich shop, I'll get a hoagie. Complete with evertything that entails, all the good fatty meats and giant 10" "small" size.

Subway I get a 6" turkey and cheese, on a better piece of bread I'd get at the local crappy deli. With mustard and all the veggies, and a diet coke, it's a lot more balanced a meal than I would get elsewhere, it's a decent lower calorie lunch (6 WW points!), and it's $5. All the overpriced crappy delis in Soho near my office charge $10 for an overdone piece of chicken on stale bread.

That said, it's not a "dinner" place, at least not for me. And I'm pretty ehh on the heated subs, for some reason it squeeges me out, a lot.

[Gigi4808]

UGH no thank you!

At least here in the Atlanta area I have yet to find a good Subway. There is just something so off-putting about slimy 'lunch meat'- the two most local to me also carry only American and Swiss cheese, no provolone, no chedder, no thank you.

[Blanche Davidian]

I've never bothered to specify what cheese to use on my Subway sub because it's all processed cheez food and tastes the same anyway. Their cheddar=american with orange dye.

[Rebecca263]

I'm not repentant one bit about my Subway visits. I also won't be trying the sandwiches. There's just no need for me to eat it in order to know that I wouldn't like it. I LIKE chips, and I ADORE my niece, and if she begged for McDonald's, I'd take her there, with a smile, too. Heck, they've got toys at McDonald's! I can trade a toy for lunch once every few months!

[Fresser]

When I think of Subway, I think of that amazingly annoying guy Jarrod.. And how puzzled I am that we make these people role models... Like he figured out some sort of magical formula.. You know, if you went to your local deli and order a turkey sandwich you would lose weight too!

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Subway omits one salient fact in those ads:

Then 400-pound Jared WALKED 10 blocks to and from Subway for both his meals. That added up to five miles a day. The full story was disclosed in Men's Health magazine, but Subway edited it to suit their purpose and make Jared a folk hero in the process.

[jsolomon]

Hmm, that doesn't seem quite right.

Where I live, 14 blocks = 1 mile.

That's 2.8 miles a day, if the blocks are the same.

Of course, 2.8 miles is a significant distance to move 400 lbs, especially if there is a grade involved.

[Fresser]

Of course, 2.8 miles is a significant distance to move 400 lbs, especially if there is a grade involved.

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That's exactly my point, Solly.

Try packing fifty pounds of sand into a backpack and schlepping the pack for three or four miles. See how you're schvitzing? That's how much effort it takes to carry an overweight body, and it demonstrates why walking is such a great exercise for losing weight.

[Daniel]

I thought it was 20 city blocks = a mile.. Either way, if someone is 400 lbs and they start eating three normal meals a day, they are going to lose weight..

[KOK]

Of course, 2.8 miles is a significant distance to move 400 lbs, especially if there is a grade involved.

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That's exactly my point, Solly.

Try packing fifty pounds of sand into a backpack and schlepping the pack for three or four miles. See how you're schvitzing? That's how much effort it takes to carry an overweight body, and it demonstrates why walking is such a great exercise for losing weight.

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Exactly right, Fresser. Also why Clay Henry (the fireman version of Jarod) wanted to drop the excess weight..

Thanks,

Kevin

[MarketStEl]

I thought it was 20 city blocks = a mile.. Either way, if someone is 400 lbs and they start eating three normal meals a day, they are going to lose weight..

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Depends on the city.

In Philadelphia, it's nine "squares" to the mile, more or less. (A "square" is the territory bounded by two numbered streets and two tree streets. Especially in the residential precincts and in Old City, many narrow "streets"--in any other city, they'd be alleys--are inserted between the major streets.

This isn't hard and fast, for the "squares" do vary a bit in size. West of 22d, the blocks become noticeably shorter until you reach the Schuylkill; the block between Spruce and Pine is longer than the one between Locust and Spruce, and the block between Pine and Lombard shorter.

[Fresser]

I thought it was 20 city blocks = a mile.. Either way, if someone is 400 lbs and they start eating three normal meals a day, they are going to lose weight..

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And that's the kicker.

Jared actually SKIPPED breakfast (a dumb move for any dieter) and walked a total of five miles to and from Subway for his remaining two meals. So their once-zaftig spokesman skipped meals, cut his caloric intake by at least one-half and POOF! "I lost weight by eating Subway sandwiches!"

This may not be fraud, but it's an egregious omission of facts.

[GBaxter]

What are currently your 2 or 3 favorite Subway sandwich fillings

and please separately say why, for each fave one named.

[Lindacakes]

Is Subway actually a food?

[HungryC]

Awful bread, awful meats: I can't for the life of me figure out why Subways are so successful, esp in cities with great indigenous sandwich traditions (New Orleans, Philly, etc). I'd rather have a banh mi any day!