Happy October! It is that time of year when we start thinking about if the McRib sandwich will be back anywhere in the United States. Below is what we now about the 2023 McRib season thus far.
Today.com is reporting that they have had confirmation from McDonald’s that the McRib WILL BE BACK in November 2023! While this is great news, they have been told that the McRib will be back at limited participating locations instead of a nationwide release. No specific information as provided to how long the promotion would last. That said, we expect it will be longer than the limited release last year. Earlier, Snackolater had reported the McRib will be back as well. There was however some confusion to their information as the image shared had a past release date.
We will soon be starting our efforts to track the availability to which locations will potentially offer the McRib. As employees typically have a more limited release plan, calling too soon can result in conflicting results. Now that we are in October, we are getting close enough that we have more certainty to the information collected. More details about the 2023 McRib release in the US will be shared as we have them.
Don’t forget as the McRib returns to share where you had a McRib on our webpage! With a more limited release again this year, fans in McRibless markets will be looking to make travel plans.
Update (October 30, 2020) : McRib to return nationwide for a limited time in United States starting December 2, 2020. More details found in Business Insider
Earlier details :
Earlier we had reported that the US McRib release was going to be late October into early November. This was based on information gathered from individual stores and also information shared from fans that have access to some of these details. Unfortunately, our latest information is suggesting that the 2020 year of bad news has struck again. Specifically in this case, the 2020 US McRib release has been delayed.
What we know currently is there are stores that have already received the McRib boxes used to serve the sandwich. These same locations have not yet received the McRib product components themselves. Some locations we spoke with indicated they know the McRib is scheduled to return, however they could only say they were expecting it sometime yet this year. Another location indicated that their store calendar still has a meeting slated for this week to cover the McRib release. This calendar reference may be a relic of a point in time where they expected to have a release next week or shortly after.
Why delayed?
The question becomes, why has the return of the McRib been delayed? We know fans are always excited for the return. We also know the McRib continues to provide 4th Quarter sales momentum for McDonald’s. Thus it is unlikely that McDonald’s would have wanted to hold back unless there was an outside influence. One fan (thank you John) shared a theory that his source was suggesting that the reason for delay seems to be related to constraint in the supply line due to COVID, specifically the Pork.
The good news, is that it appears that the Pork market is stabilizing. The National Hog Farmer shared this week that Hog prices are recovering. Most encouraging for access to Pork in the US markets was an image they shared showing overall export pressure. This chart shows the collective export volume is starting to normalize with previous years. The end result is that availability for Pork products may increase in US markets as the year continues.
Export demand to Asia is falling, which may give way to more broad Pork availability yet this year
In summary, don’t give up yet, it still looks like we will be seeing McRibs within the next month or two. We will continue to dig into what the status of the 2020… 2021(?) US McRib release. As we find more information we will be certain to share it.
Be sure to follow us here on our McRib Locator Blog, Facebook, and Twitter for all the most up to date #McRib and #McRibLocator information.
Here is the latest update for October 24, 2019 that we have regarding the McRib in the United States. Did the McRib return to your state? How long will it be here? What deals are the best?
