Earlier this spring we saw Apple and McDonald’s team up to offer free McNuggets with an Apple Pay promo. Now the pair are back this time with a slight tweak – use Apple Cash via Apple Pay for at least a $1 purchase and get a free McChicken sandwich. Here’s how it works.
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Earlier this month, we told you about a new mobile ordering app being planned and tested by McDonald’s. Now, a new report from Reuters offers more details on the upcoming app, as well as the company’s push to catch up with established mobile ordering offerings from competitors like Starbucks…
A new report from ITG has revealed that Apple Pay was responsible for 1% of the total digital payment dollars spent in November. The study also found that 60% of new Apple Pay customers used the service multiple times throughout the month, while competing services like PayPal see only 20% of customers do the same.
Additionally, the research found that shoppers who took advantage of Apple Pay used the service for around 5.3% of their future credit card transactions, accounting for about 2.3% of the total dollars spent on their credit cards.
McDonald’s is testing Bluetooth beacon-based offers in at least some of its locations as it pilots beacon platform Piper that works with both iOS devices using Apple’s iBeacon framework and other mobile devices.
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An internal memo sent to Panera Bread employees and acquired by 9to5Mac has revealed that Apple will launch its mobile payment platform on Monday, October 20th. Panera Bread was listed as one of the initial launch partners for Apple Pay during its introduction last month.
An online training course for employees has been published that includes instructions for the VeriFone readers, including the Apple Pay functions. Stores that don’t have the appropriate hardware to support the technology will receive further information on the 20th about how the company plans to handle payments those locations.
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Over the weekend we detailed how Apple and retailers are preparing for Apple Pay, the iPhone 6 and Touch ID-secured mobile payment system launching as soon as this week, including the setup process through Passbook. At launch Apple Pay will be supported by a number of retailers, restaurants and more including McDonald’s which plans to even accept Apple Pay from your iPhone 6 at the drive through…
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An internal memo sent to McDonald’s franchises this week indicates that the fast food chain is preparing to roll out a mobile payment platform on September 15th. According to the notice, employees are required to be trained on the systems by Monday the 15th and the hardware, which has already started arriving at some locations, must be installed and tested before that date.
It doesn’t seem likely that this is Apple’s upcoming iPhone-exclusive payment system, which the the Cupertino tech firm is already partnering with retailers to roll out, but will instead be a cross-platform NFC option using standard VeriFone hardware that already exists in many locations. That’s not to say the iPhone 6 won’t be able to take advantage of this, as the unannounced device is said to support NFC using chips made by XNP.
Businessweek has a fun chart showing that Apple’s iPhone business alone would make it the 9th largest stock in the Dow Jones top 30 companies, ahead of such giants as Microsoft, Coca-Cola and McDonalds.
It’s not a terribly surprising fact – the iPhone represents the bulk of Apple’s business, with its $88.4B sales greater than all of Apple’s other products and services combined ($81B), but it is quite a graphic illustration of the strength of that one product line. Apple, of course, just announced that it sold 9M iPhones in the first three days of the 5s and 5c.
Perhaps more surprising is the company that just scrapes ahead of that nominal iPhone business: IBM. While giving every impression of an out-of-date business model, the company is still making billions from large-scale IT infrastructure products, services and software. Including, I kid you not, mainframes.
iTunes Radio, Apple’s upcoming streaming music service that will compete with services like Pandora and Spotify, will be partnering with large brands for audio and video advertisements, according to a new report by Ad Age.
The service, which will be available on all iOS devices – including the Apple TV – and every computer that can run iTunes, will be ad-free for subscribers of Apple’s $24.99/year iTunes Match service, but otherwise “users will be served an audio ad once every 15 minutes and one video ad every hour”, according to Ad Age’s sources. “The video ads will only be served to consumers at times when they are likely to be looking at their device screen, such as immediately after hitting play or choosing to skip a track.”
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Images via Stephen M. Katz | The Virginian-Pilot
A McDonald’s franchise owner in Virginia Beach, Va., decided to install mounted iPads in his store for customers to use while eating—something 20 locations in Europe have already done. The Virginia-Pilot (via CNET) has the full story.
