Remember These Infamously Terrible Fast-Food Fails?

Launched in the 1960s, the Hula Burger was one of McDonald's first meat-alternative sandwiches. It was rolled out around the same time as the Filet-O-Fish.

The Hula Burger featured a thick slice of pineapple on a bun, topped with American cheese. That's it. If you can imagine how it tasted, you’ll know why it lost out to the fish sandwich, which is still going strong today.

In the 1980s, McDonald’s brought back a limited-edition hamburger with pineapple on top, which was a modest success.

19. Wendy’s Superbar

In the 1980s and ‘90s, Wendy’s restaurants had a salad bar buffet with three stations: the Garden Spot, Mexican Fiesta and Pasta Pasta.

Prices were as low as $2.99 per person to eat all the salad, nachos, pasta, garlic bread and chocolate pudding your heart desired. While families loved the convenience and big portions, the Superbars were doomed to fail.

Wendy’s staff had a hard time keeping them stocked while taking orders for regular menu items. And although the $2.99 price tag filled restaurants, it didn't necessarily fill the registers.

In 2012, Jack in the Box shocked the nation by introducing a bizarre bacon milkshake.

There was no real bacon in it. Instead, it was an assemblage of vanilla ice cream, bacon-flavored syrup, whipped topping and a cherry on top. The drink (or dessert?) became famous overnight — for its insane calorie and fat content.

The 16-oz shake had 773 calories, 30 grams of fat and 75 grams of sugar, the Los Angeles Times reported. The 24-oz size contained a terrifying 1,081 calories, 40 grams of fat and 108 grams of sugar.

Even diehard bacon lovers hated it.

You get free chicken, and you get free chicken!

In 2009, KFC launched a grilled chicken meal in partnership with Oprah Winfrey, who announced on her daytime talk show that viewers could go to KFC's website and print a coupon to get two pieces of grilled chicken, two sides and a biscuit — for free.

But KFC vastly underestimated what happens when you combine Oprah’s star power with America's love of freebies. KFC locations almost immediately ran out of chicken and had to promise customers rain checks for another meal.

Long John Silver’s introduced its Big Catch meal in June 2013, consisting of a massive piece of haddock, hush puppies and onion rings.

The meal packed a whopping 1,320 calories, 3,700 mg of sodium and 33 grams of trans fat. Medical experts recommend that intake of trans fats be limited to 2 grams per day, so the platter was loaded with more than two weeks’ worth of the heart-clogging stuff.

The consumer group the Center for Science in the Public Interest named Big Catch the "worst restaurant meal in America" — and LJS pulled it off the menus by the end of the year.

In the 1980s, McDonald’s tried to expand its dinner menu by adding spaghetti. Basically just pasta with tomato sauce and cheese sprinkled on top.

Unfortunately, boiling the pasta took too long for customers used to fast service under the Golden Arches — and at the end of the day, people really came for the Big Macs and the fries.

YouTube personality Furious Pete flew to the Philippines, one of the last places in the world to try the McSpaghetti. He wasn’t impressed: “This tastes like spaghetti with ketchup," he said.

In 1968, beloved movie and TV cowboy Roy Rogers agreed to license his name to a chain of fast-food restaurants. Americans loved the roast beef sandwiches, fried chicken and burgers at "Roy's," and the chain grew to about 650 locations.

In 1990, the Hardee’s burger chain bought out the Roy Rogers restaurants for the real estate, and began converting all the locations to Hardee’s — and that’s when the beef hit the fan.

Loyal customers were furious, sales tanked, and Hardee's started switching them all back to Roy Rogers. Today, the chain is just barely hanging on.

During the mid-1990s low-fat food craze, Taco Bell introduced its “Border Lights” menu promoting new options meant to be healthier. Customers could order baked white corn tacos filled with lean beef, low-fat cheese and lite sour cream.

But, as it turned out, customers didn’t want healthy food from Taco Bell. Critics also thought the name "Border Lights" sounded like a reference to controversies at the U.S.- Mexico border.

Taco Bell ran a $75 million ad campaign for its special menu items, but they were gone within a year.

In 1992, Burger King branched out from its quick counter service to offer what was promoted as a higher-class dinner experience — with table service.

Between 4 p.m. and 8 p.m., customers could sit at a table and order a dinner basket from a server, who brought the food to the table. You'd get a free popcorn appetizer while you waited for your meal.

BK invested heavily in ads featuring MTV's Dan Cortese and even did cross-promotions with popular movies, including Aladdin. Sadly, people just weren’t interested in the dinner baskets — and by 1993, the chain refocused on its fast hamburger business.

After the promotion was introduced in 2007, Subway’s $5 footlong sandwiches became incredibly popular. Nine years later, with costs going up, Subway announced it would raise the price by $1 — and loyal customers were enraged.

The brand has been tripping over its pricing ever since. In 2018, Subway brought out $4.99 footlongs but immediately admitted that franchisees could choose not to participate. To this day, customers never know when and if the offer will be honored.

“Well I guess no more Subway for me,” wrote one angry commenter in a thread on Reddit.

In 1984, McDonald's introduced the McDLT, a burger that came in a two-sided styrofoam container.

The container housed the hot parts of the sandwich in one side and the cold parts in the other. The idea was for customers to assemble the two sections to create one big explosion of hot and cold goodness all in the same bite.

But many McDonald's locations weren't equipped with dual heating-cooling storage units to hold the food before it was served — so, customers were served lukewarm sandwiches they had to assemble like a bad IKEA project.

In 2006, Wendy's saw Subway's healthy lifestyle shtick and decided to jump on the bandwagon. The result was a line of deli sandwiches called “frescatas,” served on freshly-baked artisan breads.

Even though customers liked the sandwiches, the problem was that fresh artisan breads take too long to bake, and the concept couldn’t keep up with the pace of orders in Wendy’s drive-thrus.

Finally, the too-slow Frescata ended up on the bench, while the Homestyle Chicken Sandwich turned out to be the team’s ringer.

In 2015, Burger King launched a special Halloween Whopper that was served on black buns tinted with A1 steak sauce.

On the surface, it was a great holiday-themed marketing idea — what's spookier than eating a sandwich served on black bread that looks rotten?

Unfortunately, the answer came not long after, when customers complained that the burger was turning their No. 2s an unexpected shade of green. Yikes!

7. Domino's 'The Noid'

Few mascots have inspired more real-world havoc than Domino's "The Noid" back in the 1980s. The Noid was a red-suited villain who was always trying to foil the restaurant's plans, and customers were advised to “avoid the Noid.”

The marketing plan backfired when a man named Kenneth Lamar Noid mistakenly believed the character was a plot to make fun of him.

He responded by taking several employees hostage at an Atlanta Domino's, demanding $100,000 and a copy of the novel The Widow's Son. Fortunately, he gave himself up to the police and nobody was injured.

What could go wrong with a plan to offer customers free iced coffee? Quite a bit, as Dunkin' Donuts discovered in 2010.

DD’s nationally broadcast commercials failed to clarify that the freebie would be available in only five states. When the big day came, coffee drinkers across the country showed up for their free java and were turned away.

The only measurable outcome of this marketing ploy: Dunkin's Facebook page got buried under a pile of angry comments from upset customers.

5. Burger King's 'Herb the Nerd'

In 1985, Burger King came up with an epic marketing campaign. The burger chain spread rumors of a guy named Herb who was supposedly the one man on Earth who had not tried a Whopper sandwich.

After building the momentum for months, it was announced that Herb's identity would be revealed during that year's Super Bowl.

Unfortunately, the chain hired an actor to portray Herb as the most unlikeable guy ever — causing the media hype to die off almost instantly.

McDonald’s is synonymous with cheap foods that take about three minutes to slap together behind the counter.

This didn't hold the fast-food behemoth back from trying to add pizza to its menu. By 1990, Mickey D’s had introduced pizzas at nearly 40% of its U.S. locations.

Sadly, it turned out that pizza prep took far too long and was not compatible with the chain’s lighting fast slap-and-serve system. McPizzas were pulled from the menu — although two locations refused to give up on the idea until 2017.

3. Pizza Hut's Priazzo

In the mid-1980s, Pizza Hut wanted to cash in on the deep-dish pizza craze. The result was the Priazzo, a two-layer pie with a ton of cheese, meat and veggies among the layers.

Although customers enjoyed eating the Priazzo pizza casserole, they didn’t like waiting an extra long time for the multilayered pizza to be assembled and baked.

After just three years on the menu, this expensive and time-consuming item was pulled for good.

What could be better than Dairy Queen's iconic Blizzard?

Sensing that customers wanted healthier options, Dairy Queen invented the "Breeze," meant as a sort of “blizzard-lite” made with nonfat frozen yogurt instead of ice cream. Best of both worlds, right?

The problem was that DQ then added the same candy, cookies and chocolate that was in the Blizzard. Even diehard DQ fans couldn’t justify adding the Breeze to their low-fat diets.

1. Quiznos' Spongmonkeys

The Quiznos' “spongmonkeys” were probably the least sensical marketing campaign of all time. In 2004, the sandwich chain decided to make the bizarre, rodent-like creatures into the brand’s new mascots.

In the ads, the creepy critters danced, sang off-key and screeched about how much they loved Quiznos.

Kids were terrified, and disturbed adult viewers described the spongmonkeys as “Mr. Potato Rats,” “drugged up hamsters” and “hell-lemurs.” They didn’t sell many sandwiches and were dropped by Quiznos within a year.

Remember These Chain Restaurants? They're Still Hanging On

Here are 26 chains you may have thought were dead, because they disappeared from your town years ago. But they're still out there — maybe with only one lingering location.

Catch them while you can!

1. Big Boy

Big Boy has endured since 1936, when the company got its start as Bob's Pantry. At one time, the chain was a giant in the restaurant industry — in more ways than one.

In 1979, 1,000 plus Big Boy hamburger joints greeted customers across the U.S. with towering statues of the chain's chubby, cheery mascot.

Since then, the chain's diner-style restaurants have lost out to quick-service competitors in the burger business. So today, around 200 Big Boys are in business, primarily in the Midwest.

2. Rainforest Cafe

You can’t help loving Rainforest Cafe, with its plastic jungles, intermittent thunderstorms and animatronic gorillas. Plus, whenever someone is served one of the erupting brownie desserts, the whole restaurant has the fun of screaming, "Volcano!"

Though it has been more than 20 years since the theme restaurant fad peaked, Rainforest Cafe continues to survive, though it's not roaring as loudly as it once did.

The chain's website shows 17 Rainforest Cafes are currently in business in the U.S., down from a high of 32. Another five locations operate outside the U.S.

The first Quiznos opened in Denver in 1981, and it wasn't long before the chain's tasty and toasty subs could be found throughout the U.S. and around the world.

But in recent years, Quiznos shops have been vanishing about as quickly as they spread. In January 2019, fewer than 400 were left in the U.S. — down from some 5,000 locations in 2007, Restaurant Business reported.

The chain took a beating during the Great Recession and filed for bankruptcy in 2014. Fans of Quiznos are hoping to see some magic worked by the company's new owner, an investment firm with experience turning troubled businesses around.

4. Baja Fresh

Before Chipotle, Qdoba and Moe's, there was Baja Fresh Mexican Grill, a burrito chain that started in 1990. It grew quickly on the popularity of its fresh ingredients and its tangy, dark and mysterious "Salsa Baja" at the restaurants' salsa bars.

In 2002, Wendy's bought Baja Fresh — and that's when things started going downhill. Wendy's would sell the burrito business at a loss just four years later as sales declined.

Baja Fresh once had as many as 300 restaurants, but the chain has been shrinking and pulling out of some parts of the U.S. The company reported that there were 165 Baja Fresh locations in 2017.

Tony Roma's boasts that it has "over 150 family restaurant locations on six continents." But the chain's website shows only 15 of those are in the U.S., where the company got its start.

Tony Roma, who was oversaw the menu for the Playboy Club, opened his first namesake restaurant in Miami in 1972. It became a franchise through an investment from Clint Murchison Jr., the founder of the Dallas Cowboys.

At one time Tony Roma's operated more than 160 stores in the U.S., but American customers eventually lost their enthusiasm for the chain's ribs and other barbecue fare.

6. TCBY

TCBY originally stood for "This Can't Be Yogurt," but the company later switched to "The Country's Best Yogurt" after its original name drew a lawsuit from a competitor.

Now, the acronym might as well stand for "This Chain Brings Yawns." TCBY — which got its start in Arkansas in 1981 — has struggled to compete against newer, trendier frozen yogurt franchises.

The company reportedly had nearly 1,800 locations in the early 2000s. The website shows that today, there are only around 350, and stores keep closing. A TCBY in Lincoln, Nebraska, went out of business in 2017 after more than three decades.

In the late 1960s, Roy Rogers — "King of the Cowboys" in old movie westerns — licensed his name to a chain of burger restaurants. By 1991, there were more than 600 locations, mostly in the northeastern U.S. and mid-Atlantic.

And then, the business was sold. The restaurants were turned into Hardee's burger joints — and fans of the Roy Rogers brand were furious. The customer revolt was so powerful that Hardee's tried switching the name back.

But the damage was done. The Roy Rogers chain went off into the sunset, though in recent years it has been trying to make a comeback. Today, there are 50 locations serving up old favorites like the Double R Bar Burger.

8. Kenny Rogers Roasters

Country singer Kenny Rogers (the guy who sang, "You've got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em") founded a chain of rotisserie chicken joints in 1991 with the help of former KFC investor John Y. Brown.

The restaurants became a part of American pop culture. In a 1996 episode of Seinfeld, Kramer declares war on a brightly lit KRR across from his apartment — and then gets hooked on the chicken.

Rerun viewers who've never heard of Kenny Rogers Roasters may be baffled, because the chain no longer exists in North America. But it's thriving across Asia: A Malaysian company operates scores of locations throughout the region.

If you were a fan of Tina Fey's sitcom 30 Rock you may remember Blimpie as an occasional punch line. Its subs were a fave of loser character J.D. Lutz.

In recent decades, Blimpie has been a loser, too. It has lost a lot of "footprint."

At the chain's peak in the early 2000s, close to 2,000 Blimpie shops could be found throughout the U.S. and overseas. But now, the company's website shows around 250 locations. The world's first Blimpie — in Hoboken, New Jersey — closed in 2017.

10. Chi-Chi's

Like Kenny Rogers Roasters, Chi-Chi's no longer exists in North America, though the Tex-Mex restaurants can still be found overseas, including in Belgium and Luxembourg. So if you're craving Chi-Chi's Mexican fried ice cream, you'll need to book a flight.

But the Chi-Chi's brand may be as close as your nearest supermarket. Hormel — the company best known for Spam — sells Chi-Chi's salsa, chips and other products.

At one time, Chi-Chi's had more than 200 restaurants, but its U.S. and Canada locations were all gone by late 2004 following bankruptcy and hepatitis. An outbreak linked to green onions at a Chi-Chi's near Pittsburgh killed four people in late 2003.

Bennigan’s is an Irish-themed restaurant chain that was founded in Atlanta in 1976. It was near death, but is trying to make a comeback.

In 2007, the owners filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy liquidation and shut down 150 restaurants overnight.

The chain had been having difficulty standing out against competitors like TGI Friday's and Chili's. Despite Bennigan's Irish pub roots, the menu featured Southwestern-style appetizers and tempura shrimp.

Today, there are 13 Bennigan's locations in the U.S., stretching from Texas to New Jersey, according to the chain's website.

12. Arthur Treacher's Fish & Chips

Arthur Treacher was a movie actor who specialized in playing British butlers. Just think of that old search engine Ask Jeeves. Treacher, in fact, played a butler named Jeeves in a couple of movies in the 1930s.

The fish and chips restaurants that carried his name got their start in Columbus, Ohio, in 1969. The chain expanded rapidly, and at its peak there were over 800 locations nationwide.

But the company’s downfall began when the price of cod skyrocketed in the late 1970s. Just seven standalone Arthur Treacher's survive, in Ohio and New York.

In the 1970s and '80s, parents endured a lot of begging to go to Ground Round, because the restaurants were famous for hosting great kids' birthday parties starring a mascot named Bingo the Clown.

For adults, Ground Round was the place where you got peanuts in the shell before your meal — and were encouraged to throw the shells onto the floor.

Ground Round went out of style, and in 2005 nearly half the roughly 130 restaurants closed abruptly closed ahead of a bankruptcy filing. Today, there are fewer than 25 locations in the Midwest and the Northeast.

14. Dog n Suds

Hamburgers and hot dogs typically get equal space on the grill at cookouts, but in the fast-food business it's not even close. Burgers are king, and frankfurters are rarely even found on the menu.

But, going back to the 1950s, hot dogs have shared star billing with root beer at restaurants called Dog n Suds. They're drive-ins — with carhops. Think of the old TV show Happy Days.

According to the book Fast Food: Roadside Restaurants in the Automobile Age, Dog n Suds in 1968 had 650 locations in 38 states. Today, only 10 are left, in the Midwest.

Planet Hollywood launched in New York in October 1991 with a ton of hoopla. The theme restaurant was backed by Hollywood celebrities Bruce Willis, Demi Moore, Sylvester Stallone and — before his days as California governor — Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Each new location reported close to $15 million in sales during its first year. At Planet Hollywood's height, 87 locations spanned the globe, in places including Phoenix; Columbus, Ohio; and the Mall of America in Minnesota.

But Planet Hollywood faded, along with the star power of its famous investors. The official website shows there are now just six Planet Hollywood restaurants, though the company is expanding as a luxury resort brand.

16. Country Buffet

In the mid-2000s, Americans were piling it on their plates at some 700 buffet restaurants called either Country Buffet, Old Country Buffet, HomeTown Buffet or Ryan's.

The names may have been different, but it was all one company and one concept: all-you-could-eat of comfort-food favorites like fried chicken, meatloaf, mac and cheese, and coconut cream pie.

The business encountered some serious indigestion and went through a series of bankruptcies and closings. The website shows fewer than 80 of the buffets are currently operating.

The Chock Full O'Nuts coffee brand and cafes have a long history, going back to a chain of New York City nut shops launched by William Black in 1926.

When the Great Depression hit — and even nuts seemed like a luxury — Black converted his nut stores into lunch counters, serving a cup of coffee and a sandwich for 5 cents. By 1971, Chock Full o’ Nuts had over 80 sandwich and coffee shops in the New York area.

When Black died in 1983, only 17 cafes were left, and they eventually closed. But in 2010, Chock Full O'Nuts coffee shops returned. Today, there are six: in metro New York and Miami.

18. Chicken Delight

In the early 1960s, it was hard to escape a jingle that told Americans, "Don't cook tonight — call Chicken Delight."

Chicken D had more than 1,000 locations and was bigger than KFC. The fried chicken was part of pop culture and was referenced in the TV sitcom Bewitched and the movie comedy Village of the Giants.

But the quality was inconsistent from one restaurant to another, and customers flew the coop. About 25 Chicken Delights are operating today, in central Canada and the New York City area.

Gino's was founded in the late 1950s and took its name from one of its co-founders, Gino Marchetti, who led the Baltimore Colts to NFL championships in 1958 and '59.

The chain was always a second-stringer in the restaurant leagues, though it grew to more than 350 locations. in 1982, Marriott Corp. bought Gino's and decided to convert its locations into Roy Rogers. (And we know how that turned out!)

The Gino's brand went away, though it returned in 2010 as Gino's Burgers & Chicken. Today, there are two restaurants, in the Baltimore suburbs.

20. The Brown Derby

During the golden age of Hollywood, the Brown Derby was synonymous with movie-star glamour. It was a place where film deals were made, newcomers were discovered, and people on the way down went to be seen.

At one time, there were four Brown Derby restaurants operating in the Los Angeles area, including an iconic location on Wilshire Boulevard with a dome that made the place resemble a giant derby hat.

The chain became old hat, and all four locations were gone by the mid-1980s. But thanks to a licensing deal, one "Hollywood Brown Derby" restaurant is in business today — at Disney's Hollywood Studios park within Walt Disney World in Florida.

Kewpee is a relic restaurant if ever there was one. The very first one started serving up hamburgers in Flint, Michigan, in 1918, and a full century later the chain is still around! But just barely.

The name was inspired by the kewpie doll, a cutesy, chubby baby doll that was popular in the early 20th century. The burgers became popular, too, and by the 1940s around 400 Kewpee restaurants were operating nationwide.

Wendy's founder Dave Thomas once said Kewpee inspired him to go into the burger business. Now, just five Kewpee locations remain: one in Wisconsin, one in Michigan and three in Lima, Ohio.

22. York Steak House

In the 1970s and 1980s, York Steak House restaurants could be found throughout the eastern U.S., primarily in shopping malls. The chain, with its faint knights-of-the-round-table theme, dished out its steaks and fixin's cafeteria-style.

York Steak House was owned by General Mills, best known for Cheerios and other breakfast cereals. After the company sold off York, most of the chain's meat-and-potatoes restaurants were shut down in 1989.

But not the location on the west side of Columbus, Ohio, which is the only one still operating to this day. It continues to serve up steaks, baked potatoes, pies — and heaping helpings of nostalgia.

At one time, Don Pablo's was America's second-largest full-service Tex-Mex restaurant chain, behind only Chi-Chi's. But Don Pablo's lost its sizzle, just like its rival.

Unlike Chi-Chi's, this chain hasn't quite gone away completely in the U.S. Today, one lonely Don Pablo's restaurant is still in in business, in New Jersey — way down from a high of around 120 in the late 1990s.

Don Pablo's got its start in Lubbock, Texas, in 1985. It has dwindled its way through a series of ownership changes and bankruptcies.

24. Damon's Grill

Yet another chain with ties to Columbus, Ohio, Damon's was founded in that city in 1979 and eventually grew to nearly 140 casual dining restaurants in the eastern U.S. and the United Kingdom. Damon's was part sports bar, part steak-and-barbecue joint.

The company suffered setbacks as other chains jazzed up their menus with much more variety than customers found at Damon's.

Damon's survived a 2009 bankruptcy filing but has continued to dwindle away. Today, just three U.S. restaurants are still going.

In the 1970s, John Y. Brown Jr. — the man responsible for developing Col. Harland Sanders' Kentucky Fried Chicken into a national chain — tried to do the same thing with a spiced burger he'd discovered at a restaurant in North Miami Beach, Florida.

Brown reportedly told the burger's inventor, Oliver Gleichenhaus, that he'd make him "bigger than the Colonel." By 1976, a streetcar-themed restaurant called Ollie's Trolley was in nearly 100 locations nationwide.

But the burgers never caught on, and the restaurants were too small to have drive-thrus, which customers were starting to demand. Today, just three Ollie's Trolleys remain: in Cincinnati; Louisville, Kentucky; and Washington, D.C.

26. Howard Johnson's

Howard Johnson's, often connected to motels, was once America's largest restaurant chain and served more meals outside the home than anyone but the U.S. Army.

At HoJo's peak in the late 1970s, it covered the country with more than 1,000 of its iconic orange roofs. The chain was even featured in an episode of Mad Men.

Today, one Howard Johnson's restaurant remains: in Lake George, New York. It tries to stay faithful to the signature dishes fans remember, like fried clam strips and macaroni and cheese. The rest withered away as the chain went through ownership changes.