Black Girl Invents New McDonald’s App That Tells You If your Local Ice Cream Machine Is Down

McDonald’s is very notorious for two things: their deliciously fattening Big Macs, and their frequently broken ice cream machine. However, the problem of not knowing whether or not the local Mcdonald’s ice cream machine is down or not is solved.
A black girl by the name of Raina McLeod invented a McDonald’s application (app) called Ice Check.
The app allows you to search for the nearest McDonald’s, then see which locations have working ice cream machines.
Angel Washington, a Speech pathology major from Winnsboro, Louisiana stated, “I find it very convenient because I love the oreo McFlurries and I love ice cream.”
McDonald’s has certainly gained a reputation for their ice cream machine never working.
The Wall Street Journal even investigated this matter and published an article titled, “Why is the McFlurry Machine Down Again?”, which is a frequently asked question about McDonald’s on social media.
The article came to the conclusions that the ice cream machine is always down because it takes four hours to clean each day and there are 11 steps to get ready for the process of cleaning.
The article states, “If someone ordered an ice cream while employees were in the process of cleaning the machines, they often just said it was down rather than reassembling it.”
The app inventor, Raina McLeod, told Buzzfeed how the idea of the app came about, stating, “I came up with the idea for the app around a year ago, after a late- night Oreo McFlurry craving went unfulfilled due to the ice cream machine being down.” McLeod also shared her frustration for the problem stating, “It’s so small, and it can be so irritating.”
McLeod explained the idea originally started out as a joke video about the app, but the joke soon turned into a good idea when people responded well to the idea.
Tia Johnson, a freshman Engineering major from Monroe, Louisiana, stated “ I love the idea of the app because nothing’s more frustrating than to crave ice cream so much and drive all the way to McDonalds to be told the ice cream machine is down. So that app will save a lot of time, gas and disappointment in the future.” The way the app works is via GPS and input for users. The user of the app can locate a McDonalds nearby and it will tell that user whether or not the machine is in service based on other people’s reports.
The only problem with the app is that the reports are crowd sourced, so the app may not be accurate all the time if there aren’t enough people reporting on the machine. However there is a feature that allows franchise owners to claim their location so they can update the statues of their ice cream machine themselves.
So far, the app will include McDonald’s locations in the D.C. metro area, Miami, New York, Los Angeles, Santa Monica, San Francisco and more but new locations are being added by McLeod, per the request of new users every day.
Although it hasn’t been made clear how many McDonald’s locations actually started using the app, McLeod expressed that her goal is to have 14,000 McDonald’s locations using the app by this summer.
McLeod, D.C. resident, also stated to DC Inno, “Why should this big company not give us what we want when we want it?. . .I don’t want us to have to work, but they’re not telling us. I feel like an activist and that’s a weird thing to say. I really do think that people should have what they want.”
The new app is available for IOS users only.