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First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

T

Tim from Springfield IL

First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

That's right--at the McDonald's at the Love's Truck Stop in Williamsville, IL (I-55 Exit 109), just north of Springfield. I noticed this for the first time this evening while returning from a brief trip out of town while grabbing a quick bite at the forementioned Mickey D's before returning home.

No actual channel lineup was listed on the TV, which had the available truck stop shower number listed below the screen--but on both sides of the shower number was listed the available networks as follows: Fox News, The Weather Channel, CMT, Discovery, CNN, USA, the Big 4 of ABC/CBS/NBC/Fox (I would presume the Springfield/Decatur/Champaign locals if the system was Dish/DirectTV based--but no PBS), and the big surprise--NFL Network. (I'm surprised they didn't go with ESPN. Plus considering all the Happy Meal tie-ins and how McD's is still kid-oriented, I'm surprised there was no Disney or Nickelodeon, or even one local PBS). So it appears to be a basic channel 2-13 setup (sans one channel). If you wanted to have the channel changed, you would have had to ask one of the McDonald's crew members for permission.

Tonight's dinnertime offering was a Big Mac with a side of Fox News. ;D ;D ;D I wonder--if the lockout is resolved to salvage at least the end of next season--if the forementioned McDonald's will see an unusual spike in business on Thursday nights due to one of their channel offerings that some areas still have to fight tooth and nail to even get on the ultra-high priced sports digital cable tier. ;D ;D ;D There are other McDonald's restaurants in the Springfield area that now have TV, but in those I have only seen CNN, MSNBC (so the local franchise group is "fair and balanced" I guess in their news offerings in their restaurants), and maybe ESPN one night (but I'm not sure exactly of that one).

I've also seen tiny 12-channel cable setups in other restaurants (with TV's in each booth), but I don't recall their channel lineups at this time.

Have you seen any other similar cable lineups at other restaurants, and do you remember what their channel lineups were like?
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

The McDonald's on Queen Street (State Route 10) in Southington, CT has TVs. They're tuned to CNN.

TD Homer's Sports Bar on Queen Street in Southington has TVs in every booth. They feature the entire analog COX Cable line-up and some extra channels as well. When I ate there I got to watch my shows.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

Most of the truck stops on the NJTP and the Gardenstate PWY in NJ have CNN on their Philips tvs.that was last year ,I will check in May when I will be heading that way again.I dont remember on the Connecticut Turnpike {RT95} truck stops have on their tv's ,My guess CNN or FOX news.Does Walmart have a feed piped in to all of their stores or is it a video server or DVD in the store.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

Walmart TV was an in-house advertising service. It would run ads for their "family friendly" garbage movies that were on NBC run ad nausem, or an ad for an upcoming theatrical movie, along with features on a new music artist. It was hard to tell, because we kept the TV wall muted all the time when I worked there. For a couple of months, we lost our connection to the server and had a Blu-Ray DVD movie play, since the wall had to show something and we weren't allowed to have local stations on it.

As for I-95 in Connecticut, you may not see much of anything for a while. The Milford rest stops on both sides are closed for renovations right now. You MIGHT see something soon when they're converted into restaurants with the Geno Auriemma's Fast Break theme. They have one now at the Mohegan Sun Casino.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

Most of the McDonald's locations in West TN have either Fox News or The Weather Channel.

Some Murphy USA gas stations at Wal Marts have an IP based network called GSTV with a loop of news, weather, sports, and entertainment briefs, and ads.

http://www.gstv.com/

It would make sense that the feed inside Wal Mart stores could be something similar.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

KML-224 said:
Walmart TV was an in-house advertising service. It would run ads for their "family friendly" garbage movies that were on NBC run ad nausem, or an ad for an upcoming theatrical movie, along with features on a new music artist. It was hard to tell, because we kept the TV wall muted all the time when I worked there. For a couple of months, we lost our connection to the server and had a Blu-Ray DVD movie play, since the wall had to show something and we weren't allowed to have local stations on it.

As for I-95 in Connecticut, you may not see much of anything for a while. The Milford rest stops on both sides are closed for renovations right now. You MIGHT see something soon when they're converted into restaurants with the Geno Auriemma's Fast Break theme. They have one now at the Mohegan Sun Casino.
Click to expand...

I remember 20 plus years ago stores like Kmart,Caldor,Sears,Woolco and even Radio Shack have put up tv antennas on their roofs and let the customers play with the dails.Why does Walmart dont allow OTA tv.Are worry about Target and other store ads running in Walmart stores.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

Part of it was also they didn't want us, the associates, tuning into football or other shows, not getting our work done. On occasion, I hid an antenna on the back of a TV or two on our wall to sneak a peak at a football score or the radar if it was going to be crappy outside.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

I worked at McDonald's in the early '90s. We didn't have TVs for the customers, but we had one in the break room that did not receive any channels. We could only watch videos. The manager always set the radio for the overhead speakers to Lite 99.7.

I can't think of any businesses that have their own in-house cable system. My funniest business/restaurant TV story is from Alaska, where I was the only customer in a diner somewhere near Glenallen. The owner asked me what I did for a living, and when I mentioned working for a FOX affiliate, he rolled out a TV on a beverage cart, set the cart near my table, and flipped to FOX News Channel so I could watch (even though I didn't want to watch).
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

McDonald's in our area has televisions that show different things. Every time I've gone in there, they show CNN. The Walmart closest to us is an older one, and the TVs don't work so there's no Walmart TV. They sometimes do, though. I heard that until a couple years ago, Walmart TV was the most watched network.

Most stores just play whatever they want you to see on their TVs.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

I was in a Mexican restaurant in Manhattan in November 2009. The TV in there was tuned to FOX 5. The entire 45 minutes I was there, the TV's picture was frozen with a still image of the judge on a court show.

I don't remember the name of the restaurant or what street it was on, but I think it was near midtown. The place had excellent food.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

Burger King Restaurant Truck stop near Coalingia Jct. along the I-5 corridor has 2 tv's inside. One of the Tv's are showing either FOX News or CNN and the other tv is showing local Univision affiliated KFTV 21 from Fresno.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

There's at least two that I know of here in L.A. County that have cable TV, one in Hawthorne (just south of where I live), and another in Norwalk (about 15 miles east). I rarely eat at McDonald's nowadays, the few times I've been to these locations, both had CNN on the tube.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

Neither of the Mickey Dees' on my side of town have TV, yet. I hope it stays that way for a really, really long time.

[size=8pt]"The TV in [the restaurant] was tuned to FOX 5. The entire 45 minutes I was there, the TV's picture was frozen with a still image of the judge on a court show."

I was having dinner at a local German restaurant a few days ago, the restaurant being equipped with a 36" Panasonic CRT and a Digitalstream receiver. They had the Universal Sport subchannel, via KRCW, playing but it was stuck on a single frame of a speed-skating event for the entire hour and a half I was there.

(The restaurant is located atop a hill, with a VERY clear line of site of the towers, yet ATSC reception as a whole in that part of town is so g[red][ EDIT - profanity ][/red]ng non-existant it's a bloody joke!)
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

The McDonalds around here are usually tuned to Fox News, in SD probably on their flat screens
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

When I've gone to my local McD's here, it's been usually tuned to either CNN or TSN.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

Last time I was in the McD's in Monticello AR, the flatscreen was showing Fox News Channel in stretchovision.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

I know of two restaurants in Lebanon, TN that carry Charter Cable's entire Basic package: Ponderosa & McDonald's.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

On the question of why McDonald's doesn't carry Nick or Disney channels for kids, there my be some kind of contractual problems with them allowing it. But most of the locations in my area that have been remodeled in recent years have free video games and in some cases indoor playgrounds to make up for it.
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

Why bother putting TV's in McDonald's? Would they not ask you to leave if you stayed more than 45 minutes?
 
Re: First Hotel, then Hospital, then College Cable--Now there's "McDonald's Cable"

rgseark2009 said:
Last time I was in the McD's in Monticello AR, the flatscreen was showing Fox News Channel in stretchovision.
Click to expand...

Fox News pays a lot of places to show their channel.
 
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