Subway Australia finally got around to responding to Australian teen Matt Corby's request to know why his footlong sub was an inch shorter than expected, and, just like the actual length of its signature sandwich, the company's statement leaves much to be desired.
While Subway acknowledged that the undersized bread "is not baked to our standards," it goes on to claim that there really is no such thing as "undersized bread" because "footlong" is just a word.
"With regards to the size of the bread and calling it a footlong, 'SUBWAY FOOTLONG' is a registered trademark as a descriptive name for the sub sold in Subway® Restaurants and not intended to be a measurement of length."
The hell you say.
As BuzzFeed's Copyranter points out, Subway makes it pretty clear in its ads how long a footlong sub should be.
And all this talk of an inconsistent "proofing process" causing the bread to vary from store to store doesn't really make up for that lost inch of sandwich.
If the subs are known to shrink, why not make the pre-proofed bread a bit longer to make up for it? Because Subway is purposely cutting corners to save money.
"The shops have sliced their cold-cut sizes by 25 percent in the past few months," the New York Post reported yesterday. Less bread makes the reduction in cold cuts seem less conspicuous.
Naturally, Subway Australia has since removed the half-baked response.