🍦
The Ice Cream Machine Conspiracy
Why McDonald's McFlurry Machines Are Always Broken
Taylor Company makes the machines. Taylor charges for exclusive repairs. A startup called Kytch fixed them independently. McDonald's allegedly conspired with Taylor to destroy Kytch. The FTC opened an investigation. Kytch sued for $900 million. This is the full story of how a broken McFlurry machine exposed a corporate monopoly.
I've been saying “the ice cream machine is broken” my entire life without knowing why. Then I went down the rabbit hole and discovered it's not incompetence — it's a repair monopoly worth hundreds of millions of dollars. The machine isn't broken. The business model is working exactly as designed.— Glen Bradford, Miami Beach, has never successfully ordered a McFlurry after 9pm
13,000+
U.S. Locations
all using Taylor machines
$900M
Kytch Lawsuit
vs McDonald's
10-15%
Broken at Any Time
per McBroken.com
4hrs
Nightly Heat Cycle
if it fails, machine locks
Wait, Why Is the Machine Actually Broken?
The McDonald's soft-serve machine — the Taylor C602 — requires a nightly 4-hour heat pasteurization cycle. If the dairy mix temperature doesn't hit the right number, or if a sensor glitches, or if someone looks at it wrong, the machine locks itself and displays a cryptic error code like ERROR CODE: LO3 TEMP.
What does LO3 TEMP mean? Nobody knows — except Taylor's authorized technicians. The repair manual is proprietary. The diagnostic software is locked behind Taylor's paywall. The franchise owner who bought the machine cannot legally fix it themselves.
So every time you pull up to McDonald's and they say “the ice cream machine is down,” what they really mean is: “the machine threw a code, we can't read the code, we called Taylor, they'll be here in 3 days, and it'll cost $500.”
The Full Timeline
From locked-down machines to a $900M lawsuit and an FTC investigation.
Taylor Company Locks In the Contract
McDonald's signs an exclusive deal with Taylor Company to supply all soft-serve machines for its U.S. locations. Taylor's C602 machine becomes the only option for over 13,000 franchises. The machines are notoriously complex — they require a nightly 4-hour heat cycle to pasteurize the dairy mix, and if anything goes wrong during that process, the machine locks itself out with a cryptic error code. The repair manual? Only Taylor-authorized technicians get access. The average franchise pays Taylor thousands per year in repair visits. This is the business model: sell the razor AND the blades AND the right to touch the razor.
Kytch Is Founded
Jeremy O'Sullivan and Melissa Nelson, a married couple running a frozen yogurt chain, get so frustrated with their Taylor machines breaking down that they reverse-engineer the problem. They build Kytch — a small device that clips onto the Taylor machine, intercepts its serial data, and sends real-time diagnostics to the franchise owner's phone. It translates cryptic error codes into plain English. It tells you what's actually wrong before you call a $300/hour Taylor technician. It works. It works really well.
Kytch Goes Viral Inside McDonald's
Word spreads through the McDonald's franchise community. Hundreds of locations deploy Kytch devices. For the first time, franchise owners can actually understand their own machines. Uptime improves dramatically. McDonald's corporate is aware of Kytch and, according to later court filings, some McDonald's executives privately praise the device. This is the high-water mark. The ice cream machines are actually working. The broken-machine meme is about to die. Unless someone intervenes.
Taylor Sends the Warning Letter
Taylor Company sends a letter to McDonald's warning about "unauthorized third-party devices" attached to their machines. The letter claims Kytch could pose safety risks — a claim Kytch calls baseless, noting their device doesn't modify the machine's operation at all, it just reads data. But the letter works. It gives McDonald's the cover it needs for what comes next.
McDonald's Nukes Kytch
McDonald's sends a blast email to every franchisee in the country: remove Kytch devices immediately. They cite the Taylor letter. They frame it as a safety issue. Kytch's business evaporates overnight. Hundreds of franchise owners — who were thrilled with the product — are forced to rip the devices off their machines. The ice cream machines go back to being broken. McDonald's later announces it's working with Taylor on its own diagnostic solution called Open Kitchen. Kytch alleges this new Taylor tool was based on ideas stolen from Kytch's technology.
The FTC Opens an Investigation
The Federal Trade Commission begins investigating McDonald's relationship with Taylor Company. They send letters to franchise owners asking about the repair situation. The investigation examines whether the exclusive repair arrangement constitutes an unfair business practice. This is the federal government saying: something smells here. Because it does. The maker of the machine is also the only one allowed to fix it, and the machine breaks constantly. That's not bad engineering — that's a business model.
Kytch Sues McDonald's for $900 Million
Kytch files a lawsuit against McDonald's for $900 million. The complaint alleges that McDonald's conspired with Taylor to destroy Kytch's business. It claims McDonald's stole Kytch's trade secrets and shared them with Taylor to build a competing product. It alleges that McDonald's executives privately praised Kytch while publicly planning to kill it. The filing reads like a corporate thriller. Jeremy O'Sullivan tells reporters: 'They didn't just shut us down. They stole our ideas and gave them to the company that was already ripping off their own franchisees.'
Taylor Countersues Kytch
Taylor Company fires back with its own lawsuit, accusing Kytch of trade secret theft and hacking. Taylor claims Kytch's device accessed proprietary data from their machines without authorization. Kytch responds that reading diagnostic data from a machine you own isn't hacking — it's basic consumer rights. This is right-to-repair in its purest form: does the person who bought a machine have the right to understand how it works?
Right-to-Repair Movement Explodes
Multiple states pass right-to-repair legislation. The McDonald's ice cream saga becomes the poster child for the movement. If a billion-dollar franchise owner can't fix their own ice cream machine without paying the manufacturer, what chance does a regular consumer have with their phone, their tractor, their wheelchair? The broken McFlurry machine — the butt of a million memes — turns out to be a case study in monopolistic repair practices. Sometimes the most serious issues hide inside the funniest stories.
The Litigation Grinds On
The Kytch v. McDonald's case works its way through federal court. Discovery produces internal emails. Depositions happen. The public gets glimpses of corporate conversations that don't look great for anyone. Meanwhile, across 13,000+ U.S. McDonald's locations, the ice cream machines continue to be broken about 10-15% of the time according to McBroken.com — a tracking website built by a 24-year-old software engineer named Rashiq Zahid who reverse-engineered the McDonald's app to check ice cream availability. Yes, someone had to build a separate website to track whether a multi-billion dollar company's dessert machines work. That's where we are.
The Cast of Characters
A married couple, a monopolist, a $200B corporation, and a 24-year-old who built a website to track ice cream availability because nobody else would.
Jeremy O'Sullivan & Melissa Nelson
Kytch Co-Founders / The Fixers Who Got Fixed
A married couple who ran a frozen yogurt chain, got fed up with broken Taylor machines, reverse-engineered the problem, built a solution that actually worked, got it deployed in hundreds of McDonald's locations, watched their business get nuked overnight by a corporate blast email, and are now suing McDonald's for $900 million. They went from 'we just want the machines to work' to starring in a federal antitrust case.
“They didn't just shut us down. They stole our ideas and gave them to the company ripping off their own franchisees.”
Taylor Company
Machine Manufacturer / Also the Only Repair Option / Also Allegedly the Idea Thief
Makes the C602 soft-serve machine that breaks constantly, then charges thousands per visit to fix it with proprietary tools and codes that franchise owners can't access. When someone finally built a device to let owners diagnose their own machines, Taylor allegedly helped McDonald's shut it down. Then they announced their own competing diagnostic tool.
“We are concerned about unauthorized third-party devices.”
McDonald's Corporation
The Franchise That Can't Make Ice Cream / $200B Market Cap
Operates 13,000+ U.S. locations. Has been the butt of the 'ice cream machine broken' meme for over a decade. When a startup actually fixed the problem, McDonald's allegedly conspired with the machine manufacturer to destroy the fix. Some executives privately praised Kytch while corporate publicly killed it. Their own franchisees pay the price.
“We are committed to providing our customers with a great experience, including a working dessert menu.”
Rashiq Zahid
Creator of McBroken.com / Folk Hero
A 24-year-old software engineer who reverse-engineered the McDonald's app to automatically check ice cream machine availability at every U.S. location. Built McBroken.com so you can check before you drive. The fact that this website needs to exist says everything about the state of affairs.
“I just mass-ordered a McSundae at every McDonald's in the country to see which ones would go through.”
The FTC
Federal Trade Commission / Late to the Party But Here Now
Opened an investigation into the McDonald's-Taylor relationship after years of public complaints, memes, and finally the Kytch lawsuit pulling back the curtain. Sent letters to franchise owners. Whether anything comes of it remains to be seen.
“We have questions about your repair practices.”
The McDonald's Franchise Owners
13,000+ Business Owners Caught in the Middle
They buy the franchise. They're told which machine to buy. The machine breaks. They're told who can fix it. They find a product that actually works. Corporate tells them to remove it. The machine breaks again. They keep paying. This is their life.
“We loved Kytch. Then corporate told us to rip it out. The machines went back to being broken.”
The Price of a Broken McFlurry
Average repair visit
Taylor-authorized technicians only
$300–$500
Annual repair costs per location
some franchise owners report
$10,000–$12,000
Kytch device
translated error codes, improved uptime
$100/month
Lost McFlurry revenue per breakdown
desserts are high-margin
$200–$600/day
Taylor's estimated annual repair revenue
13,000+ captive locations
Hundreds of millions
Cost of a working McFlurry
if you can find one
$4.29
The Monopoly, Visualized
McDonald's franchisees can only buy Taylor. One supplier. 13,000+ locations. No alternatives.
Only Taylor-authorized technicians can diagnose and fix the machines. Franchise owners are locked out of their own equipment.
Error codes are proprietary. Repair manuals are restricted. The Kytch device was the first time owners could read their own machine's data.
About 85-90% of machines work at any given time. The other 10-15%? Sorry, the machine is broken.
Why This Story Matters
This isn't really about ice cream. It's about right-to-repair. It's about whether you own the things you buy. It's about whether a company can sell you a machine, make it break on purpose, and then charge you to fix it — while making it illegal for anyone else to help.
John Deere does it with tractors. Apple did it with iPhones until legislation forced their hand. Medical device companies do it with hospital equipment. And Taylor Company does it with soft-serve machines at 13,000 McDonald's locations.
The Kytch story is what happens when someone actually tries to break the cycle. A married couple reverse-engineered a solution. It worked. Franchise owners loved it. And then the manufacturer and the corporation allegedly conspired to destroy it. If that doesn't make you angry, you're not paying attention.
The next time someone tells you the McDonald's ice cream machine is broken, you can tell them: it's not broken. It's working exactly as designed — for Taylor Company.
Glen's Take
I have tried to order a McFlurry at approximately 47 different McDonald's in my life. I have succeeded maybe 12 times. I always assumed it was just bad maintenance. Turns out it's a corporate monopoly that generates hundreds of millions of dollars in repair revenue for a single company. I genuinely didn't know whether to laugh or throw something when I learned this.
The Kytch founders are the main characters of this story, and they deserve to win. They built something that actually worked. Not “disruption” in the annoying Silicon Valley sense — just a device that tells you what's wrong with your machine. And for that, a $200 billion corporation allegedly conspired to destroy their business.
This story has everything: corporate conspiracy, a startup getting crushed, an FTC investigation, a $900M lawsuit, and a 24-year-old who built a website to track whether the ice cream works because a multi-billion-dollar company couldn't figure it out. The broken ice cream machine is the funniest monopoly in American history.
The McFlurry deserves justice. Share this.
960+ Pages and Counting
Get the Weekly Rabbit Hole — new pages, new games, new deep dives. No spam.
Unsubscribe anytime. I build weird things on the internet.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why are McDonald's ice cream machines always broken?
The Taylor C602 machines require a nightly 4-hour pasteurization cycle. If anything goes wrong during that cycle — and things frequently do — the machine locks itself with a cryptic error code that only Taylor-authorized technicians can diagnose and fix. The machine's complexity and the exclusive repair arrangement create a situation where 10-15% of McDonald's locations have a broken ice cream machine at any given time. Critics say this isn't bad engineering — it's a feature that generates repair revenue.
What was Kytch and why did McDonald's shut it down?
Kytch was a small device that clipped onto Taylor machines and translated cryptic error codes into plain English, letting franchise owners diagnose problems themselves. It was deployed in hundreds of McDonald's locations and dramatically improved uptime. In November 2020, McDonald's sent a blast email to all franchisees ordering them to remove Kytch devices, citing a Taylor Company letter about 'safety concerns.' Kytch alleges McDonald's conspired with Taylor to destroy their business and steal their technology.
How much money does Taylor make from repairs?
Exact figures aren't public, but franchise owners have reported paying thousands of dollars per repair visit, and the machines break frequently. With 13,000+ U.S. McDonald's locations all exclusively using Taylor machines, the repair revenue is estimated to be enormous. One franchise owner told the FTC he spends $10,000-$12,000 per year on Taylor repairs for a single location.
Is the FTC investigation still active?
The FTC opened its investigation in 2021. It has not been publicly closed, but the commission has not announced formal enforcement action as of early 2026. The Kytch v. McDonald's lawsuit continues to work through the courts and may produce more evidence that could inform the FTC's decision.
Why is this page on Glen Bradford's website?
Because the McDonald's ice cream machine saga is secretly the most important consumer rights story of the decade — it just happens to also be the funniest. It touches right-to-repair, corporate monopolies, franchise law, antitrust, and the FTC. And I'm a guy who built a 960-page website to explain things that matter. This matters.
Keep Exploring
Afroman vs. The Cops
Cops raided his house. Found nothing. He made a 14-track diss album from the security footage. They sued for $4M. Jury: 13-0.
Read moreNewBoeing's Whistleblower Problem
Two crashes. 346 dead. A whistleblower found dead. A door plug blew out. Boeing pled guilty. Full timeline.
Read moreStrava Military Leaks
A fitness app accidentally revealed the locations of secret military bases around the world.
Read moreNewDisney Lightning Lane Pricing
FastPass was free. Now it's $35/person/day. A family of 4 spends $900 for one day. The full price timeline.
Read more