Steak ‘n Shake has made a number of…questionable marketing decisions over the past couple of years (depending on where you land politically), but its latest decision to use AI-generated imagery to launch a new menu item may be the most questionable of them all.

Here’s the brand’s most recent Twitter (never X) post:

Users across the platform, who are typically very supportive of the MAHA-aligned brand, were quick to push back against the chain’s use of AI-generated food imagery, especially as a means of launching an entirely new product.

Until recently, AI-generated food imagery seemed largely confined to mom & pop shops and carnival booths. But Steak n’ Shake joins a number of national restaurant chains who have begun incorporating this “AI slop” into their marketing content.

Consumers MIGHT be willing to give independent restaurants and carnival food vendors a SMALL pass when it comes to AI-generated food imagery, particularly given that they often lack the financial resources, marketing teams, and production capabilities needed for professional food photography.

But for major national restaurant chains, that excuse just doesn’t hold up.

Especially for a brand like Steak ‘n Shake, which generated more than $270 million in revenue in 2025 and celebrated its strongest annual same-store sales performance in decades (a reported 10.2% increase).

With those kinds of numbers, it’s hard to believe that the cost of photographing a SINGLE new menu item was a major barrier. Especially when UGC and iPhone photography have become perfectly acceptable forms of marketing content for restaurants (and can sometimes outperform professional photography).

Over the past two years, Steak ‘n Shake has led a major, well-publicized effort to position itself as a brand committed to “higher-quality, more natural” ingredients, under the idea that consumers deserve better, more authentic food.

Which makes its decision to use artificial imagery to promote that very food all the more questionable.

After spending considerable time and resources convincing consumers that its food is real, why use fake imagery to sell it?

And while there’s certainly a place for AI in restaurant marketing, there’s a difference between using the technology to enhance creative content and using it to depict a product that customers are actually expected to purchase.

Hell, I even used AI to help clean up and proofread this blog entry!

But for a brand that’s built so much of its recent marketing around authenticity, this feels like an unnecessary gamble with consumer trust.

I guess we’ll just see how this all Steak ‘n Shakes out. Sorry. I had to.