I find JJ's to be average at best. I'll drive right past a JJ in search of a Firehouse Subs!

Lets make something very clear. JJ's, Subway and Potbelly are a small step above fast food. If you have expectations of fresh meat and artisan bread you will be disappointed. We are talking $7.00 for a sandwich and a soft drink. I happen to like the bread at JJ's so it's my quick sandwich shop choice.

AMEN:-:define good, if you mean premium:

Breads: When I worked for a deli meat company, I did a presentation up in N Michigan. I brought our premium (whole muscle, not beaks & cheeks) meats as well as some excellent artisanal breads from a really good bakery in Chicago. After the presentation was over, the buyers/marketing folks all loved the meats but each told me my breads were 'burnt' or 'too crispy'. Lesson learned there, that N Michigan is the land of overproofed/undercooked bread as is much of the nation.

Meats: besides Jersey Mike's roast beef (mentioned a few posts above) there isn't a national or large regional chain that serves "real" meat at their stores. Every meat is cooked off premise and is usually chunked & formed meats with lots binders & water holding additives. The meat is not whole muscle.

So for the avg person in the US, soft non-artisanal breads & mediocre meats at a cheap'ish' price seem to sell, so why would a large sub chain offer anything else?

When JJs first was getting started, our group used to sell to him, the meats he chose were of very high quality. As JJs started to expand, his bean counters told him he could make X more money if he started to use cheaper products, which JJs did, then they were told they could make Y more money if they started to use even cheaper products, etc etc. It becomes a vicious circle.

I think part of the problem is that people are habituated to the poor quality products offered by the major restaurant chains. Why would you offer premium products when clearly people have been programmed to prefer the poor quality product.

Personally, I like my sub to be a french stick, using french flour, a thin layer of butter, a thin layer of mayo and then meat sliced thickly off the bone/joint/breast with fresh salad. Cost to make at home to feed 3 people is the same as 3 Subway subs. Time invested to make is pretty similar too - how hard is it to roast a chicken.

Wow...this trend towards 'fast' deli shops is just awful, I grew up in NY where you could walk into your corner deli and order a sandwich and they would SLICE the meat paper thin (the meat was plentiful) in front of you slap it on fresh bread with whatever you wanted and wrap it up...walking into your generic Subway, JJs, Potbelly etc...it's sad that this is what society thinks a deli/sub shop should be...you want to know a real sub shop go to Tastee Sub shop #2 in NJ, I don't care how far it is from your work, it's that good and how a sub shop should be judged...

Sorry for the rant...living in Texas and not in NY has driven me deli crazy, no one can slice meat properly here for a sandwich and my options are all of the above and one not mentioned which which...and I'd rather have a dirty dish towel rung out in my mouth than eat at ANY of the places (tell us how you really feel)

+1
There's a deli in my office building that will make a turkey or ham sandwich for you with a portion of Boar's Head meat about an inch think, cheese, lettuce, and tomato for $4.50 on a roll, $5.50 on a hero. But then again I work in NYC and that's not available to folks where JJs are.

I tried Jimmy Johns once when I was in Chicago just to see what it was about. I'd say about the same as Subway more or less (though their sandos tend to have more cals). But they sponsor Kevin Harvick in NASCAR and I hate Kevin Harvick so I won't ever be going back.

I understand the cost is about the same but there is no way that the time investment is equal. From time to order to eating a Subway sub is less than 5 minutes. In your scenario you still have to roast the chicken and slice it then clean up the mess. You pay for the convenience of fast food.

NYC and some other East Coast cities are blessed to have these sort of deli's on nearly every street corner. This is not true in the rest of the country. I'm in the Detroit area, there are two good sandwich Deli's nearby (Dagwood's and Dan's. However, near my office, there is nothing like this.

I grew up in flyover country, and good delis just don't exist out there. It sucks but it is what it is.

I have always been un-impressed with most of the NY hyped food items, especially the pizza, but they do have [consistently] the best sub sandwiches and breakfast sandwiches I've had anywhere. It's the bread mostly, but it's more than that.

If you are in the right part of Texas, I bet someone could properly slice you some brisket. Making a sandwich of it would be your call.

As far as the crappy chain sammich places, I honestly can't tell much difference between Panera, Subway, JJs, Quiznos, and Blimpie. They all use substandard, food service grade products and produce something that is mostly edible, and is a small step above a McDs or a BK.

Is pizza a hyped food in NY? It's way too common to merely be hyped.

Now, those dastardly cronuts and various LES/Brooklyn restaurants might belong in the hyped category...

It's true that there are lots of corner stores all over NY where one can get a sandwich some even 24/7. That said not even close to all of them are good. A lot of them will slice the cheese too thick, use ingredients that they should have thrown out the night before or give you a poppy seed roll when you ask for a plain roll. That said with some trial and error you can find the right deli and be set with some great sandwiches.

As for JJs I tried it in Omaha a couple of times when I used to go there for work. It couldn't have been good, I would have remembered it if it was. I do remember wondering why all of my co-workers that were local were so in love with JJ.

This sums up my thoughts on JJ's and Subway and Potbelly pretty well. I don't seek out any of them, but they are all fit the bill adequately enough. If they were all in a row across the street from my office, I'd generally go to JJ's first, Potbelly second and Subway third. But Subway is a bit closer than the other two, so they seem to get most of my sandwich business.