Why You Won't Get This In-N-Out Order Number Anymore

There are some food stories that just confuse people, maybe a strange flavor or curious marketing decision, but if you've eaten at In-N-Out in the past few months and are over the age of 25, something completely baffling has been happening. Recently, hordes of teens have been crowding into In-N-Out's many West Coast locations and waiting patiently for order number 67 to be called, then bursting into hysterical cheers when it happens. If this sentence has already confused you, there are videos of the mass psychosis event you can find on Instagram. It's a trend that has gotten so disruptive that People just reported In-N-Out will no longer be using the number in its ordering system. To some of you, just seeing that the behavior in question centers around the number 67 is enough, but for the rest of us, this requires an explanation.

As with most things inexplicable, it started on the internet. The scenes at In-N-Out have their origin in an online meme around the term "6-7." References to the numbers apparently originated from a song called "Doot Doot (6 7)" by the rapper Skrilla, and quickly morphed into a joke with a life of its own. Trying too hard to understand what the joke means if you don't already know will instantly age you into a withered skeleton, but essentially, the point is that it has no meaning. Referencing 6-7 is an in-joke among mostly teenagers meant to deliberately confuse people who don't get it.

The 6-7 trend has gotten massive over the past few months, to the point that it was named Dictionary.com's word of the year, calling it an ambiguous slang term that is often shouted by younger people. The best explanation it could offer was calling 6-7 the verbal equivalent of internet brainrot, something embraced by younger generations that symbolizes the meaninglessness of endlessly scrolling through content. At least Gen Z is self-aware.

This isn't the first time the slinger of the double-double burger has banned a number from its ordering system. Several years ago, it also stopped using order 69, essentially for the same reason of avoiding jokes from rowdy teens. Hopefully, we don't need to explain that one to you. And while it's understandable that massive crowds of cheering kids might disrupt In-N-Out's business, opinions around the 6-7 joke have been mixed. As you might have seen in the video, plenty of employees have been happy to play along. But some workers over on In-N-Out's Reddit page expressed relief when learning of the ban, too. It shows that there is often a fine line between some harmless fun and being really annoying to fast food workers trying to do those jobs, and sometimes, with a trend like 6-7, that line can be crossed pretty fast. So pour out your In-N-Out milkshake for order number 67, and get ready to try and explain all this to anybody in just a few years.