On a Chicken Wing and a Prayer

Today I ordered one of my favorite combinations from my favorite pizza place, a pizza and chicken strips. I got a call a few minutes later telling me they were out of chicken strips and would I like wings instead. I had to politely tell the manager that I didn't want wings, and to remove the chicken strips from the order.
The pizza came a few minutes later, and the delivery person said the manager told him there would be no charge. Wonderful!
But as I sat down to eat a slice of pizza, I thought about the whole concept of chicken wings and why they seem to take on the popularity they have. It just seems strange to me that the part of the chicken with the least amount of meat, a piddly amount at best, would command such a demand. And then I wondered why on earth restaurants can get away with charging as much as they do for these wings?
I mean you might as well just take a bit of chicken skin, put on all the spices and sauces they add, and serve those, and you'd get almost the same experience, with no bones to throw away.
Anyway, that's what's going through my head at the moment.