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McDonald's Corporation is the world's largest chain of fast-food restaurants. Although McDonald's did not invent the hamburger or fast food, its name has become nearly synonymous with both.
1 Corporate overview
McDonald's Corporation operates more than 31,000 quick-service restaurant businesses under the McDonald's brand, in 121 countries around the world. In addition, the company operates other restaurant brands, such as Aroma Café , Boston Market, Chipotle Mexican Grill, Donatos Pizza and Pret a Manger. Revenues for 2001 were US$14.87 billion, with net income at $1.64 billion.
Most McDonald's offer both counter and drive-through service, with indoor and sometimes outdoor seating. Drive-throughs often have separate stations for placing, paying for, and picking up orders, though often the latter two steps are combined. In some countries "McDrive" locations, near highways, offer no counter service or seating. Locations in high-density neighborhoods, as in many downtowns, often omit drive-through service.
Specially themed restaurants also exist, such as Rock-and-Roll McDonald's, 50's themed restaurants. A select few McDonald's from the 70s or 80s in suburban areas feature large indoor or outdoor playgrounds, called McDonald's Playlands or PlayPlaces.
The McDonald's Corporation's business model is slightly different from that of most other fast-food chains. In addition to ordinary franchiseFranchise agreement Franchising from the French for 'Free', franchising is a method of doing business wherein a franchisor licenses trademarks and methods of doing business to a franchisee in exchange for a recurring royalty fee. The term is commonly used fees, supplies and percentage of sales, McDonald's also collects rentRenting is an agreement where a payment is made for the temporary use of a good owned by another person or company. Examples: Housing tenure, where the person who lives in the house is a tenant, paying rent to the landlord, who owns the property. The rent, partially linked to sales. As a condition of the franchise agreement, McDonald's owns the property on which most McDonald's franchises are located. According to Harry J. Sonneborne , one of McDonald's founders:
- "We are in the real estateReal estate is a legal term that encompasses land along with anything permanently affixed to the land, such as buildings. Real estate is often considered synonymous with real property (also sometimes called realty , in contrast with personal property, or business. The only reason we sell hamburgers is because they are the greatest producer of revenue from which our tenantA tenant (from the Latin tenere to hold), in legal contexts, holds real property by some form of title from a landlord. Various forms of tenancy exist, or have existed in the past. These include: socage tenancy for life tenancy for years tenancy from years can pay us rent."
McDonald's trains its franchisees and others at Hamburger UniversityHamburger University is a 130,000 square foot (12,000 m²) training facility of McDonald's Corporation, located in Oak Brook, Illinois. The university was designed to instruct personnel employed by McDonald's in the various aspects of the business. The uni in Oak Brook, IllinoisOak Brook is a suburb of Chicago located in DuPage County, Illinois. As of the 2000 census, the village had a total population of 8,702. Oak Brook hosts the world headquarters of McDonald's Corporation, which include the company's principal training facil.
2 History
50s-themed McDonald's sign in Bangor, MaineBangor is a city located in Penobscot County, Maine, United States. As of the 2000 census, the city had a total population of 31,473. It is the county seat of Penobscot County 6. In the 19th Century it was a center of the timber and logging business and a
- 1940Events January-February January 5 FM radio is demonstrated to the FCC for the first time. January 6 World War II: Mass execution of Poles, committed by Germans in the Poznan, Warthegau. January 12 World War II: Russia bombs cities in Finland. February 2 F: The first McDonald's restaurant was founded on May 15 by brothers Dick and Mac McDonald in San Bernardino, California.
- 1948: The McDonald's restaurant gained fame when the brothers implemented their innovative "Speedee Service System", an assembly line for hamburgers.
- 1954: entrepreneur and milkshake-mixer salesman Ray Kroc became interested in the McDonald's restaurant when he learned of its extraordinary capacity. After seeing the restaurant in operation, he approached the McDonald brothers with a proposition to open new McDonald's restaurants, with himself as the first franchisee. Kroc worked hard to sell McDonald's. He even attempted to prevail on his wartime acquaintance with Walt Disney, in the failed hope of opening a McDonald's at the soon-to-be-opened Disneyland. Eventually he opened his first restaurant in Des Plaines, Illinois. It was an immediate success.
- 1955: Kroc founds "McDonald's Systems Inc.", on March 2.
- 1960: The company was renamed "McDonald's Corporation".
- 1961: McDonald's brothers agreed to sell Kroc business rights to their operation for $2.7 million, which Kroc borrowed from a number of investors (including Princeton University). The agreement allowed the brothers to keep their original restaurant—renamed "The Big M"—which remained open until Kroc drove it out of business by opening a McDonald's just one block north. Had the brothers maintained their original agreement, which granted them 0.5% of the chain's annual revenues, they would have been collecting nearly $180 million per year today.
- early 1960s: One of Kroc's marketing insights was his decision to market McDonald's hamburgers to families and children. A Washington, DC franchisee sponsored a children's show called Bozo's Circus, 'Bozo' was a franchised character, played (in Los Angeles) by Willard Scott. After the show was cancelled, Goldstein hired Scott to portray McDonald's new mascot, " Ronald McDonald" in the first three television advertisements featuring the character. The character was eventually spread to the rest of the country via an advertising campaign, although it was decided that both Scott and his version of the original costume were unsuitable for the role. An entire cast of McDonaldland characters was developed.
- 1974: On October 12, the first Mcdonald's open in the United Kingdom
- 1990: On January 31, the first McDonald's opened in Moscow. In contrast to the fast food stereotypes of McDonalds in the United States where it is seen as cheap, convenient, low quality food, in parts of the world such as Russia and China, McDonald's food is seen as a status symbol and the restaurants are admired for their atmosphere and cleanliness.
- 1992: Stella Liebeck receives third degree burns from coffee purchased at a McDonald's drive-through. She sued in what became known as the McDonald's coffee case.
- circa 1995: McDonald's receives complaints from franchisers that too many franchises were being granted, leading to competition among franchisees. McDonald's started conducting market impact studies before granting further franchises.
- 1997: McDonald's wins the "McLibel" case, in what many consider to be a Pyrrhic victory in terms of its image.
- 2001: The FBI reported that employees of Simon Worldwide, a company hired by McDonald's to provide promotion marketing services for Happy Meals and the 'Millionaire'/'Monopoly' contest, stole winning game pieces worth more than $20 million.
- 2002: A survey in Restaurants and Institutions Magazine , ranked McDonald's 15th in food quality among hamburger chains.
- 2002: McDonald's posted its first quarterly loss ($344m) for the last quarter. It responded to the stiff competition from other fast food restaurants, offering higher quality burgers and more variety, by attempting to move more upmarket by expanding its menu and refitting restaurants.
- 2003 McDonalds started a global marketing campaign which promotes a new healthier and higher-quality image. The campaign was labeled " I'm lovin' it™" and began simultaneously in more than 100 countries around the world.
- 2003: According to Technomic, a market research firm, McDonald's share of the market has fallen 3% in five years and is now at 15.2%. [1]
- 2003: The firm reports a $126m loss for the fourth quarter [2].
