History of McDonald’s

In America, food culture has been dominated by fast food outlets for the last few decades, and
in fast food, McDonald's is king. McDonald's Corporation is the world's largest chain of
hamburger fast food restaurants, serving more than 58 million customers daily. Simple and
efficient format that permitted the brothers to produce huge quantities of food at low prices. A
basic hamburger cost 15 cents, about half the price charged by competing restaurants. The self-
service counter eliminated the need for waiters and waitresses; customers received their food
quickly because hamburgers were cooked ahead of time, wrapped, and warmed under heat
lamps. The first McDonald’s restaurant was started in 1948 by brothers Maurice (“Mac”)
and Richard McDonald in San Bernardino, California. They bought appliances for their
small hamburger restaurant. The first McDonald's restaurant opened in Des Plaines Illinois on
April 15, 1955. Their first day sales were $366.12. By 1965 there would be over 700 McD's
throughout the United States

The first McDonald's, Des Plaines Illinois, 1955

The public face of McDonald’s was created in 1963 with the introduction of a clown named
Ronald McDonald, while the double-arch “m” symbol became McDonald’s most enduring logo
in 1962, lasting far longer than the tall yellow arches that had once dominated the earlier
restaurant rooftops. Other products and symbols would define the McDonald’s brand, including
the Big Mac (1968), the Egg McMuffin (1973), Happy Meals (1979), and Chicken McNuggets
(1983).
The chain continued to expand domestically and internationally, extending to Canada in 1967,
reaching a total of 10,000 restaurants by 1988, and operating more than 35,000 outlets in more
than 100 countries in the early 21st century. Growth was so swift in the 1990s that it was said a
new McDonald’s opened somewhere in the world every five hours. It effectively became the
most popular family restaurant, emphasizing affordable food, fun, and flavors that appealed to
children and adults alike.

Present Position:
McDonald’s has made itself to be the family friendly low-cost restaurant in the fast food
business. We have a narrow scope for a customer base and a low-cost strategy.
McDonald's today:
Number of Global Restaurants:
More than 32,000
Number of Countries:
117
Number of worldwide employees:
1.7 million
Percentage of franchised restaurants around the world:
More than 75%

Strategic Positioning is defined as doing different activities than your competitors or doing the
same activities differently. This is the way your company becomes a superior performer in the
industry. Many people describe their positioning based on their customer base. For example,
Burger King focuses on young adult males as their target customer. Their strategy and
positioning are directed to satisfy this sector of the market. Wendy's on the other hand has a
different positioning. They base their positioning to satisfy the older health conscious
individuals. They both differ from our strategy. When you simplify things down it turns out
there are only two basic types of positioning; low cost or differentiation. This is how you choose
to serve your customer base, or how your customer base guides you to operate. You choose
your customer base to be either broad or narrow scope. The company needs to select one or
the other in both categories or they will achieve below average results and be mediocre. We
have selected one and are doing it well

Product and Services:

McDonald’s deals with products such as French fries, hamburgers, milkshakes, and
cheeseburgers among many others, the fast food giant has also expanded to serving fish, fruits,
salads, and smoothies. McDonald’s serves close to 69 million consumers in more than 100
countries and this is where most of their 24.6 billion dollars’ worth of revenue (as at 2016) is
generated from.

1 Hamburgers

1.1 Hamburger

1.1.1 Double Cheeseburger

1.1.2 Triple Cheeseburger

1.2 Big Mac

1.3 Quarter Pounder

1.4 Big N' Tasty

1.5 McDouble

1.5.1 Bacon McDouble

1.5.2 Daily Double

1.6 McFeast

1.7 Other notable burgers

2 Chicken

2.1 McChicken

2.2 McNuggets

2.3 Premium Chicken Sandwiches

2.3.1 Premium Chicken Deluxe

2.3.1.1 Grilled Chicken Deluxe

2.3.2 Tasted Crafted

2.3.3 Deli Choices

2.4 Snack Wrap

2.5 Premium Chicken McWrap

2.6 Chicken McBites

2.7 McArabia

2.8 Buttermilk Crispy Tenders

2.9 Other notable chicken products

3 Fish

4 Pork

5 Sauces

5.1 Szechuan Sauce

6 Other products

6.1 Salads

6.2 Sides

6.2.1 Loaded Fries

6.3 The Happy Meal

7 Breakfast

7.1 McMuffins

7.2 Breakfast Sandwiches

7.2.1 Bagels

7.3 Breakfast Wraps

7.4 All Day Breakfast

7.5 All Day Lunch

7.6 Additional Breakfast Items

8 Beverages

8.1 Soft Drinks

8.2 Coffee and tea

8.3 Shakes
8.4 Alcoholic Beverages

8.5 Frozen Beverages

9 Desserts

Service Design Model

McDonald's makes use of a restricted menu, division of labor, a homogenous product,
assembly-line strategy, task groping to enable specialized skills, all applied to the practical
principle that is shielded from the customer. Product quality and customer satisfaction are the
basis that enables McDonald's to create the exceptional fast food service. Since McDonald's
was established, the service concept has been based on the first-class quality, value, and
cleanness, which has become an essential service direction of the company's marketing
operations (Thornton et al., 2016). Most importantly, the service concept is facilitated by the
employees who reveal positive attitudes and commitment aimed to customer satisfaction. In
this case, McDonald's restaurants concentrate on attracting and employing the best and at the
same time offer the finest place to work.
The company embraces strict sanitary principles to keep a clean kitchen and dining
environment. McDonald's aims to offer distinctive service quality and high value to its
customers as it is broadly recognized that the service quality is a major aspect in defining the
accomplishment of a company (Schaarschmidt, 2016). The company has a belief that it is more
convincing in marketing the brand by using the service concept along with the service
operation. According to Hanks and Wansink (2013), the continuous change across the globe
calls for an appropriate service operation in any business corporation that is in line with the
changing customer preferences.

Competitions:
McDonald's competition is diverse and boundaryless. The company competes with large
international and national food chains as well as regional and local retailers of food products. It
competes globally on price, convenience, service, menu variety, and product quality in the
fragmented restaurant industry.
As we discussed above, McDonald’s faces competition from local food outlets to global food chains. So,
competition is fierce for McDonald’s. It competes directly with similar format chains such as Yum!
Brands (YUM), The Wendy’s Company (WEN), Domino’s Pizza (DPZ), Burger King, and Jack in the Box
(JACK). It’s also facing increased competition from other formats such as Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG),
The Cheesecake Factory (CAKE), Panera Bread, and many more.

Additionally, Starbucks (SBUX), Darden Restaurants (DRI), Tim Hortons, and Bloomin’ Brands (BLMN) are
some other food and coffee providers that offer people options when they plan to eat out.

Market Share:

Market leaders of fast food is McDonald’s, with a market of 22% globally. Where Burger king
holds 3.2% and Starbucks holds 4.6% of share. It refers they have a strong control over the
global share market.