McDonald's goes bust...?

[Guest guest]

Abandoning beef in the UK? It's got to be good news from the Guardian!

 

ys

hkdd

 

Molly wrote:

 

> /Saturday, March 4, 2006, Guardian <http://www.guardian.co.uk/> / UK /

> *I'm Lovin' It

> The week brought great news for fans of real food: _falling sales

> have forced the closure of 25 UK McDonald's branches._ Could this be

> a tipping point?

> *

> *by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall *

>

> We all have our fantasy headlines - the announcement of events of

> global or national significance that chime irresistibly with our own

> personal values and ambitions. "Texas oil reserves found to be

> unlimited" would probably be George Bush's. Though I suppose it might

> be trumped by "WMDs found in Iraq - and Iran".

>

> Well, I almost got to see one of mine this week. "McDonald's goes

> bust!" - that would have been the undiluted, full-fat,

> maximum-caffeine version. In truth, the news isn't quite that

> spectacular. But it's pretty brilliant all the same: "McDonald's to

> close 25 stores in the UK". Yes! For me, and no doubt others who

> share my loathing of this huge ugly lump of global corporate muscle,

> this is an air-punching moment. All morning after I heard, I was

> wandering about in daze of delighted disbelief. And when I'd done

> with the air-punching, I went for the double forearm salute, shouting

> "YES!" again, through clenched teeth, to my two clenched fists. A

> childish reaction, perhaps, but schadenfreude is primordial stuff.

> And the bigger the beast that's fallen, the greater the glee. In

> short, I'm lovin' it!

>

> At last, it seems that McDonald's is losing its hitherto stellar

> domination of the vast fast-food market in this country. *This is not

> a regional or temporary blip, or a mere tactical realignment. They

> really are in trouble.* Their poor performance in Britain dragged

> profit margins from McDonald's European company-owned restaurants down

> to 14.9% of sales last year - from 15.6% in 2004. *No new openings

> are planned for the coming year*. Even McDonald's European boss,

> Denis Hennequin, is struggling to put a happy face on the situation:

> "The UK has been in negative territory for a couple of years now," he

> admitted. "The brand 15 years ago was very trendy and modern. It is

> now tired."

>

> This is dramatic stuff. It was only a few years ago that the march of

> the Golden Arches seemed inexorable. As recently as 2002, we heard

> that four new stores were opening somewhere on the planet every day.

> McDonald's were able to buy the endorsement of any global superstar

> they felt might enhance their brand. Their supremely aggressive

> advertising, coupled with relentless merchandising tie-ins with

> Hollywood blockbuster kids' movies, gave them untold power over the

> minds, and consequently stomachs, of our kids. *They had seemed, for a

> couple of decades, literally unstoppable*. The halting of such a

> seemingly irresistible force is no mean feat. It smacks of

> revolution. And as we celebrate (dancing in the high street may not

> be excessive) we should ask: How has this been brought about?

>

> There's no doubt in my mind that the *guests of honour at the big

> McClosure bash should* *be Morgan Spurlock, maker of the documentary

> Super Size Me, and Helen Steel and Dave Morris of the McLibel trial*,

> now reworked into a stunning feature documentary. (Incidentally, I

> think Jamie Oliver deserves a few popped corks, too. McDonald's were

> not the focus of his school dinners campaign. But they must have

> suffered by implication. In the end it is easier for concerned

> parents to steer their children clear of the Golden Arches than it is

> for schools to reinvent the greasy wheel of the school canteen. Of

> course we all want this to happen, and parental pressure is the only

> way it will. But it makes sense for parents to put at least some of

> their money where their mouths are....)

>

> As McDonald's themselves have known for a long time, entertainment is

> one of the most powerful marketing tools there is - hence Ronald

> McDonald, and every merchandising deal they have ever done. So to see

> entertainment used as a weapon against them has been especially

> satisfying. The two McMovies between them have certainly done a

> magnificent job of exposing McDonald's as a horrendous corporate

> bully, and a peddler of nutritionally bankrupt junk.

>

> But much more importantly than that, for my money, is the way they

> have encouraged us no longer either to fear McDonald's or to genuflect

> to their supremacy, but to laugh at them. *The best piece of pure

> farce to emerge from the McLibel trial was the revelation that

> McDonald's had hired at least four private detectives to infiltrate

> the London Greenpeace campaign group.* What's more, not all the

> investigators were made aware of each other's existence. They

> therefore ended up wasting fantastic amounts of their time and

> McDonald's money investigating each other.

>

> Super Size Me, as well as being a sizzling indictment of the

> devastating effect of the McDonald's diet on the human body, is also a

> very funny film. And some of its humour is of the gross-out variety

> so beloved of a teenage audience - Spurlock vomiting up his supersized

> Happy Meal before he even gets out of the drive-in is practically a

> Farrelly brothers moment....

>

> Guardian Unlimited

> © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006

>

> © Copyrighted 1997-2006

> www.commondreams.org <http://www.commondreams.org/>

>