...the company’s expansion throughout the country. As Eric Schlosser writes in “Fast Food Nation,” “Franchises and chain stores strive to offer exactly the same product or service at numerous locations. Customers are drawn to familiar brands by an instinct to avoid the unknown. A brand offers a feeling of reassurance when its products are always and everywhere the same.” Truly unique experiences at McDonald’s are most often bad ones—an especially dirty bathroom or a uniquel...
The Church of McDonald’s - The New Yorker
9 years
...rant’s menu or in the experience of eating its food. You may be able to get a McVeggie in Delhi or tofu-and-fish McNuggets in Tokyo, but here in the United States a Big Mac is a Big Mac is a Big Mac; the oil in the fryolator better be set at precisely the correct corporate-mandated temperature, or else somebody is in trouble.
The Church of McDonald’s - The New Yorker
9 years
...ded to address these problems. Seen from that perspective, “Signs” is selling an idea of authenticity: that McDonald’s is not a faceless global corporation but rather, at its heart, a local business. Most of the company’s restaurants are franchises, owned and operated by people who live at least approximately nearby to their customers. The beef and potatoes may not be locally sourced, but the jobs are—and, more important, so is the sentiment.
The Church of McDonald’s - The New Yorker
9 years
McDonald’s, we’re told, is struggling—it is failing to connect to young people, and is losing market share to so-called “fast-casual” competitors like Chipotle and Panera. The company has launched a new marketing campaign intended to address these problems. Seen from that perspective, “Signs” is selling an idea of authenticity: that McDonald’s is not a faceless global ...
The Church of McDonald’s - The New Yorker
9 years
The ad first aired during broadcasts of the N.F.L. playoffs and the Golden Globes, and the response has been mixed. (The ad was also quickly parodied.) People have complained that it is a crass attempt to cash in on the memory of national tragedies—that McDonald’s is using the feelings of solidarity that emerged in the aftermath of 9/11 and the Boston Marathon to sell burgers and fries. (And perhaps for a second time, since the signs themselves had been doing a version of the same thing.) Others argue that it is bitterly ironic for the ad to feature a pro-labor sign, “KEEP JOBS IN ...
The Church of McDonald’s - The New Yorker
9 years
Everybody grumbles—it’s a basic human behavior. Still, it sometimes seems as though everybody’s doing it more. Last week, I spent the day keeping track of my social interactions, asking myself what percentage included grumbling. The answer was nearly a hundred per cent. I had grumbled; my friends had grumbled; if I’d overheard a phone conversation on the street, it had involved grumbling. It’s the kind of thing that makes yo...
A Few Notes on Grumbling - The New Yorker
9 years
The City Council has taken notice. In November, Margaret Chin, a councilmember from lower Manhattan, introduced a bill that would require the Department of Environmental Protection to start sampling noise across the city. The bill notes that “noise pollution is widely prevalent in urban areas” and that “transportation systems are the main source”—though it adds that bulldozers, air compressors, loaders, dump trucks, j...
Mapping New York’s Noisiest Neighborhoods - The New Yorker
9 years
...t to have control over what they order and what they’re eating,” said John Barker, a former chief communications officer for Wendy’s who is an adjunct professor of marketing at Ohio State University. “That trend is just building and building and building.” Bonnie Riggs, an industry analyst with the market-research group NPD, told me that it was also partly a response to fast-casual restaurants, which have been poaching customers from both fast-food and...
Fast-Food Chains’ Secret Menus - The New Yorker
9 years
... Drink, a bar in Boston, offers exactly fifteen off-menu hamburgers every night for the first fifteen people who know to ask for them. And Alfred Coffee and Kitchen, in Los Angeles, will quietly pour espressos in chocolate-dipped ice-cream cones—three dollars for the coffee, five for the cone. Chain restaurants, on the other hand, are known for providing the same experience in every location: a Big Mac is a Big Mac, whether in Boston, Iowa C...
Fast-Food Chains’ Secret Menus - The New Yorker
9 years
The Harvard Square Chipotle is a standard outpost of the brand, neither antiseptically corporate nor intimidatingly hip, but I felt sheepish as I approached the counter on a recent afternoon and asked, “Do you have a secret menu?” Immediately, the line cook snapped into focus and grinned. “Of course!” he said, then, without missing a beat, “I don’t know anything about that.”
Fast-Food Chains’ Secret Menus - The New Yorker
9 years
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