Coalition of Franchisee Associations

May 7, 2009

Something Squirrelly With Your McCafe Bills?



Now that the smoke is clearing from the McCafe installations
(at least in 70% of USA stores) it would be wise for the
individual Owner/Operator to take a good, line by line look at
the costs being billed by the corporate approved contractors
and suppliers.

I'm hearing a new horror story everyday about unjustifiable
and unexplainable expenses with no responsibility borne
by McDonald's corporate people.

It must come as a surprise to corporate staffers that Owner/
Operators know what it costs to install a drink system, move
a wall, or cut in a floor sink. These bureaucrats have never
had to write the checks so it's up to the Operators to keep
track of these things.

What can an Owner/Operator do about these over charges?
You probably won't ever get your money back but at least
the corporate types can be made aware you are on to their
game. That might prevent this from happening again, for
instance, when you change out your MFY kitchens in a few
years.

The other question is - what happened to all that money?
This will possibly amount to $100 to $200 million in over
charges just for the United States.

It's hard to believe Oak Brook facilitated these excesses as
a simple favor to their captive contractors and suppliers.
Ah, the wonder of only using privately held vendors with no
transparency requirements!

.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

$1000 PER HOUR LABOR to install beverage system???????????? Somebodies getting a kickback here.

Anonymous said...

Contrary to the free
enterprise system and good
business practices we were
forced to accept the
worst contractors available
who charged us the highest
prices.

Problem was this deal was
designed a few years ago
when every contractor and
tradesman in the country
wasn't looking for work.

Nobody in OB was smart enough
to reset the remodel prices
to 2009 rates. Seems nobody
at McD understands supply
and demand.

Richard Adams said...

It would be fun to see the bills on the McOpCo remodels.

Anonymous said...

compared to the dozens of remodels I've done @ mcd stores over 30 yrs Id say everything in cbb was marked up 25% maybe 30%