Coalition of Franchisee Associations

December 19, 2021

McDonald's Invented Diversity

My McDonald's history is divided into two parts, the part I remember intimately and the part I've observed from 30,000 feet.

The first part is the hard work McDonald's Corporation expended to diversify the franchisee base dating back into the 1960s. My involvement in these efforts began in the 1970s as a shave-tail McOpCo guy learning to understand a diverse workforce in Southern California. Then, as a field service guy opening new stores in dusty southwestern towns with a diverse group of franchisees.  That was followed by years in the franchising department, most of which were spent recruiting and processing franchise applicants with a focus on diversity.

But I was just a foot soldier in the effort to make McDonald's a diverse franchise system. My work was duplicated thousands of times across the country. Was this an altruistic effort on the corporation's part? Maybe to some degree but it was generally thought that it was just darned good business. Was it all done with perfection? Afraid not, we only had human beings to work with.

And in my post-McDonald's career, I can only look at things from 30,000 feet. I have no direct knowledge about what happens at the corporate level or at the McDonald's home office. But, it does appear that around five or six years ago "diversity" fell off the corporate radar.

After all, how could a new CEO parachute in from Europe and immediately understand the history of USA race relations and the history of diversity at McDonald's? That CEO was soon sent packing. How could the next CEO, possessing minimal McDonald's experience, have any interest in diversity in the McDonald's system? Especially given the fact that his first years at McDonald's were spent downsizing the franchisee community. This downsizing was done with a spreadsheet and a machete, no humanity was involved. Certain franchisees were a liability to corporate cash flow and had to go, ignoring the corporate culture of inclusiveness.

Then the new CEO proceeded to blunder into politics, making mistake after mistake and embarrassing the McDonald's brand.

The greatest danger is that the still "new" CEO might claim he inherited a McDonald's system that was racially insensitive and he would be the hero that would fix the corporate culture. His recent letter says some good things about the system's history but leaves many opportunities for future falsities.

Spending the next year acting holier-than-thou and claiming he's fixing a broken system might be the only way he can save his job - or his entire career.

What's your version of McDonald's history?

December 14, 2021

December 10, 2021

Beyond Meat Hires Tyson / McDonald's Guys

So who thinks that Beyond stole these Tyson guys without direction from McDonald's Corporate? Pretty soon we won't be able to tell where McDonald's ends and Beyond starts - kind of like Coke.

Marketwatch reports on fake meat company exec hires

December 9, 2021

Fake Meat Humor

"High Horse Inc. is proud to move the world to a new place beyond animal cruelty and into a more natural, organic future, where meat is processed from strange chemicals and protein globs in test tubes and beakers, bubbling and slimy in science labs, forming into coagulated steaming piles of brown mush that drip strange pink fluid and smell like wet cardboard — just as mother nature intended."

 Plant-Based Meat Tastes Like Meat To People Who Have Never Eaten Meat

Starbucks Union Vote Goes Wrong Way

 A first for coffee chain

December 3, 2021

Anonymous Felt This Should be a Thread


Random stuff on the internet should be ignored but this was sent in by anonymous and it alines with anecdotes from McDonald's Owners and with my own personal experience.  DoorDash seems to have very low hiring standards as compared to Uber.  While we are trying to cut down on the number of times we order food delivered, Uber is our only choice due to problems with DoorDash.

"Your order just sits there" DoorDasher claims

November 14, 2021

Comment on Comments

Many anonymous comments have not been approved for posting because they are just too inflammatory. In other words, they contain a lot of name-callings. There is entirely too much name-calling in this country as evidenced by the newly elected Lt. Governor of Virginia being called a "White Supremacist".


Name-calling isn't a discussion, it's the end of discussion.

And I don't think this is all about race. Yes, race is the symptom but the disease is a bumbling CEO who thinks he's here to change the world, not to sell hamburgers.

So please stick to the issues at hand and express yourself without sounding like you on CNN or MSBC.

October 17, 2021

What's With All the "Testing" of McPlany?

Were it not for the pandemic McPlant would probably have gone nationwide in 2020. And Beyond Meat was always destined to be the primary supplier given the it's McDonald's connections. Maybe all the "testing" is a way to excite Beyond Meat's shareholders?

This will be the first time in McDonald's history that Owner/Operator advertising money will be used to buoy up the value of another public company's shares.

October 12, 2021

A Fanatic's Opinion

This is an opinion piece by a very unhappy lady who wants humans to stop eating meat to save the planet. I can't duplicate the editorial here but I will sneak a quote

"McDonald's has a tremendous amount of power and, as such, a tremendous opportunity to shift sustainability efforts toward solutions that work."

Doesn't that sound like a Chris K. press release?

The beef with McDonald's net-zero plan 


September 13, 2021

A McPlant Grows in Britian

This first article describes the rollout of McDonald's fake meat in McDonald’s United Kingdom The second article breaks down the McDonald’s menu for a potential vegan customer. It’s hard to read the vegan article without thinking “these people are crazy”.

Crazy is a harsh word but they certainly are fanatics.

* Exercise fanatics have an ever-shrinking social circle. * 

* Covid-19 fanatics drive around in their cars - alone - wearing a mask.

* Religious fanatics have a hard time finding a place to worship.

* Vegan fanatics have a hard time dining outside their homes.

It's impossible to make these people happy. Your staff should focus on selling real food instead of being distracted by fussy, whinny vegans.

If McDonald's management and directors think McDonald's should be in the vegan business they should use some of their cash to buy one of the already successful vegan restaurant chins.

What's that? There are no successful vegan chains? Never mind.

Meatless in the United Kingdow

Treehugger barks about McDonald's food

September 2, 2021

Still Standing

 
 
Thanks to our website regulars who checked in about my absence. We traveled to what was supposed to be a small family reunion but apparently, everyone was anxious to get out of the house for some human contact it turned into a well-attended midwestern hoe-down. That meant traveling around the great plains catching up with long-lost relatives. And, like many people, I stuff a laptop in my luggage thinking I'll have time to do some work on the trip - not this time.
 
But nothing ever happens in late August. The most exciting thing I've seen is that McDonald's had to stop selling milkshakes in the U.K. Going forward I think I'll take a break from posting in the last half of August and yjr last yeo errkd of December. But, If I do so I'll post a notice that we're going dark for a while.
 
Have a great Labor Day weekend!