McDonald’s – Company Overview, History, Products

McDonald’s is one of the most popular American fast food companies that is popularly known for its hamburgers. It was initially founded by two siblings Richard and Maurice in 1940. McDonald’s opened up its first restaurant in San Bernardino, California. As mentioned on the website of the multi-national fast-food chain, McDonald’s has over 38,000 restaurants in over 120 countries. According to the standard sources, the company generated a revenue of over $22.87 billion dollars in the year 2021. It is currently headquartered in Chicago.

If you ever see any fast food restaurant company with the largest revenue, then McDonald’s will always come at the top of the list. As per an estimate, it has over 69 million per day visiting customers who eat from McDonald’s with a presence in over 120 countries. The topmost ordered fast food at McDonald’s includes hamburgers, French fries, and other fast food. They are also famous for their cheese, meat, and other fish and fruits that they use in their burgers.

Most of the revenue that McDonald’s earns from its customers comes from the rent, sponsorships, and royalties paid by other firms and franchisees to customize their special edition fast food including the money that comes from the customers. McDonald’s also is one of the largest employers in the world with over more than 200,000 employees all around the world. But McDonald’s has a quite large brand valuation all over the world as a fast-food retail company.

How Did McDonald’s Start?

Two siblings Richard and Maurice started McDonald’s in North E Street, San Bernardino in California in 1938. They first opened a speedy delivery of the hamburgers in tehri restaurant. McDonald’s main aim was to achieve a good image in the minds of the customers, especially children. The original logo and mascot of McDonald’s was a chef hat on which “Speedee” was written

Initially, when McDonald’s started, it only used to sell hamburgers, french fries, and breakfast food like sandwiches, and desserts. Also, McDonald’s used to sell chicken, salads, and other vegetarian wraps. McDonald’s also cared about the season and it used to sell one special item during a particular season.

Back then, McDonald’s offered only two types of food dining services – Dine-In and Take out. The Dine-In meals were just served the food to the customers on plastic and paper plates. The take-out meals by McDonald’s were properly packaged meals for the customers who wanted to eat out of the restaurant. But now, McDonald’s has also started a Driveway delivery service where the customers make a queue by their car for taking the delivery in their respective cars.

McDonald’s Products

McDonald’s has extra care for the menu that they offer to their customers. McDonald’s in the United States has decided to adopt healthier food options and remove artificial synthesis and other high fructose preservatives to ensure the health of the customers. The Chicken Nuggets in McDonald’s are replaced with chicken skin, safflower oil, and citric acid. McDonald’s has adopted effective fast food to avoid meat wastage and also provide some alternatives to them.
McDonald’s has now focused on removing artificial preservatives and flavors and colors from the hamburgers and meat products.

McDonald’s just now in 2021, announced a new hamburger product called McPlant, which was the special edition plant-based burger by McDonald’s to avoid meat hamburgers and offer some alternatives to the customers for healthier options to avoid calories.

McDonald’s Menu

If you notice carefully then, McDonald’s has several different menus for customers from different countries. For example – McDonald’s in Asian countries popularly serves hot soup. McDonald’s also takes care of the various food taboos of each country, like, beef is banned in India, so McDonald’s doesn’t serve beef hamburgers in India while they serve in other countries. McDonald’s serves McRice in Indonesia because Indonesian people love rice.

McDonald’s also serves prawn burgers in Singapore and Japan and in some of the European countries like Germany, McDonald’s serves beer as well. In New Zealand, McDonald’s sells meat pies.

But during the pandemic, McDonald’s stopped its dine-in services and then started its outdoor seating services like Drive-Thru, Pay and Drive, and Auto-Mac. In 2019, McDonald’s acquired an AI startup Apprente to place McDonald’s orders by the voice of the customers instead of the human servers in United States-based restaurants.