Introduction
McDonald’s truly is a one-of-a-kind company in the modern fast food industry. Remaining at the top of the world’s most famous fast food services list, it maintains an extraordinarily strong presence in the global market and remains memorable and easily distinguishable from the rest of similar organizations. The success of the organization can be attributed to its focus on customer satisfaction and the tendency to push the envelope as far as the customer options are concerned.
In retrospect, McDonald’s success was not quite expected by the general audience since the firm did not introduce any groundbreaking concept when entering the food market. In fact, it was not even the first organization to bring its customer’s fast food products – the White Castle Company had already been operating in the identified market rather successfully when McDonald’s made its first attempt at attracting a new audience (Strom 2015).
However, the firm gained recognition for its unique branding strategy and the ability to update their services and products, at the same time retaining the distinctive characteristics that made the entrepreneurship a worldwide success.
The organization is represented in 119 states and has a total of 34,480 locations in the identified countries as of 2013 statistics (‘Countries without McDonald’s’ 2013). Therefore, the brand recognizability and the popularity of the product delivered by the company can be viewed as McDonald’s key strengths. However, when it comes to identifying the defining feature that makes the company a success, one must mention the fact that McDonald’s approach to production processes, public relations, and company management, in general, is very pliable. By viewing change as an essential part of progress, the leaders of McDonald’s have created the environment in which customer and staff satisfaction can be achieved successfully.
Analysis
The Food industry is one of the aspects of the global economy that many customers take for granted, yet the changes that the target environment has been going through clearly deserve a closer look. The interview with one of the representatives of the McDonald’s service has shed a lot of light on the changes that the organization has been experiencing over the past few years.
Particularly, the focus on green products, the sustainable economy, and the need to respond to the changes in the market and the buyers’ behavior quickly need to be listed among the current priorities of McDonald’s. The identified approach seems rather sensible since the firm needs to cater to the needs of an extremely diverse population, yet the predictability of McDonald’s response to the changes in the global market seems somewhat disappointing.
The approach used by the organization is fully justified by the needs of the target audiences that McDonald’s views as its potential customers. In the environment that can be deemed as highly multicultural, there is a consistent need for maintaining diversity rates high. However, it feels that McDonald’s could have taken more chances with its current approach and explored the areas into which it has not wondered yet. For instance, the design of a new brand that could represent the organization in an entirely new and exciting way could have been a possible solution to the challenges that the entrepreneurship is currently facing.
Nevertheless, one must give McDonald’s credit for remaining at the top of the fast-food industry. The recent focus on sustainability and healthy products can be viewed as a significant improvement in the company’s strategies as it is likely to appeal to a wider range of people. However, it is desirable that the organization should be more innovative in its branding strategies.
Reference List
‘Countries without McDonald’s’ 2013, Fox News. Web.
Strom, S 2015, ‘McDonald’s seeks its fast-food soul’, New York Times. Web.