The Making of McDonald's

After a long day of sitting in a stifling cubicle inside a tall drab building for work, you get in your car and head home. Trapped in traffic that travels a bit faster than a tortoise, your empty stomach tells your brain to think about food. What’s for dinner? Unless you have leftover food in the fridge or planned ahead and bought ingredients to make a meal for the evening, this is a question that will cross your mind while you ride on the slow, shelled reptile. You think of all the fast-food joints from where you can pick up food on your way from work. A fluffy cloud appears over your head. Inside of the cloud exist a magnificent image of an M; two bright yellow arches. A red-haired giggly clown dances near the arches. You finally decide that you will eat McDonald’s for dinner.

The aforementioned burger joint is one of the most popular restaurants not only in America, but across the entire world as well. There are over 40,000 McDonald’s around the world from Canada to South Africa to Japan. Practically every sentient human in America knows what McDonald’s is. Even two-year-old children, unable to vocalize complete sentences, have uttered the corporation’s name. It’s almost as if McDonald’s has been around since the dawn of America considering the extent to which the restaurant is taken for granted. Nobody imagines that the food chain will be gone anytime soon.

However, the time period in which McDonald’s was founded occurred no earlier than the Big Bang, even if it occasionally seems that way. On the contrary, McDonald’s was founded on May 15, 1940 in San Bernardino, California by two brothers – Richard and Maurice McDonald. From this starting point, the next logical questions are as follows:

How did the restaurant chain become popular? And what originally set it apart from any other restaurant?

Remember that McDonald’s is a business, meaning that there are multiple factors that contributed to its longevity. Therefore, the two questions above can be tackled from various angles.

With the preceding paragraph in mind, we can first direct our attention to the menu items of the restaurant. When McDonald’s was a new joint, it sold only two burgers – hamburgers and cheeseburgers. The former were 15 cents each; the latter, 20. The patties in the burgers were one tenth of a pound. People prefer simplicity over complexity any day of the week. As far as preparation is concerned, the cooks keep the griddle scrapped while frying patties.

Although McDonald’s is technically a burger joint, according to Raymond Kroc, author of Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald’s (1977), the most valuable food item was the McDonald’s French fry. What factors are attributed to the distinct flavor profile of these fries? Why were these fries superior to your standard restaurant fries?

One factor is the oil utilized. Up until the 1990s, McDonald’s fries were fried in beef tallow. Presumably, fries are tastier after being fried in beef tallow as opposed to vegetable or olive oil. Another important factor that contributed to mouth-watering fries was the manner in which the oil was handled. McDonald’s always fried their fries in clean oil. On the other hand, many restaurants fry fries using the same oil they use to fry other foods, such as chicken. A third factor involves the moisture of the potatoes. McDonald’s potatoes are dried before being cooked. This allows the sugars in the potatoes to transform into starch, which enhances the flavor of the fries.

Now that we’ve touched on the burgers and fries, it’s time to mention other McDonald’s food items that became popular. One of these notable items is the Filet-O-Fish, which was first conceptualized in Cincinnati by Louis Groen. At first, Raymond Kroc, who bought McDonald’s from the two brothers in 1961, disapproved of the fish item, stating that it would cause the restaurant to smell nasty. After examining the Filet-O-Fish in a laboratory, Kroc, still partially skeptical, decided to sell the fish sandwich in a limited number of areas. The demand for the cooked fish exceeded the CEO’s expectations. Therefore, in 1965, this fish was sold at all McDonald’s restaurants.

Other now high-ranking McDonald’s items that sprung about were the Big Mac, Apple Pie, and Egg McMuffin. These items were invented by individual operators, unlike the Filet-O-Fish, which was created by someone much higher on the corporate ladder.

Evidently, the McDonald’s menu items had a substantial influence on the success of McDonald’s. Though, the food isn’t the only reason why McDonald’s is so well known today. The MVP who uprooted the chain from its humble beginnings is no other than Kroc himself. McDonald’s would likely still be a simple small town local joint had it not been for the ambitious entrepreneur. What qualities did the exemplary businessman possess that allowed him to propel McDonald’s into the spotlight? Surely, one of his caliber ought to be a fantastic source of wisdom.

The most fundamental lesson Kroc lays out in his book is this:

Success involves risk.

Now, you may be thinking, “That’s it? This is the holy grail of wisdom the great Kroc provides us?” The perspective that you are coming from can be anticipated by those with prescient minds. You believe that this type of wisdom is cliché to the point of being corny. Who can blame you? You’ve heard this many times before. You heard this advice in movies, and you’ve likely heard this many times from parents.

There are those who listen, but don’t hear; look, but don’t see; touch, but don’t feel; etc.

Not only is the risk of failure baked into the equation of becoming a success, says Kroc, but the chance of going broke is inherent in any fresh business venture. This makes sense. After all, many businesses fail. And that’s okay. Each failure in life adds a stair on the path to success. If you, like a donkey, haphazardly plunge into creating a business and fail, then you will be wiped clean. However, if you, like an owl, observantly dive into creating a business and fail, then you can never be zeroed out. You will be able to start your next business or goal from experience. You will know which mistakes to avoid.

Even if a business that is an overall success has minor failures from time to time. One such example in Grinding It Out involves the unsatisfactory launch of a menu item – roast beef. The item was profitable in only a few McDonald’s stores. The operations were not suitable for the testing and distribution of cow chuck. In spite of this failure, McDonald’s remained, and still remains, robust.

Besides the requirement that risk-taking is a key ingredient for a viable business, what other pieces of wisdom can we learn from Kroc? Upon reading Kroc’s book, two life philosophies will stick out: 1) every person is responsible for their own happiness and 2) if you’re not green, you’re not growing. The former is straightforward. The latter eloquently describes the process of improvement. As soon as a fruit is ripe, it’s at its peak. From then on, it begins to rot. Likewise, as long as you are continually learning something new, you’ll remain on an uphill trajectory with respect to any goal you set for yourself.

It is clear that the former McDonald’s CEO had a sharp head on his shoulders. In the preface of Grinding It Out, Kroc was described as a rare individual who was both charismatic and detail oriented; in other words, a mix between a persuasive salesman and an orderly administrator. The entrepreneur took tremendous pride in making McDonald’s successful. This was an easy endeavor by no means. Fortunately for us Americans, we get to enjoy a quick meal at McDonald’s because of Kroc’s determination and persistence.