WITH its battle against "McJobs" jibes and facing a backlash over healthy eating, McDonald's is facing one of the toughest times in its 34-year history of operating the UK. Thomas Kelly is the man charged with leading the burger chain's Scottish bran
ches through what the company admits is a time of transformation. In just the past six months, the firm has ploughed £3 million into revamping its branches north of the Border. The style is deliberately more coffee-shop interior than the garish burger bar atmosphere it adopted in the 1990s.
"We've had more changes in the last two years than in the previous 30," says Kelly. But the changes appear to be working. Despite a massive nationwide shift towards more healthy eating over the past five years, McDonald's in Scotland – and across the rest of the UK – last year enjoyed its most successful 12 months since 1996, with revenue rising by around 7 per cent to more than £120m. Customer numbers are on the up, also by about 7 per cent.
Sitting in Glasgow's Sauchiehall Street branch, the chain is almost unrecognisable, save for the familiar golden arches emblazoned above the door and on food packaging. Shiny green apples form the centrepiece of a decorative, glass shelving display, while the decor is all in muted browns and creams with squishy leather-look stools making up part of the seating arrangements.
"We have a very varied customer demographic and we have to do everything we can to accommodate that," says Kelly. "That's why we have a variety of seating – from long, low tables for groups of teenagers to higher rounded seating areas for older people."
And even the famous Ronald McDonald icon has been all but axed as part of the revamp. "Ronald polarises opinion. We bring him out occasionally," says Kelly, who started his career as a graduate trainee at the firm 19 years ago and has held positions from burger flipper to his current title of director of operations in Scotland and Northern Ireland.
"Last year, we took him to a football match we were sponsoring and the kids loved him – but they had no idea who he was. My five-year-old daughter is very aware of McDonald's – she loves it – but she doesn't know anything about Ronald."
But while the image is decidedly different, the core product remains the same: Big Macs sell more than one million every week in Scotland alone. "We like to have a choice of salads or sandwiches, but our main bestseller remains the hamburger, because we sell them so well," Kelly says.
However, even the Big Mac has undergone a change, with McDonald's working to reduce fat, salt and sugar and introducing nutritional information on its products – an idea trialled in Scotland two years ago and later rolled out across the country. Free wi-fi throughout the branch has made it a common stop-off for business customers on their way to a meeting, while the range of coffee on offer has exploded from the previous single option of a tall black to include lattes and cappuccinos.
While McDonald's says it is still on the lookout for obvious new opportunities, its major concern is consolidating its existing 92-strong Scottish chain. It plans to invest about a further £3m in the renovation of the branches over the coming nine months or so.
But Kelly is confident that now having started to embrace a new way of doing things, the brand will remain in a constant state of flux. He says: "It is a bit like painting the Forth Bridge. We'll finish renovating all of the branches and then start again – what looks modern now isn't necessarily going to in a few years."
As McDonald's's is a relatively low-cost restaurant, Kelly is not too worried about the effect the credit crunch will have on his business. He explains: "At times when people don't have as much money, they want good value and that's what we can offer them."
He is expecting a growing awareness of the changes within McDonald's to boost customer numbers even further. "We're expecting a similar rate of growth as last year," he says. "As people find out more and more what is available, they will visit more."
MILLION SELLER MCDONALD'S first came to the UK in 1974 after trading for more than 30 years on the other side of the Atlantic.
Now, the company serves more than 2.5 million people in Britain everyday – and more than one million Big Macs a week in Scotland alone.
In the US, the business began in 1940, with a restaurant opened by siblings Dick and Mac McDonald in San Bernardino, California.
The restaurants are now found in 120 countries worldwide and serve nearly 54 million customers a day.
The full article contains 824 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
