The dateline instantly grabbed my eye: “BEIJING.” So did the lede: “Much of McDonald’s Corp.’s success in China — 42 consecutive months of revenue growth — is based on its four-year-old five-point strategy focused on product, people, place, price and promotion.”
Oh, brother. If the Chicago Sun-Times, having taken the extraordinary step of sending a business reporter to China to report on the Oak Brook, Ill.-based fast food giant, could only come up with such unadulterated corporate-speak, that did not bode well for the rest of its Tuesday story.
Perhaps “story” is too strong a word for a piece that adroitly explained, in five breezy sections, “how that strategy plays out in China and Asia, the company’s most important growth market over the next 10 years.” After all, it only included one quote, from a 23-year-old in Hong Kong who appreciates McDonald’s local menu, who said this: “They added some cultural things to the menu.”
That nagging “man-on-the-street” business taken care of, the Sun-Times‘ Cheryl V. Jackson went on to explain the manifold products McDonald’s offers in China, including the new Mega Mac, which is “a Big Mac with four beef patties” (“Chinese consumers associate beef with strength and energy, management said, noting a 60 percent increase in sales of beef products”), and a “new Quarter Pounder [which] has a spicy sauce, tomatoes and cucumbers, replacing the blander pickles found on the U.S. version.”
“The McPepper currently being promoted is a black-pepper-sauce-seasoned double-patty burger. Quarter Pounders also come in Brazil Black Pepper and Cucumber Vegetable versions. A grilled chicken sandwich, a chicken filet burger, the Filet-O-Fish and McWings all come in spicy varieties,” Jackson added. “The more intense flavoring is spreading to its beverage offerings, with the company recently introducing a peppermint-flavored soda and root beer.”
In contrast to that verbosity, the end of the “PRODUCT” section was frighteningly minimalist:
Other offerings:
Pies on the mainland are fried and come in root taro, green bean and pineapple varieties. The apple version is available in Hong Kong.
Rice burger with chicken or teriyaki beef, where toasted patties of sticky rice stand in for buns.
A sausage-egg-cheese burger with ketchup is made with a regular hamburger bun.
Sides of sweet kernel corn.
Next came “PEOPLE”: “The company is grooming Chinese employees to take over operations, and it has established a leadership development program based on Western management practices.”
That was followed by “PLACE,” which told us that McDonald’s stores “tend to be destination centers where the average customer spends a longer period,” and that dessert is very important. (For somewhat better examples of our craft, check out part one of the paper’s two-part series from Monday, and sidebars below each article. Notice the Hong Kong and Shanghai datelines.)
Under “PRICE,” the Sun-Times explored, among other things, McDonald’s Sino-specific reduced-price Extra Value Meals: “The smallest version, with small fries and small drink, goes for two bucks. Customers can pay another 40 cents and get medium fries and a medium drink. Another 80 cents gets a large fries and large drink.” Then came a surprising note of near-analysis: “Management tries to distance it from the supersize concept it abandoned several years back.”
But by “PROMOTION” (“The company is appealing to women big time”), the Sun-Times was back in line.
Of course, by that point, a section devoted to “PROMOTION” was entirely redundant.
Edward B. Colby was a writer at CJR Daily.