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<ul><li>As Westlife Development Ltd's <keyword id="126895" type="General" weightage="100" keywordseo="mcdonald" source="Orion">McDonald</keyword> celebrates its 25th anniversary in India this year, we speak to <keyword id="7251099" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="Arvind-RP" source="Orion">Arvind RP</keyword>, Director - Marketing and Communications, <keyword id="602278" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="McDonalds-india" source="Orion">McDonald’s India</keyword> (West and South) about the brand's marketing milestones.</li><li>We discuss several phases of transformation that the brand has gone through over the years to become India’s one of the most trusted brands.</li></ul>McDonald’s, for 25 years, has remained synonymous with burgers in India. The golden arches entered the country in 1996 and was an undisputed leader in burgers until 2014, that’s when its rival Burger King set up its first store in Delhi. However, by then, McDonald’s had captured the lion’s share of the market. Surviving through many neck-to-neck burger rivalries, economic crises and pandemic, McDonald’s stands strong today. When the American fast-food giant first thought of entering the Indian market, it had to face a huge challenge. Across the world, Big Mac beefburger was McDonald’s signature product and India was known as a vegetarian market back then. So, the starting point for McDonald's India was to position itself as Indian, represent family values and culture and position itself as comfortable and easy while retaining its global values. McDonald’s gracefully Indianised its global menu and Indians couldn’t get enough of its burgers, which is a quintessential American fast food. <div type="Video" msid="87852925" hostid="261" title="How to win over a challenging market as India: Inside McDonald’s success story" dataSource="BUSINESSINSIDER" thumbUrl="https://denmark.timesinternet.in/cmslite/api/app/images.jpg?msid=87852925"></div> Sharing how the company laid its foundation into the country, Arvind RP, Director - Marketing and Communications, McDonald’s India (West and South) said, “McDonald's is a very interesting case study. It has gone through several phases in its 25 years in India. Phase one was all about building the foundation through localisation or as we call it, the democratization of the burger. We introduced the McAloo Tikki and many such locally relevant burgers for the Indian market. We also introduced many new practices to win over consumer trust such as using separate veg kitchen and non veg kitchen.” After introducing its famous McAloo Tikki and the Chicken Maharaja Mac, McDonald’s next step was to win consumer trust and it went all out with its marketing activities to woo them. Another way to win over Indians was by offering low prices and beat street food, so it introduced its Happy Price menu starting from Rs 20 back then. McDonald’s made it a point to highlight its ‘value for money’ range in its marketing campaign and that’s when its iconic tagline ‘I’m lovin’ it’ was born too. <div type="Youtube" id="ErnTTK7zOeU" title="Very funny Indian ad for Mcdonalds-Doctor" thumbUrl="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/ErnTTK7zOeU/mqdefault.jpg"></div> “It was time to create a strong brand-connect with consumers for a brand that was unknown in India before that. So, we launched several campaigns, the one campaign that comes to mind is ‘McDonald's mein hai kuch baat’. Those were the early days of laying the foundation for the brand in India. The second phase was more about making it affordable for the masses. McDonald's is a democratic and a mass brand and we also felt that at some point in time, it was important to lay a broader appeal. And that's when we can came up with many campaigns around happy price combos. One such campaign was <a href="https://www.behance.net/gallery/2039247/McDonalds-Happy-Price-Menu">Aapke zamane mein, baap ke zamane ka daam</a> (prices from your father's era, in your era). It was a really stellar campaign with a broad-based appeal.” <div type="Youtube" id="gk5ZiuFhwxI" title="McDonalds India Ad-1997" thumbUrl="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/gk5ZiuFhwxI/mqdefault.jpg"></div> After localising the menu and introducing affordable offers, McDonald’s started focusing on establishing itself as a FoodTech platform. As per Arvind, it was one of the first companies in India to offer home delivery services. “Our early campaigns focused on making the brand more affordable and then it was accelerating to kind of a food tech image. We scaled up on McDelivery. We also launched McCafe around that time, which added a whole new dimension and a whole new vision,” said Arvind. <div type="Youtube" id="HKXeMCL5b2Q" title="McDonald's McDelivery | McDelivery Online | McDonald's India" thumbUrl="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/HKXeMCL5b2Q/mqdefault.jpg"></div> Cut to the pandemic which brought with it a time when all marketing playbooks felt redundant. Even India’s oldest brands were struggling to survive during the initial phases of the lockdown. As the government eased lockdown, the QSR industry left no stone unturned in doubling down on their ‘doorstep and contactless delivery’ proposition. McDonald’s also revamped its marketing strategy; from focusing on creating happy memories, affordability and home-delivery before the pandemic, it started assuring its consumers about its safety practices and focused on empathy after the pandemic. Arvind said, “In the post-pandemic phase, the brand has gone to the next level, we have really amped up on our omni-channel convenience. Delivery is a very important lever for the business today. Over the last two years, we went to the consumer with our golden guarantee campaign. And that went a long way in reassuring consumers in the context of the pandemic, telling them food is safe to eat and also talking about stringent quality standards and safety standards the brand has always had, which elevated during the pandemic. Also, in the post pandemic era, it's important for brands to be empathetic, not to be tone deaf to what's going out there, and tweak their marketing messaging, marketing mix, to kind of be more relevant to today's context.” <div type="Youtube" id="5Qzw-yqjkxw" title="Safety and Hygiene | McDonald's Golden Guarantee | McDonald's" thumbUrl="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/5Qzw-yqjkxw/mqdefault.jpg"></div> Today, home delivery contributes around 40-45% to McDonald’s business and its drive-through services were first to recover post-lockdown. So, the brand started positioning itself as a convenient omni-channel service. Sharing how convenience has taken the center stage today in its communication, Arvind said, “We were the first QSR brand to launch McDelivery in India, and we have been consistently at it to kind of grow it. Pre-pandemic, about 20-25% of the business was delivery and now 40-45% of the business comes from delivery. In fact, our overall convenience channels, which is our delivery, our drive through, our on the go is upwards of 50-60%. So in essence, McDonald's has kind of transformed itself over the years into an omni channel, convenient brand and that's quite important for consumers of today.” To celebrate these milestones and commemorate its 25 years of existence in our country, McDonald’s has launched a new campaign called ‘25ActsofHappy,’ a gourmet range of burgers and healthy beverages. <div type="javascript" title="Instagram" contenttype="Video"><cdata><![CDATA[ ]]></cdata></div> Explaining the thought behind its 25th anniversary campaign, Arvind said, “All kinds of consumers have had wonderful memories of the brand built over the last many years. And our 25 years is all about those happy memories. What we are saying is, we will do 25 acts of happiness over the next one year. And the first such Act has happened, which is all about building memories at McDonald's and bringing them alive. The next such act will happen later in November. So through these 25 acts over the next one year, we want to celebrate the brand and the fandom that McDonald's has among the consumer.” Capturing newly-entered territories If Arvind is to be believed, Mcdonald’s is just getting started! In its next phase of growth, the QSR giant aims to expand its presence further into the country and capture the coffee and fried chicken market. According to Edelweiss Securities report, India’s quick-service restaurant (QSR) market is expected to clock a compound annual growth rate of 23% between 2021 to fiscal year 2025. As per Technopak, India’s food services market was estimated at ₹4,236 billion in FY20. “We plan to open about 25-30 stores every year and are broadly open to emerging retail opportunities. Apart from metros like Mumbai and Bengaluru, even the smaller towns are doing very well. As an example, our drive throughs in some of the smaller towns were the first to recover post pandemic and they went up to over 50% of their original pre-pandemic sales. Our new products like McSpicy fried chicken are higher in demand in smaller towns, especially in the South,” said Arvind. Talking about the next phase of growth, Arvind added, “Future McDonald's would be something that plays across multiple dimensions. The first dimension would be categories, where we build leadership in burger, chicken and coffee. The second dimension would be across different dayparts. We are uniquely positioned as a brand to play across breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner and post dinner. And we have got burgers and beverages that are relevant across these day parts and that's such an important differentiator for the brand.” With its glocal approach and affordable options, McDonald's has quietly made inroads into desi households in these last 25 years and has built a brand connect that is here to stay.

How to win over a challenging market as India: Inside McDonald’s success story

In a bid to attract the middle class Indian who thinks twice before splurging on a costly meal, quick service restaurants had introduced entry-level prices and value meals for less than Rs 50. However, it didn’t get them much crowd, as a result of which, they are now going premium, so that they can bring in elite food lovers. 
 
McDonald's India, for example, has pitched itself as a mass-priced brand for over two decades now, but it has now launched its most expensive burger yet, the Maharaja Mac at Rs 145. Similarly, Dunkin' Donuts would soon be launching specialised coffees. Domino's Pizza tied up with celebrity chef Vikas Khanna last year in a bid to introduce European-styled pizzas and snacks which were priced upwards of Rs 250. Starting next month, the US burger chain Wendy's would be adding beer, wine and premium coffee to its Indian menu. 
 
"QSR was all about operations. Now, it is going back to being restaurants that offer customised and premium products," Jasper Reid, a director of the holding companies of Wendy's and Jamie's Italian in India, told ET. 
 
As per an internal study which was conducted by McDonald's last year, consumers now prefer products that are 'premium and satiating,’ which is why the world's largest restaurant chain saw a 10% jump from 2012 to 2015 in the premium offerings that it offered to young consumers in India. 
 
<a href="http://www.mcdonaldsindia.net/maharaja-mac.aspx">Image source</a>

Quick service restaurants go premium in India, launch costlier products for better sales

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image">THE ECONOMIST</div></div></div>Our flame-grilled guide to currencies suggests the dollar is getting dearer
COUNTRIES with McDonald's fast-food restaurants may only rarely become embroiled in military conflict (Russia and Ukraine are obvious exceptions at the moment), but currency wars are another matter.
In recent years central banks in many rich economies fired up big bond-buying schemes to put some sizzle into economies that had only recently emerged from a deep freeze. Emerging-market governments complained that the capital that flowed their way as a result was hard to digest.
Meanwhile Americans griped that China was serving up an undercooked yuan. Burgernomics provides one way to keep track of the food fight.
Our Big Mac index is based on the theory of purchasing-power parity. It says that in the long run exchange rates ought to adjust so that a basket of goods and services costs the same across countries.
Our basket contains just one item, a Big Mac (except in India, where we substitute the Maharaja Mac, a chicken sandwich). Since a Big Mac costs 48 kroner ($7.76) in Norway and only $4.80 in America, the kroner is overvalued by 62% according to this lighthearted, protein-rich analysis, making it the most puffed-up currency in the index.
The same burger costs just $1.63 in Ukraine, by contrast, making the hryvnia the feeblest currency of the bunch.
The latest dispatch from the world of burgernomics suggests that despite the Federal Reserve's best efforts, the dollar has been fattening up. The average valuation of the currencies in our index (weighted by GDP) has moved from roughly neutral in 2009 to about 15% undervalued against the dollar this year.
Crises of various sorts are partly to blame. Political turmoil is depressing the hryvnia. And quite a lot of the dollar's relative appreciation can be linked to the woes of the euro area.
Flailing French firms may fret about the "crazy euro" but there is little to justify their beef; the euro is near fair value now, down from overvaluation of as much as 50% in 2008. Nordic currencies that looked wildly overvalued by our greasy metric fell closer to fair value during the worst years of the euro crisis--to the relief of Swedish and Danish exporters. Despite its recent rise sterling also remains below its hearty level of six years ago, and is now close to fair value.
Some central banks have helped their currencies slim down. The Swiss franc's decline is thanks in part to the Swiss National Bank. It put a styrofoam lid on the franc's value when capital began flowing in from panicked European investors, lest the rising cost of Swiss exports abroad drive Switzerland into recession.
The Bank of Japan has also taken a bite out of the yen's value. Its generous portion of quantitative easing has helped push the currency down from close to fair value to 24% below it.
The Chinese yuan, once the most undercooked currency in the index, is now only the 12th-most-undervalued, thanks to slow but steady appreciation in recent years. Yet because China's economy has grown so quickly, it has piled on weight in the index, helping to push the average undervaluation even lower.
It is not on the whole surprising that currencies globally are looking a bit less supersized. A healthier American economy and reduced asset purchases by the Federal Reserve are a recipe for a stronger dollar. But American firms need to maintain their competitiveness. History suggests that even when Fed tightening is well done, it is rare that global credit conditions shift without a little scorching.
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The Big Mac index: A basket of sliders

 BIG MAC INDEX: Kroners And Swiss Francs Are Still Overvalued

<div class="KonaFilter image-container float_right"><div class="image">The Economist</div></div>Our bun-loving guide to currencies
LAST summer mere talk from the Federal Reserve about "tapering" (ie, phasing out) its monetary stimulus through asset purchases was enough to fry emerging-market currencies. The exchange rates of the "fragile five"--Brazil, India, Indonesia, South Africa and Turkey--fell sharply. Now that tapering has, belatedly, commenced this month, which currencies look susceptible to further grilling?
The Big Mac index, The Economist's gauge of exchange rates, offers some food for thought. The index is based on the theory of purchasing-power parity (PPP), which holds that currencies should in the long run adjust to rates that would make a basket of goods and services cost the same wherever they were bought. Our basket contains just one item, a Big Mac, since its ingredients are the same the world over, except in India, where the Maharaja Mac is made of chicken. Because buying a Big Mac in Norway, for instance, costs $7.80 at market exchange rates compared with $4.62 in America, our index suggests that the Norwegian krone is almost 70% overvalued.
Of the fragile five, Brazil looks the most vulnerable, because a Big Mac there costs $5.25, implying that the real is overheated by 13%. The other four all have undervalued currencies, to varying degrees. The Indonesian rupiah, the South African rand and the Indian rupee are undercooked by 50% or more.
In the short term, however, it is financial and economic factors, together with confidence or lack of it, that hold sway in currency markets. Brazil is running a current-account deficit of 3% of GDP, but it has a healthy stockpile of foreign-exchange reserves to call upon if necessary. Though the credibility of the Brazilian government has been eroded, the central bank has clawed back some respect by pushing through interest-rate rises.
In contrast, both Turkey and South Africa are running current-account deficits (as shares of their GDP) that are twice as large as Brazil's. Their foreign-exchange reserves are much smaller than Brazil's when gauged against their external-financing requirements. The Turkish lira, which has been plummeting in recent days, has also been affected by the central bank's stubborn refusal to raise interest rates, along with a more general loss of confidence in the Turkish government. The lira has been among the worst performers of the currencies in our index over the past year; as a result, it has swung from 9% overvalued to 19% undervalued.
Although new forecasts from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) this week envisage an increase in global growth from 3% in 2013 to 3.7% in 2014, the demand for commodities is likely to remain restrained. That has already been affecting the currencies of economies that are rich in resources, such as Australia and Canada. Declines in the Australian dollar since it peaked in 2011 mean that it is now undervalued, by 3% according to our index. By contrast the Canadian dollar, which has been dropping sharply in recent weeks, remains overvalued, by 8%.
The IMF is predicting growth for the euro area of just 1% this year. That forecast chimes with the message from the Big Mac index, which finds that the single currency is overvalued, by 7%. The strength of the euro is unwelcome for exporters and casts a shadow over a recovery in the 18-country zone that is already proving to be feeble and faltering. By contrast the British pound is at the right level, according to the index, which should help the much sturdier growth the IMF now expects in Britain this year, of 2.4%.
Our Big Mac index will soon be beefed up with the addition of the Vietnamese dong as McDonald's is soon to open its first branch in Vietnam, the first new country to welcome the golden arches in 15 years. Ketchup on this new entry to our index online next month.
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How to win over a challenging market as India: Inside McDonald’s success story

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Quick service restaurants go premium in India, launch costlier products for better sales

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The Big Mac index: A basket of sliders

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BIG MAC INDEX: Kroners And Swiss Francs Are Still Overvalued

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Grease-Proof Taper: Our Bun-Loving Guide To Currencies

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