Hbr McDonalds Case Study

McDonald’s is the world’s largest chain of hamburger fast food restaurants, serving around 68 million customers daily in 119 countries across 35,000 outlets. The company was founded in the United States in 1940 by Richard and Maurice McDonald which was later purchased by Ray Kroc and he oversaw its worldwide growth. The majority of the restaurants are owned through franchises. The primary competitors are other fast food chains like White Castle, Burger King, Wendy’s, Pizza Hut. The McDonald’s Brand is one of the most well-known brands in the world, who doesn’t recognize the golden arches.

Background

On April 6, 2006, Greenpeace posted an article titled “McAmazon” and a 64-page report entitled “Eating up the Amazon” on its website. They specifically indicted McDonald’s for the destruction of the endangered parts of the Amazon rain forest in Brazil. According to Greenpeace, around 1.2 million hectares of soya were planted in the place of Brazilian Amazon rain forest in 2004-2005. Although McDonald’s Europe’s supply chain accounted for only about 0.6% of its suppliers, and less than 0.5% of that was estimated to come from the Amazon area, Greenpeace made a direct assault on the McDonald’s brand. This paper analyzes, discusses, and provides insights on the following questions:

- Why Greenpeace attacked McDonalds irrespective of them not being directly involved in the Amazon rain forest destruction?

- Who are McDonald’s suppliers that are directly involved in the Amazon rain forest destruction?

- How did McDonald’s respond to Greenpeace?

- What kind of initiatives McDonalds have taken to avoid such future attacks by environmental conservationists?

- What were the results of McDonald’s actions?

- What is the complexity of the situation and are there better ways to deal this situation than what McDonald’s did?

Prioritizing Sustainability among other Supply Chain goals

Supply Chain is an integrated framework that combines economic and environmental aspects. So, sustainability should be equally significant along with other supply chain goals.

Sustainability is a growing trend that attracts considerable attention from investors, stakeholders and consumers. Investors and stakeholders care about supply chain sustainability because they like to see McDonalds maintain its social responsibility, “doing the right thing” and ensure that its brand image is protected. McDonald’s does not want another incident such asGreenpeace’s article “McAmazon” directly attacking it for partnering with a supplier that was using deforested land in Brazil.It is highly believed that following sustainable