Mickey D’s Dos and Don’ts

What’s it going to take to keep folks coming back, driving through or plopping down at America’s generally beloved McDonald’s? Hamburgers alone do not a business make. Not anymore, that is. Not with hungry shareholders and snippy press examining your every move.

I remember a time when my mother gave us a buck and said that we could go ahead and get what we craved. I liked the plain 19 cent burger. I loved the combination of catsup and mustard and pickle on top of a gnarly beef patty, inside a strangely soft bun unlike any other bread we were ever allowed to eat. And I remember those fries. Perfect, crunchy, potato-y, salty and something else we could never describe. Turns out it was beef suet. Rendered fat with real flavor. And a Coke. The truly occasional Coke, from a fountain mix that had real oomph. It was all somehow the real deal.

These days, McDonald's is in a constant battle with every sort of burger, cronut and fresh-pressed juice joint. Fighting for market share and the authenticity crown, in pitched battles over fair-trade farming and food production, pink-slime patty building, and social networking worthy of the NSA.

So what’s a corporate behemoth to do? I mean, we’re talking 35,000 locations worldwide. How do you keep “over 800 zillion served” feeling fresh?

McDonald's CEO Don Thompson, tasked with turning around sales at the burger giant.

It's a question for Don Thompson, the McDonald's CEO who is being tested at the moment. After years of outpacing rivals, McDonald's sales at established locations have slowed. Customers complain of long wait times and wrong orders in restaurants. McDonald's executives agree; internally, they have called the customer service system "broken."

The company has vowed to re-tool its drive-thrus (adding a third window) and reduce the size of its menu to fix the problems. Yet Thompson, who will appear at the Bloomberg Business Summit in Chicago this week for an interview with Bloomberg TV's Betty Liu, needs to do more.

The current focus seems to be on modern efficiency (more slots and choices on the prep table so that beleaguered minimum wagers can slap on a “custom” addition to your burger), yet a third drive-by window so that folks getting that “custom” scramble don’t hold up the just-give-it-to-me line. Mickey D's is still rolling out new interiors, myriad social networking fidgets and still more toys and sports team tie-ins. They’re also reaching for grocery store shelves to expand their presence. Packaged coffee is a natural, and I do think a Big Mac secret sauce next to the ranch dressing section is a distinct possibility.

OK, that’s probably all good business thinking, to some extent, but are those tweaks enough to win the twerk generation? How does this address some of the biggest trend tsunamis coming over the dune? What about local? Seasonal? Non-industrial? Kale?

Maybe none of that really matters. Maybe there will always be a place in world culture and business for some sort of a 20th century American burger joint. Maybe just the occasional face lift is enough. Technological advancements don’t really go beyond some minimal efficiencies (and that multi-slot prep table, not to mention the added pick-up window, are really pretty low-tech). But at a long, gustatory moment when food trucks and market halls are multiplying like rabbit burgers, the fast and efficient, the familiar and consistent may be somewhat at odds with a growing awareness and comfort with the variable nature of real foods and the true life experiences that can go with them. This a moment where there's a waning fascination with anything smacking of futurism.

Maybe we just want something better to eat.

Photos: Getty Images