It seems that McDonald's closed stores that operated directly under their control. As a result, only stores in westert part of Russia were closed (in Moscow, Saint-Petersburg). The stores in Siberia (i.e. Novosibirsk) and in Moscow airports continued operating as usual, as they are working under franchaising. Even the mobile app continued functioning. So not much is going to change, I think. Hell, McDonalds is even o…
I think the suggestion is that they are going to remove the branding rights from the franchise owners “de-Arching” them. So there will be no McDonalds branded restaurants in Russia.
Sure they might taste different - but what is McDonalds' recourse? Not sure they can do anything if they've decided to remove themselves from doing business in Russia. Seems similar in situation to the knock-offs in other countries that McD's doesn't do business in.