This is somewhat false. McDonalds amassed all of this real estate during the normal course of doing its main business. It would be like saying Walmart is in the shelf business because they have a lot of shelves. If amassing large amounts of real estate is the end goal, selling burgers for 50 years is probably not the best way to do it. I think McDonalds fears that if it spins off its real estate holdings, those prope…
When Starbucks went public, they explicitly told the investment community "don't invest in us because of coffee, invest in us because of real estate, we are a real estate company that happens to sell coffee"
An important point about owning the franchise real estate: a rental agreement is far stronger for the landowner than a franchise agreement is for a franchiser. The McDonald's franchise agreement specifies the address the franchise must be located. In effect, McDonald's can cancel a franchise agreement by ending the rental agreement. This gives them enormous power to enforce company-wide standards on cleanliness and m…
>The McDonald's franchise agreement specifies the address the franchise must be located. In effect, McDonald's can cancel a franchise agreement by ending the rental agreement. I don't think you are really taking a position, just acknowledging McD has power to enforce Franchise Agreements more than others Franchisors because separately they tend to also be landlord. on first reading though I thought your comment was s…
My interpretation of what he says was basically McD's has more leverage. Part of establishing a restaurant is establishing enough return clientele at a certain location. And a large portion of the clientele might stay with the owner if it turned into a Jack in the Box. But this number drops off a cliff if it's also across the street. So the BATNA for a non-McDonalds franchisee is just switching franchises, and taking a hit to their business. But the BATNA for a McDonald's franchise is starting all over again.
ie -> in example. Burger King is the only example I explicitly recall.
Ah, right, no. "i.e." is an abbreviation for the Latin "id est", meaning "that is". "For example" would be "e.g.", ("exempli gratia" in Latin.) "E.g." is illustrative, whereas "i.e." is exhaustive. I hadn't heard "i.e." expanded to "in example" before - that explains one source of misunderstanding (despite being grammatically incorrect in its own right). Edit: It seems you've since been unfairly downvoted for explain…
I forget where I picked this up, but I use the following to keep them straight:
ie -> in example. Burger King is the only example I explicitly recall.
Ah, right, no. "i.e." is an abbreviation for the Latin "id est", meaning "that is". "For example" would be "e.g.", ("exempli gratia" in Latin.) "E.g." is illustrative, whereas "i.e." is exhaustive. I hadn't heard "i.e." expanded to "in example" before - that explains one source of misunderstanding (despite being grammatically incorrect in its own right). Edit: It seems you've since been unfairly downvoted for explain…
I can never remember the Latin, but in my mind, I usually substitute i.e. to mean "in essence" and e.g. as "e.g.xample" to remember which means which.
> And it isn't as though a drop in temperature of 5 degrees changes the flavor. Leaving aside the rest of the discussion, and not even addressing if throwing it out was good/fine, this line stood out to me. I often feel that temperature changes the taste. More obvious in ranges > 5 degrees, but still noticeable at that range. Given how subjective taste is, it's hard to prove, though I'm sure some neurologist has hook…
It's well known that the current temperature changes the taste. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/19/temperature-can-eff... But, I think his comment was changing the temperature is easy, and having food get cold does not change the taste after reheating. However, there is a large food safety issue with how long food stays between 40f and 140f, which is probably the root cause of this policy.
I don't agree with your assessment of the comment, it seems very clear that he thinks temperature does not affect the flavor.
Also, maybe I'm the only one, but I think (some) food tastes entirely different after a trip through the microwave.
Off-topic: How can HuffPo not know the difference between effect and affect?
In a Country that largely believes virgin birth and one very specific zombie. One crazy belief is not sign of universal insanity. Perhaps though it is a sign of susceptibility, which is what we seem to be talking about.
I just knew some smartass was going to liken Santa Claus to God.
Both make a list of the naughty and nice boys and girls. One substitutes brimstone for coal, nebulous "eternal happiness" for toys, but they seem pretty similar to me.
It was an eye-opener for me when I was a teen and bought a gallon of soft drink syrup from a McDonald's for use at a party. It worked out to about 5 cents a cup for the drink in a soft drink, which sold for 75 cents (if I remember correctly). McDonald's doesn't make money selling burgers, they make money selling the soft drinks and the fries. The same goes for any restaurant, it's why they ply you for drinks.
I've always assumed the costs surrounding a cup of soda (machine, CO2, ice, cups, lids, straws) are actually much higher then the cost of the syrup itself.
When I was a teenager I heard 17c for the cup, Of course they go for like $1.50 so no matter how it breaks down, it's a nice ROI.
>The McDonald's franchise agreement specifies the address the franchise must be located. In effect, McDonald's can cancel a franchise agreement by ending the rental agreement. I don't think you are really taking a position, just acknowledging McD has power to enforce Franchise Agreements more than others Franchisors because separately they tend to also be landlord. on first reading though I thought your comment was s…
My interpretation of what he says was basically McD's has more leverage. Part of establishing a restaurant is establishing enough return clientele at a certain location. And a large portion of the clientele might stay with the owner if it turned into a Jack in the Box. But this number drops off a cliff if it's also across the street. So the BATNA for a non-McDonalds franchisee is just switching franchises, and taking…
Actually, the book expands on that. Originally, McDonald's franchise agreements had exclusive territories (in fact, a franchise agreement could be for an entire region/state/country). McDonald's franchise agreements eventually specified a particular address (own by McDonald's) without any exclusive territory. If you lose the rental of that property, you lose the ability to run the franchise.
The owner/operators purchase from approved vendors; I've been out of the game for awhile, but we bought everything through two distributors; bread products from an approved vendor, and everything else from a second vendor.
It is all through one distribution vendor with regards to product now. Only plant(equipment) purchases are outside of the primary distributor now.
It's killing me that I can't remember the distributor! Sixteen years of working through them and my mind is a sieve. This was in SoCal, and they had the contract for almost all of the region.