A small-time Irish businessman in the early 1950s, portrayed by Bob Hoskins in the film The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne, tells of turning down an offer to sink some money into some new fangled American notion of "fast food" as "it clearly had no future". How wrong can one be? Thirty-five years on, from darkest Africa to the Russian steppes, the onward march of McDonalds' yellow arches towards global domination of the junk food market seems unstoppable.
The organisation, which operates some 23,200 outlets in 110 countries, said this week that alarmist conjecture of market saturation was not warranted. Indeed McDonalds plans to further tighten its grip as the major Irish purveyor of the ubiquitous burger and French fries with yet more outlets. Mr Andy Corcoran, Ronald's chief representative in Ireland, said that the Big Mac will be spreading its tentacles with an additional 36 outlets, bringing the number to 75 by the year 2000 (McDonalds prefers to use the word "restaurant" to the more accurate, but downmarket "fast food" outlet). The company also plans to double its payroll by recruiting 2,500 additional staff. So far this year, sales in Ireland have grown by 9 per cent and the US-based conglomerate is aiming to grow turnover by £15 million to £75 million. The group already has planning permission to bring its chrome and plastic emporiums to Castlebar, Quarryvale, Mallow, Mullingar, Roscrea and Swords, indirectly creating downstream employment opportunities for additional community litter-clearing staff in those areas.
Corcoran contends that as there is only one restaurant for every 50,000 people in Dublin further substantial growth opportunities exist. He could well be right. On a global scale, Big Macs are only available to a fortunate 1 per cent of the world's population; remarkably there are still vast tracts of the Australian bush and Gobi desert without a single yellow arch or an abandoned biodegradable chip carton.
Corcoran claims that the average return for the franchisee is in excess of 60 per cent. He also notes that in Irish towns with a McDonalds some 57 per cent of 15 to 55 year-olds wrap their jaws around a Big Mac an average three times every 28 days. As Fox Mulder would say, spooky.
