The History of McDonalds

May 15th, 1940 is a historic day for all fast food lovers-myself included. On this particular day the McDonald brothers opened their first restaurant in San Bernardino, California under the name “McDonald’s”. Today in 2021, the name McDonald’s has come to mean much more than just a restaurant with a “Speedee” quick food service system. McDonald’s is a worldwide corporation that serves millions of customers on a daily basis. McDonald’s also has an extremely recognizable brand that is embedded in American culture. Ronald McDonald is almost more recognizable to younger generations than Uncle Sam. To understand the successes of McDonald’s you must not only understand the innovations, but also the turmoil and power struggle that defined McDonald’s in its early stages.

When looking to understand the foundation of any business, it is natural to look to the founders. For Richard (Dick) and Maurice (Mac) McDonald, their entrepreneurial spirit was ignited when “They’d watched as their father had been kicked to the curb after 42 years of employment at the G. P. Crafts shoe factory” according to Lisa Napoil in her article entitled “The Story of How McDonalds First Got Its Start”. In order to take control of their financial futures, the brothers first opened a movie theatre. When the theatre business was not booming as they had hoped, the brothers pivoted their business model to focus on a restaurant called McDonalds.

One of McDonald’s main innovations, the “SpeeDee Service System”, was developed in this founding location by the McDonald brothers. This system broke the norms of many restaurants across the country at the time. The standard drive-in procedure would be that you sit in your car, wait for an employee to come take your order, and your order would then come out on a tray with glass plates and metal silverware. The time it took for the entire transaction was significant, and that’s where the McDonald brothers saw their opportunity for innovation. The brothers decided to emphasize efficiency when making the food, as well as using disposable packaging and a walk-up service counter in order to serve the highest number of customers possible. In his article “How McDonald’s Beat Its Early Competition and Became an Icon of Fast Food”, author Christopher Klein compares the McDonald brother’s Speedee System to Henry Ford’s groundbreaking assembly line technology. Klein explains that “Each of its 12-person crew specialized in specific tasks, and much of the food was preassembled”. This substantial decrease in time from grill-to-customer also meant that food rarely went cold and was usually ready within minutes of a customer order. The “SpeeDee Service System” set the new standard for the fast food industry and is widely implemented today.

After implementing the innovative “SpeeDee” system, the only thing left to do for the McDonald brothers was to expand their restaurant into an empire. The franchising process also brought a new business partner for the McDonald’s brothers, Ray Kroc. Kroc was a milkshake mixer salesman from Illinois who became confused when the McDonald’s brothers bought eight mixer’s for their restaurant. Kroc would later become enticed with the “Speedee” service and the McDonald’s restaurant as a whole which leads to him signing on as the company’s franchise agent. The relationship between Kroc and the McDonald brothers did not always remain positive however. With the success of McDonald’s showing even in its early stages, Kroc and the brothers fought for control of the company. The McDonald brother emphasized catering to their loyal customers in San Bernardino while Kroc advocated for rapid expansion. Ultimately, Kroc’s attempts to buy the business are successful and he becomes the sole owner of McDonald’s. Even after this shift in power, it is clear that the McDonald brothers harbored resentment for Kroc. In his autobiography Grinding it out, Kroc writes “It was almost as though they [The McDonald brothers] were hoping I would fail”. In many accounts of the history of McDonald’s, Kroc is portrayed as an aggressive business partner. Coming from a family of Czech immigrants, Kroc was fueled by the same entrepreneurial spirit that the McDonald brothers possessed. Both parties looked to secure their financial futures, but Kroc was more aggressive when it came to expansion. In 1971, the original San Bernardino store closes, effectively signaling the beginning of the Ray Kroc era.

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