"QuarterPounder" news and stories

Burger King Double Cheeseburger. Photo: sjeemz, Flickr.

The King has had a change of heart. Starting Oct. 19, Burger King will offer its quarter-pound double cheeseburger for $1 nationwide. This comes after we reported back in July that franchisees turned down a plan to instead sell the double cheeseburger for a buck, forcing the chain to plan a coupon campaign targeting nearly 80 million households nationwide.

But Nation's Restaurant News reports that the $1 promotion is just the fast-food giant's latest attempt to boost sales following a 4.5-percent drop in the last quarter.

The point of fast-food franchises is instant familiarity--every outlet serving the same food under the same sign in essentially the same building. But McDonald's has been messing with that paradigm, opening new restaurants that are hard to recognize as the home of Ronald and the Big Mac. Viva McDonald's recently opened on the Las Vegas Strip, tearing down a 25-year-old golden arches to rebuild a slick new restaurant. The arch is still there--at least one, anyway--stretched as a marquee above a row of 20-foot wide video screens. Inside, there's something of the Quonset hut design of a Chipotle, along with even more screens, all broadcasting McDonald's own in-house TV channel. You can even get a latte and use wi-fi!

Not enough change for you? How about the McDonald's with no branding at all, not even the name. In Tokyo, the fast-food megalith has opened several small restaurants named, simply, Quarter Pounder. There's not an arch in sight--the black-and-red decor looks more like a bar or nightclub and even the wrappers are redesigned, streamlined and logo-free. However, don't get your hopes up about a chic new shame-based No-I-Am-Not-a-McDonald's: The stores are open as part of a promotion for the quarter pounder, which was not previously available in Japan.

Did you know that the first McDonald's restaurant in the UK opened in Woolwich on October 12, 1974?

This was the company's 3,000th restaurant in the world. The cities of Tokyo, Amsterdam, Munich and Sydney all had McDonald eateries before the UK, but the UK was ahead of the French who took until 1979 to succumb to the lure of "Le Big Mac." The 1,000th UK outlet was opened in 2000, inside the Millennium Dome but since then, with declining sales, many have closed such as this one I found on flickr.

On this day (June 19th) in 1997 McDonalds won a partial victory in the longest trial in English legal history. Two environmental campaigners had published a leaflet accusing the company of several unethical and environmentally destructive activities. The judge agreed with the fast food giant that some of the claims made in the leaflet were unjustified.