Research and written assignment: McDonald’s, Week02

Today’s assignment is to recognize the SCAMPER method used in the historic promotion of the fast-food chain McDonald’s. I started reading the Britannica entry.

Already in this early paragraph, we can see three SCAMPER points used. We had the adaptation and elimination when the brothers sold their product over the counter to cut the time and money serving at tables required. Cooking the hamburgers ahead of orders and heating them under lamps gave a modification to the product and production and eliminated time spent on each order. 

Soon, the restaurant became a franchise, enabling the company to repeat the first restaurant’s success again and again in new places, which magnified the product by making it familiar. Magnifying it further, the company created the logo in 1962, which is one now of the most recognizable images in the world, and in 1963 the famous clown appeared for the first time.

As the company grew, criticism increased accordingly. Health concerns, environmental damage, and low wages harmed the brand’s reputation. In 1973 the brand started doing charity work combating some of the damage to the brand name, which in many ways uses all of the SCAMPER points. Some SCAMPER points are: 

–substituting focus on issues within the production of the products to focus on work done besides the company’s main activity

–combining fast food with charity

–adapting to a changing society and environment

–modifying the brand and the product to be acceptable (also done by changing ingredients in products in countries forbidding certain items)

–eliminating criticism by making these changes already mentioned.