Sir, - I refer to Wesley Boyd's Irishman's Diary on Ray Kroc and McDonald's (July 13th). Mr Boyd gives an interesting insight into how meticulous and thorough Mr Kroc was.
However, he seems to have fallen for some of the Ray Kroc mythology on the "humble" origins of McDonald's. By 1954, when Ray Kroc came upon McDonald's, they were already a legend in the food industry. The magazine American Restaurant had done a cover story on them in 1952. McDonald's was one of the most successful restaurants in America and many people came to visit and see how they operated. Mr Boyd says that Ray Kroc talked the McDonald brothers, Dick and Maurice (Mac), into allowing him become their first franchisee, as if the brothers had no ambition and never thought of this before. By the time Ray Kroc visited them, the McDonald brothers already had a dozen franchises operating.
Much of what is associated with McDonald's today owes its origin to the two founding brothers. The idea of announcing how many hamburgers had been sold to date goes back to as early as 1950. They had a sign outside saying "Over one million sold". The brothers also came up with the design of the sloping roof and red-and-white tiles. Those famous golden arches were first used in their first franchise operation which was located in Phoenix, Arizona, in 1952, two years before Ray Kroc came along.
The McDonald brothers were afraid of flying and this presented a problem in overseeing their growing and widespread businesses. Ray Kroc offered to take care of the franchising and the brothers were happy to accept. Ray Kroc was an excellent franchiser and made McDonald's grow spectacularly. But lets not imagine that the original McDonald's was an insignificant little chipper in somewhere USA. It wasn't.
All of the above information was gleaned from Bill Bryson's excellent book Made in America.
Mr Boyd mentions the opening of McDonald's in Moscow in 1990. I was there in 1991 and though it looked similar to other McDonald's I had been in, there was one difference. Curiously, the flag of Canada was prominently displayed inside. - Yours, etc.,
Michael McGuire, Speenogue, Co. Donegal