The Golden Arches – Branding
by debbiemiller767
Before you even heard the name of this company, you knew I was talking about McDonald’s. Yes the giant golden arches of McDonald’s are recognised world wide.
It is the world’s largest chain of hamburger fast food restaurants, serving around 64 million customers daily
The business began in 1940, by brothers Richard and Maurice McDonald .
The original mascot of McDonald’s was a man with a chef’s hat on top of a hamburger shaped head whose name was “Speedee.” Speedee was eventually replaced with Ronald McDonald by 1967.
McDonald’s use of cartoon mascots as part of there branding has been reduced from its height in the 80’s with characters such as Hamburgerler and Grimace regularly appearing along with Ronald, on merchandise, posters and in shops, is rarely seen.
McDonalds is also great at brand affiliations. Any child will tell you the drink of choice and the only brand served is Coke a Cola. Combining their brands in advertising make one hell of a team.
McDonald’s have changed there logo slightly over the years but the golden arches, size and proportion have stayed the same.The same red and yellow combination have remained but since 2006, the red is muted to terra cotta, the yellow was turned golden for a more “sunny” look, and olive and sage green were also added. This was to give a more homely, less plastic look to the product.
They use the repackaging of there food and advertisements to refresh the brand without taking away the the strength of the original message of the brand.
Redesigning regularly the packaging for there food and happy meals as well as combining them with strong branding from other sources, such as movies, cartoons or toys allow them to keep current.
The current trend for healthier meals and environmentally friendly packaging have forced them to redesign their packaging, moving from the 80’s polystyrene to the new cardboard packaging that contains 72% recycled paper.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonald’s
http://www.mcdonalds.co.uk/ourworld/environment/packaging.shtml?dnPos=-302
http://brandstory.typepad.com/writer/2007/08/mcdonalds-prove.html
http://first.emeraldinsight.com/samples/mcdonalds2.pdf
http://brandsymphony.org/branding/mcdonalds-branding-and-marketing-strategies/
GDF - S2 - 2011 
My daughter at 18 months would go crazy when she’d see the golden arches from her car seat! That’s the first letter she recognized! The brand also inspires confidence because it’s associated with a “standard” of food quality (whether we like it or not) and its universality is attractive when funds and confidence in local food is low too!
interesting to see how the packaging went from dull looking more cooler colors in the past to warmer more brighter feel.
Like Helene I recall my 2year old nephew knowing what ‘that’ M meant.
Whether one likes the product/company or not, it is a classic example of successful and effective branding/borderline brainwashing.
Great post.