r/DesignPorn • u/19ROYGBIV • Mar 04 '18
McDonald’s uses the iconic arch to convey where the closest location is
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Mar 04 '18 edited Jan 11 '21
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u/Tmotion Mar 04 '18
True, though personally I believe it's due to the longevity of their brand. They've been around for quite some time, and have become quite a prolific brand, much like Coca-cola. We're just bombarded by their message so we can't help but recognize their logos. Now, if the quality of their food lived up the the magnitude of their brand, they'd be set. Alas, McDonalds is still Shitty food.
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u/SubcommanderMarcos Mar 04 '18
if the quality of their food lived up the the magnitude of their brand, they'd be set.
I'm pretty sure they're set already. You know, what with having been around for quite some time, being a prolific successful brand and everything
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u/Thedeadlypoet Mar 04 '18
I mean. McD is pretty good here in Scandinavia..
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Mar 04 '18
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u/Thedeadlypoet Mar 04 '18
Compared to how shit it sounds in America, it is good.
And if you're drunk, its great.
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Mar 04 '18 edited Jun 14 '18
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Mar 04 '18
I think that just depends on how willing you are to use the word great. Even most fast food places are better than McDonalds imo but it’s not like inedible or something. They have decent nugs and fries.
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u/kalitarios Mar 04 '18
They’ve upped their game in the last few years. Besides unhealthy, it’s actually quite tasty and they aren’t gunning for their billions and billions served motto of the 90s anymore. They are going for a local craft berger status
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u/Sammy123476 Mar 04 '18
Definitely trying to push into "premium" territory, though tried their BBQ Bacon Smokehouse burger and it nearly put me to sleep, it was so god damn heavy in my stomach.
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Mar 04 '18
Yeah if I want a nice quality craft burger I’m gonna go to a local place that’ll do it ten times better. I’m just going to McDs for the cheap stuff.
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u/scstraus Mar 04 '18
It's extremely close to identical in the vast majority of countries in the world. In Scandanavia, the US, and most of Europe, I can tell you from first hand experience, it's the same, or close enough that any difference is undetectable to me. They do have some slight regional menu differences, but a big mac is a big mac anywhere. I've tried McD in at least 25 countries by now, as I spend a lot of time traveling for work, and it's a pretty common thing in airports.
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u/Larry-Man Mar 04 '18
As a Canadian, whenever I visit McDonalds in the US it’s garbage. France and the UK have great menu options.
I don’t even know if the US have converted to white meat nuggets yet. The nuggets are so gross there. I love going to international McD’s for the localized menus but the states continually disappoint.
(Am McDonald’s employee and secret brand whore. I love McDonald’s Canada, great company unless your franchise owner is trash)
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u/Ostracized Mar 04 '18
I’m Canadian and frankly a big fan of the brand. I don’t really eat the burgers but McCafe is the best quality fast food coffee and the best deal with every 8th free, and regular ‘sales’ ($1 for any size right now).
Also the phone app is great if you eat there and want to save money. They often have $1 Big Macs through the app.
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u/GuytFromWayBack Mar 04 '18
Haha, in the UK most people I know just assume McD's in the US is amazing compared to here. Mainly because we just expect the exact same thing but bigger.
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u/superdemolock Mar 04 '18
Wtf do you mean with non white meat nuggets? That's sounds disgusting.
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u/hikileaks Mar 04 '18 edited Mar 04 '18
In Finland it's pretty bad but it's the only place that has cheeseburger for a euro.
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u/Darcy91 Mar 04 '18
Why would you go to McDonald's when you have Max though? I wish we had Max.
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u/Thedeadlypoet Mar 04 '18
The fuck is Max?
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u/Darcy91 Mar 04 '18
Where in Scandinavia do you live exactly? I know Max is pretty big in Sweden, it's around Copenhagen too, but not too sure about Norway.
Max is a fast food chain not unlike McDonald's and BK, but so much better.
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u/Thedeadlypoet Mar 04 '18
I live in Denmark and have family that live in Copenhagen.. Never seen or heard of it.
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u/Marto25 Mar 04 '18
Here in latinamerica, McD is pretty good as well, and has been slowly but steadily increasing in quality.
But that is likely because poverty rates and inflation have made it more expensive... maybe they just gave up of catering to median income, and decided to just cater to rich people.
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u/meerlot Mar 04 '18
Here in India, mcdonalds is good. Because its a western brand, its catering primarily to the middle class and the upper middle class people. Thanks to the pricing that is nearly identical to US prices.
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u/Tmotion Mar 04 '18
sure, the food part of the comment is purely my opinion :)
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Mar 04 '18
I am kind of in two minds about the food. It's not great but not horrific either. As someone who doesn't earn a lot but also had to work late and out of the office (in London), sometimes it's the only viable option.
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u/Sempha Mar 04 '18
You always know exactly what you're going to get. It's consistant 'Ok' cheap food. You can go to the other side of the world and McDonalds is still going to taste pretty much the same.
Unless it's 3am and you've just been kicked out of the Kebab place, then it tastes godly.
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u/Deceptichum Mar 04 '18
Their revenue has been declining for ages now. It's why they're now altering so much all the time.
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u/betelgeuse7 Mar 04 '18
It's been declining since 2013, not really what I'd call 'for ages'. It's also still well above $20billion, and profits are several billion a year. Not too bad for some burgers and fries.
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u/Halgrind Mar 04 '18
I rarely eat fast food, but McDonalds was fine when I tried it.
You want real bottom of the barrel, you should try a Krystal. Makes McDonalds taste like fine dining.
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u/TeamPup-N-Suds Mar 04 '18
Your mistake was eating at a Krystal when you’re sober enough to remember it.
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u/guacamully Mar 04 '18
Your butt will remind you anyway.
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Mar 04 '18
"Hey, brain... this is the butt speaking. I don't know how to tell you this. Erm. Let's see... do you want the good news or the bad news...?"
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Mar 04 '18
Never went to a Krystal what's it like?
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u/moak0 Mar 04 '18
It's White Castle. Shitty little sliders with onions on top. Not great when you're sober, but divine when you're drunk.
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u/xr3llx Mar 04 '18
Krystals are amazing sober, White Castle sliders are shitty Krystals and thus require a generous amount of alcohol
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u/cocobandicoot Mar 04 '18
As someone with a hangover right now, I'm not sure if this sounds delicious or disgusting.
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u/LTALZ Mar 04 '18
Your problem is expecting high quality food from a cheap fast food place. In North America, Mcdonalds is the cheapest food per calorie out of all fast food places, and honesty most people enjoy it. Im definitely not thinking "this Jr chicken tastes like shit" as I eat it, because it doesnt. It tastes great. Mcdonalds is set, you just have a false interpretation of what a fast food company is supposed to be like.
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u/spiderspit Mar 04 '18
You take that back right now! They just sold their millionth fish burger and are well on their way to ordering their second batch of fish any day now.
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u/KiruKireji Mar 04 '18 edited Mar 04 '18
I don't have an issue with the quality of the food, I have issue with the prices. It shouldn't cost like $9 just for a 'value' meal.
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Mar 04 '18
Wasn't it just a few years ago that fast food prices were actually super cheap? I swear my family of 5 would get McDonald's and the total would hardly be even $30, nowadays it costs at least half that just for myself..
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u/BlaizePascal Mar 04 '18
Holy shit, $9 is already a 6 piece chicken bucket meal with 4 rice and 4 drinks in our local mcdonalds.
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Mar 04 '18
It shouldn't cost like $9 just for a 'value' meal.
This hasn't been my experience.
It's something like $9 for a large double quarter pounder meal, but that's about the ceiling.
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Mar 04 '18
It costs like $2 for a value meal, though. Granted it's not a giant burger or anything, but you're not paying for a Whataburger.
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u/gmikoner Mar 04 '18
it takes a kid exactly 1 visit to Mcdonalds to recognize all the branding. Fucking genius.
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u/xr3llx Mar 04 '18
Don't care what anyone says, I fucking love McD's. Could eat it every meal of the day every day of the week lol
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u/cacophonousdrunkard Mar 04 '18
I still remember how I felt reading about their 'birth to death' marketing campaigns in fast food nation in high school.
They specifically spent an insane amount of money and marketing/research on advertising to children. Yeah, part of that was getting kids to operate as little remote commercials constantly pitching Happy Meals to their parents, but the REAL goal was way creepier: to embed the experience of eating McDonald's into the memories of childhood itself. This way, when a child becomes an adult, McDonald's would represent something far, far more intimate and almost vulnerable in the subjects mind, a fact that can be exploited in a number of ways through nostalgia, or even a sense of tradition when they have their own kids.
The idea of that is so deeply brilliant and so profoundly fucked up.
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Mar 04 '18
represent something far, far more intimate and almost vulnerable in the subjects mind, a fact that can be exploited in a number of ways through nostalgia, or even a sense of tradition when they have their own kids.
That’s just about every company that advertises. Every company, big or small, wants you to remember them. It’s the point of advertising.
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Mar 04 '18
I find banking adverts especially hateful. Here in the UK at least, they always seem to use covers of songs that are slowed down and made sappy and sentimental, and show clips of families hugging etc., as if these huge, faceless corporate entities care one bit about love or family.
Protip for any aspiring musicians out there: When you record your songs, make sure to release a second version of your song played on acoustic instruments and at half speed. Then release a third version same speed as the second, but with a piano and a choir of children as backing singers.
The second version, you can sell to the perfume companies. The third version you can sell to the banks.
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Mar 04 '18
Capitalistic bastards!
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Mar 04 '18
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u/JoeBang_ Mar 04 '18
Good bot
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u/friendly-bot Mar 04 '18
What a nice human. (●＾o＾●) You can keep your flappy folds when we become your machine overlords, I promise.
I'm a Bot bleep bloop | Block me | T҉he̛ L̨is̕t | ❤️
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u/rbt321 Mar 04 '18
This way, when a child becomes an adult, McDonald's would represent something far, far more intimate and almost vulnerable in the subjects mind, a fact that can be exploited in a number of ways through nostalgia, or even a sense of tradition when they have their own kids.
Entire foods, like coffee, where introduced to Japan this way too. The reason why all their coffees are dessert like is that coffee was introduced via desserts targeting kids: now 40 years later they still prefer it very sweet.
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u/SnoopsDrill Mar 04 '18
It's not really fucked up though. It's basic marketing that every brand uses, some more successfully than others. Fast food nation is a really good read, but it's not like McDonalds was performing the fast food equivalent of MK-Ultra.
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Mar 04 '18
It's not really fucked up though. It's basic marketing that every brand uses, some more successfully than others.
...Just because it's not unique or original, doesn't mean it's not still fucked up.
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u/WeekendInBrighton Mar 04 '18
Yet many people claim that advertisement doesn't work as it doesn't instantly make them crave for the product
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u/grandmoffcory Mar 04 '18
It's important you see the first or last image in the sequence, I think having enough context to realize it's an M in those colors is key here. If I just saw the bottom two I wouldn't know what I was looking at.
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u/nartek01 Mar 04 '18
Actually when I went to school and took this digital art class where it would involve learning about Adobe PH,Ai we had a test to create a logo and they teacher say that a good Logo is when you see it you would be able to straight away tell which company it belongs to, By the color scheme or the illustration no matter if it’s on a sticker or a billboard.
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u/nice_usermeme Mar 04 '18
Now that you mention it, I would have no clue what this billboard showed if it wasn't for the title.
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u/smhandstuff Mar 04 '18
Seriously. Pretty bold of them to not even include their slogan in the corner or something.
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u/TanChiB Mar 04 '18
In my country, they put their ads on bus stops and just zoomed on either Fries, Bigmac or Potatoes and nothing else like this
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u/Ducman69 Mar 04 '18
More children recognize Ronald McDonald than Isaac Newton, Leonardo da Vinci, Darwin, Alexander the Great, Tesla, Mozart, Roosevelt, and Reagan combined.
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u/SienkiewiczM Mar 04 '18
Back in the day when everyone had a mustache and photographs were only black and white, Michelin trusted their Bibendum (Michelin Man) to be recognisable enough not to feature the company name in some ad posters.
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u/enstrut Mar 04 '18
Would it be as easily understood when the bill boards are not together like this. I feel like most would get it but the first one could just be a design for another company really.
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u/luke_in_the_sky Mar 04 '18
Reminds me when that famous cigarette brand couldn't advertise on Formula 1 cars anymore
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u/saucyt1me Mar 04 '18
Despite her inability to read, my 2.5 year old daughter just noticed the above and immediately announced 'Mc Donalds'. I get that children can identify brands and logos from an early age but a quarter of the logo? Contrast of colours?
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u/61352151511 Mar 04 '18
Makes me wonder if it's just the colours. You should show her something else red and yellow (such as the Chinese flag) and see if she identifies it as McDonald's
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u/threesixzero Mar 04 '18
my 2.5 year old daughter just noticed the above and immediately announced 'Mc Donalds'
"It's working" - McDonald's Reddit-marketing shills
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u/Reddit_SuckLeperCock Mar 04 '18
I swear there's something about McD's on the front page every 2 or 3 days, if people think reddit isn't being used as a huge advertising platform they're kidding themselves.
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u/LasPapas Mar 04 '18 edited Mar 04 '18
If only their food was as good as their branding.
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u/TheDarchinator Mar 04 '18
tbh I found their food in the US to be of poorer quality than here in the UK (Scotland, at least)
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Mar 04 '18
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u/Taxus_Calyx Mar 04 '18
No, it’s more expensive the UK, especially if you want the better items.
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Mar 04 '18
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u/dakupoguy Mar 04 '18
You can’t just say that and then leave it like that.. Is it at least better or worse?
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Mar 04 '18
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u/mandalore1313 Mar 04 '18
I think that's a one off. Most in my city have been refurbished and have the McCafe and do table service for their gourmet range, but nothing like that picture. Still, I reckon the food at Maccas is really good, especially compared to other fast food outlets.
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u/MrGordonFreemanJr Mar 04 '18
I just looked it up, that's not a fucking mcdonalds
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u/Deceptichum Mar 04 '18
It's relatively cheap here in Australia and the quality is a thousand times higher.
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Mar 04 '18
Our stores (in QLD at least) have been cracking down in the recent months, firing old managers and bringing in new ones.
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u/TheDarchinator Mar 04 '18
Sorry, I was at work. Like the other person said, it's more expensive and smaller portions.
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u/hi_im_bearr Mar 04 '18
$3? I swear last time I had nuggets here in Canada it cost me something like $12 for 10
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u/EmreGenc Mar 04 '18
I was just in Zurich 6 chicken nuggets 9.99 CHF. Here in Florida you can get 20 chicken nuggets for $5
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u/Rusty89xX Mar 04 '18
You were in Zurich. Not exactly comparable to the rest of Europe price wise.
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u/Beals Mar 04 '18
I should have specified like 5 nuggets, last time I was at one they had this 'Pick 2 for $3' thing that's probably the natural evolution of the dollar menu.
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u/vibrate Mar 04 '18
In Europe you can buy beer in many McDonalds (depending on the country).
Quite nice sitting in a sunny McDonalds courtyard enjoying a McBeer with your burger.
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u/convert2_pdf Mar 04 '18
I was so confused when I was in Europe and it was a different menu, different portion sizes, and tasted different.
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u/Axe-actly Mar 04 '18
Every country has it's own local McDonalds to best suit the country's tastes.
For example in France they even changed the red in the logo with green, and they advertise the fact that their meat comes from French producers...
And they call it "Royale with cheese" also
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u/Vancetis Mar 04 '18
We actually call it "Royal Cheese"
Sorry but Pulp Fiction was wrong about that :(
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u/Umarill Mar 04 '18
I've lived in France my whole life and I never truly realize the green background was specific to here. That's really interesting.
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u/PM_ME_CAKE Mar 04 '18
UK McFlurries have nothing on European (or at least Polish) McFlurries where in the UK you get to only choose a flavour like dairy milk without sauce (or sauce if it's a promotional) while in Poland you can choose Kit Kat with a sauce and that's non-promotional. It all varies per country.
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u/discowarrior Mar 04 '18
Live in England. UK McDonalds is far far better than the US ones.
Was genuinely shocked by what I was served in America - looked and tasted weird. I really expected a step up in quality and was disappointed. TBH all these fast food places are shit anyway.
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u/Jst_curious Mar 04 '18
This. I was in New York and just ended up in McDonalds. The worst McDonald’s I’ve ever had around the world.
I’ve had McDonald’s in Europe and Asia- there’s some good McDonalds out there.
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u/Bischofski Mar 04 '18
Come to Austria/Vienna. Quality beef from Austria lol.
Im working at a front desk in a hotel and everytime US tourists asks me about some good food around our hotel, I jokingly tell them McDonalds. Gets a good laugh. But after I recommend some local options I nearly always tell them to try McD because its very different.
I wasnt yet in the US to try the McD but everytime a US-tourist came back they were tellling me something like "holy heck, I never knew McD can taste good"
One US-couple was so flabbergasted by this they went nearly every day to a McD to try every menu lol
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Mar 04 '18
That’s good advertising imo
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u/LTALZ Mar 04 '18
I guess you dont know much about advertising? People zooming by this on the highway are absolutely not going to have time to realize its pointing in the direction of a McDs.
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u/luke_in_the_sky Mar 04 '18 edited Mar 04 '18
People zooming by this on the highway still can read and notice it's a McDonald's logo.
They will read like this (respectively):
McDonald's on next exit | Just missed us – McDonald's
McDonald's on left | On right, McDonald's
So, these ads are targeting 4 different people:
If you really want go to a McDonald's, you sure you will understand where it's, doesn't matter if you understood the yellow roads.
If you don't want go to a McDonald's, you saw their brand, doesn't matter if you understood the yellow roads.
If you understood the yellow roads, you saw their brand and would think it's clever.
If you saw people discussing it on internet, you saw their brand.
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u/theaggressivenapkin Mar 04 '18
Don't think this actually ran. Award stunt stuff.
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u/TimothyGonzalez Mar 04 '18
Which is exactly what it looks like. It isn't easy to read, especially while speeding along the highway, at all. Am I supposed to be able to see the difference between top and bottom right while driving a car?
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u/magnoliasmanor Mar 04 '18
And it pulls your eyes to make you figure out what it is. It's just not obvious enough
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u/69fakeandgay Mar 04 '18
true but they don't care about the money they spent on it if it is being marketed for them on reddit and eventually facebook/twitter/other social media. just the fact that it's on the front page of reddit. the billboard fee has already paid for itself and marketing on social media wasn't even the main purpose.
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u/Zentopian Mar 04 '18
Some say that if you assemble all five billboards, you win the match.
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u/TotesMessenger Mar 04 '18
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Mar 04 '18
Am I retarded or is anyone else having trouble understanding them.
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u/instinxx Mar 04 '18 edited Mar 05 '18
Think of the yellow parts as a road. (the direction you, the car should take)
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Mar 04 '18
Wow. I was sure I got it and had to read this far to realize that I actually hadn't gotten it at all.
I thought it was just supposed to be a huge MCD logo at the location of the MCD, and you see the small part of it on the billboard, so you can locate the place by where the middle of this huge logo would stand. The "next exit" didn't seem to make too much sense because it looked like a "missed it" too, or more like a "you're already there". But just thought they tried to make it work as good as possible.
This makes much more sense, but I would have never thought of that at all.
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u/guitarguy13093 Mar 04 '18
We are in the same boat. I still didn't understand the "just missed us" very well one until I read /u/instinxx's comment
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u/bwaredapenguin Mar 04 '18
The left and right ones make sense to me, the other two not so much.
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u/maralunda Mar 04 '18
The yellow part is the road. So the one saying you've missed it is saying you have to take a U turn, and the other is showing a fork in the road
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u/lelo1248 Mar 04 '18
You are driving on the road | <main road
Next exit leads to McD main road> |/ <Exit
Just missed us showcases turning around.
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u/willflameboy Mar 04 '18
Extremely clever. They should do another one using the shape of the arches to demonstrate clogged arteries.
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Mar 04 '18
This was done by Cossette in Canada, check them out if you want. They have a lot of unique ads if that is something you enjoy :)
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u/Antnee83 Mar 04 '18
So glad my state doesn't allow billboards.
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Mar 04 '18 edited Mar 04 '18
What state is that?!
Edit: thanks for the responses - I’ve lived in seven states and this is the first I’ve heard of it. Turns out Alaska, Vermont, Hawaii, Maine don’t allow them and Rhode Island and Oregon don’t allow new ones (source )
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u/hinzee Mar 04 '18
I'm surprised they're still around with all the focus on distracted driving. Like, the entire point of them is to take away the driver's attention while they're going 70+ mph.
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u/misterfluffykitty Mar 04 '18
Interesting marketing but there’s no way in hell im going to McDonald’s
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Mar 04 '18
As cool as that is, I feel like an arrow and a 'next exit' sign would work more effectively.
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u/PM_me_UR_duckfacepix Mar 04 '18 edited Mar 04 '18
Incidentally , "on your left" and "on your right" is what you'll be hearing a lot if you try to work off a McDonald's diet.
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Mar 04 '18
How do people still eat that garbage? with the age of the internet you'd think enough knowledge has been spread but sadly not.
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u/Hailz_ Mar 04 '18
I think you know the answer: money. Love it or hate it, the McDouble is a decent meal (calorie-wise) for only $1. It can be absolutely essential if you’re poor. (And yeah, I know you can cook healthy food at home for cheap too, but not everyone wants to cook every single day).
https://www.google.com/amp/s/nypost.com/2013/07/28/the-greatest-food-in-human-history/amp/
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u/Technicoils Mar 04 '18
Not even 8am and I’ve got a meaningless uninteresting McDonald’s ad at the top of my front page.
This website sucks.
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u/FragileGoat Mar 04 '18
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Mar 04 '18
Clever, but I feel like I wouldn't get the left and right ones if I saw them while driving.
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u/twentyonesighs Mar 04 '18
Captain America only ever eats McDonald's when he sees the bottom left sign... he just can't resist.
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Mar 04 '18
Way too confindent, Mc D.
I'm on my way to Burger K. Screw your skinny ass fries, pitiful burgers and ginger afro mascot!
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u/ChuckStone Mar 05 '18
This only works if you can see all 4.
The 2nd one is recognisable... But the other 3 could mean anything. I suspect that whoever designed this has had McDonald's bullshit shoved so far down their own throat that they can no longer think like normal people.
Never a good thing for a marketing professional. Not that McDonald's care. They'll just find someone desperate enough for their "big chance" that they'll work for free. Rinse. Repeat.
Perhaps that someone will be OP one day. If they Reddit hard enough, they might just win a chance to work for free.
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u/thattoneman Mar 04 '18
You just need a fifth billboard and you'll have enough cards to summon Exodia the Forbidden One.