McDonalds: From Salesman To Owner

“I’m lovin it” That’s what most of say when we eat burgers of McDonalds. It’s the largest chain of fast food restaurants which serves more than 68 million customers daily around the world having its branches in more than 100 countries.

Ray Kroc is one important name in the growth of McDonalds. Though it wasn’t his recipe, he knew how exactly he could market it and become one of the greatest salesman and a businessman in life. Ray Kroc was born on 5^th October 1902. It was in his 50s he started his new adventure of life which shaped a complete new future for him. The same happened with the KFC (second largest restaurant chain in the world) Col Sanders who started his KFC endeavour in his late 60s.

To know about the man behind McDonalds growth is fascinating. Here are his achievements and untold stories which will prove about the myth of old age and tell you why age doesn’t matter.

ACHIEVEMENTS

• The chain he started in his 50s is the first largest fast food chain in the world today

• He owned a baseball team- San Diego Padres

• He launched a training program which later became Hamburger University. More than 80,000 people have graduated from this program and it is the first restaurant company to develop a global training center.

UNTOLD STORIES

Every job was a Lesson

Ray Kroc started with a  lemonade stand in front of his home at an early age, worked at a grocery store, worked even as an ambulance driver, a paper cup salesman and a multi-mixer salesman for many years.

He was a one of the best salesman for the paper cup company and as well as the multi-mixer company. The same salesman later on happened to become one of the most appreciated marketing gurus later on.

Start of Business

When Ray Kroc was working as a multi-mixer salesman he received an order for 8 multi-mixers. The company wasn’t running quite well as people had started to migrate to new products in market. Receiving an order of 8 multi-mixers surprised him. Ray visited the restaurant which ordered the multi-mixers with curiosity. There he met two brothers Dick and Mac McDonald running a successful restaurant in California.

Even though the brothers worked on limited menu, the taste and quality of burgers, french-fries and beverages impressed Ray to a great extent and that’s when he decided. He decided to start on a new venture with the brothers.

Takeover

In 1955 Ray Kroc founded the McDonald’s Corporation. He was unhappy with the brothers desire to maintain small number of restaurants, so in 1961 he bought the company for $2.7 million and the expansion went on. Today it has more than 35,000 outlets in the world.

Age No Bar

At his old age when Ray was confined to a wheelchair, he still continued to go to his San Diego office everyday to monitor the work in progress.

Overnight Success?

Ray Kroc was in his early 50s when he started the chain of McDonalds. The company grew rapidly within a few years. Upon asked on how could he create a restaurant empire and become an overnight success at the age of 52. Ray said “I was an overnight success all right, but 30 years is a long, long night.”

QUOTES

If I had a brick for every time I’ve repeated the phrase Quality, Service, Cleanliness and Value, I think I’d probably be able to bridge the Atlantic Ocean with them.

Luck is a dividend of sweat. The more you sweat, the luckier you get.

The definition of salesmanship is the gentle art of letting the customer have it your way.

If you work just for money, you’ll never make it, but if you love what you’re doing and you always put the customers first, success will be yours.

If you’re not a risk taker, you should get the hell out of business.

Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence.

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COURTESY:

wikipedia.org
mcdonalds.com