rat

McDonald's response from a business standpoint was the appropriate one. Nothing kills a product line or comapny faster than appearing to be bigotted or coarse-humored about another country's population. They introduced a product in an area that was very sensitive to the plight of the people the product was named after. You didn't see this many people bitching when the Dixie Chicks music stopped being aired because they made fun of our president. Of course not, that offended us so it must be offensive to everyone.

It's kind of like naming a land acquisition company "Native American Land Development" around the time that they were all being pushed onto reservations--it seems crass and mean-spirited regardless of the actual intentions of the company. Especially with McDonald's being one of the largest global corporations, there are entire departments of people paid to do nothing more than develop culturallly- and socially-sensitive (and -responsible) marketing strategies, tools and materials to prevent such things as what happened. We're not talking a mom-and-pop shop that could be put out of business by a small regional problem. We're looking at a multi-billion dollar company with contracts worldwide (a significant portion of which are outside the United States) that could take a major hit across the board if they were viewed as bigotted, crass, racist or callous concerning the plight of starving nations.

I mean, honestly, what imbecile decided it was a bright idea to name a relatively expensive fast-food hamburger after a continent rife with plague, genocide and of all things starvation? I mean seriously, what was that person or team thinking? They're trained how not to do things that are the corporate equivalent of stepping on one's own penis with golf shoes. It's bad for business to have people make mistakes like this--especially in semi-socialist countries with activist populations who tend to care a whole lot more about liberal ideals like world peace and world hunger. That's someone in the marketing department not doing their research, and thus, not doing their job. It's not like this was run in the U.S. where the average joe couldn't give two shits about the people down the street, let alone across the ocean. This was done in Norway, land of a semi-socialist state of relatively liberal ideals compared to corn-fed home-grown "regular" Americans. McDonald's development and release teams severely misjudged their market with that one.

it seems like a lot of the people that post in threads like this are not geared towards the modern business environment, let alone a global business environment. Those of us currently getting our degrees in any business field (accounting, finance, marketing, management, and management information systemss) have situations like this constantly provided us as examples of what not to do. We're constantly reminded how essential it is to be culturally astute when doing business on any level, from small business ownership to working for a Fortune 100 firm. Things like: allowing Catholics to wear the ash on their foreheads on Ash Wednesday, allowing Muslims off for Ramadan and Jews for Yom Kippur, from understanding traditinoal greetings and how they vary from Europe to the Middle East to the Far East all the way to proper etiquette when dining with different cultures. To a greater or lesser extent, these focii placed on cultural awareness and one's ability to negotiate these situations are overarching throughout our classes, and thus, we have a more discerning eye regarding the overall implications of things like this. The gut reaction for most of you is "Hey, that's dumb. It's not McDonald's fault that Norwegians are pisssy!" and I'd say you're right. But it is McDonald's fault for ignoring the fact that Norwegians are sensitive to issues like African starvation, and plowing ahead carelessly with an ill-advised marketing plan for a new product that pissed off quite a few people.

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