Monday, August 30, 2010

The Advertising of McDonald's Big Mac

The Big Mac is one of the biggest fast food in America. The Hamburger is consists of beef with lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions and special sauce on a Big Mac three part sesame bun.

History

The Big Mac was created by Jim Delligatti, one of Ray Kroc's earliest franchisees, who was operating several restaurants in the Pittsburgh area. It was designed to compete with a similar Big Boy sandwich. Customer response to the Big Mac was so good that it rolled out nationally in 1967. One of its most distinctive feature is a middle slice of bread ("club" layer) used to stabilize contents and prevent spillage.

The Big Mac is known worldwide and is often used as a symbol of American capitalism. The Economist has used it as a reference point to determine the cost of living in different countries — the Big Mac Index — as it is so widely available and is comparable across markets. This index is sometimes referred to as Burgernomics.

Advertising

The earliest instances of McDonald's utilizing advertising for the sandwich were mainly print ads, and a TV ad where Hoyt Axton sings "The Ballad Of Big Mac" which aired in 1969.

Two all Beef Patties Slogan

The Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun concept for the jingle was created by Charles Rosenberg, Creative Supervisor of the Dan Nichols team at Needham, Harper and Steers, Chicago. Originally, the ingredients appeared as a one-word heading for a McDonald's ad developed for college newspapers. The words were then set to music created by Mark Vieha, who performed the original jingle. Charlie's advertising concept was to purposely turn the ingredients into a tongue twister. The jingle first appeared in a TV commercial titled "In a Word" developed by Dan and the advertising agency team. The first run of commercials ran only a year and a half, going off the air in 1976, but its popularity remained beyond its TV life. Subsequent to the jingle, McDonald's followed up with a promotion based on its customers spontaneously having a "Big Mac Attack".

Many franchisees in the United States ran promotions during the original campaign that awarded a free burger to customers who could recite the slogan within a specified time (usually two or three seconds). One example of its success, was that the McDonald's operators in New York City ran out of Big Mac buns. McDonald's Australia emulated this promotion in the mid-1980s, and some Brazilian McDonald's around the same time (only offering a free glass of Coca-Cola instead), in the Portuguese version, which goes as "Dois hambúrgueres, alface, queijo, molho especial, cebola e picles num pão com gergelim".

In 2003, McDonald's revived the phrase. In an English-language ad from McDonald's international "i'm lovin' it" campaign, a rapper rapidly spouts off the trademark in the background music. Also in 2003, American Greetings and Carlton Cards released a Christmas ornament of a Big Mac, on which the slogan was both printed and played aloud by pulling on a string. Roy Bergold, National Advertising Manager at McDonald's, has a big hand in championing the original campaign and helping to bring it back.

In 2008, the phrase was revived by McDonald's Malaysia. The revival includes the original prize of a free Big Mac if the customer is able to recite the phrase in under four seconds. This was released in May, along with the promotional Mega Mac, which has four beef patties rather than the standard two.
1980s advertising

In the early 1980s, as a promotional, McDonalds staged an in-house rivalry between their two most popular products. Consumers were invited to decide "Which one will be number one? Chicken McNuggets or Big Mac sandwiches?". For every one of either that a customer bought, they received another of the same at half price. Later in the ad campaign, the second was offered for free. It was eventually announced that Big Mac was "number one".
2004-2005 advertising

In 2005, McDonald's began offering product placement rewards to hip hop artists who namechecked the Big Mac in their music, giving US$5 to the artist for every time a song mentioning the hamburger was played on the radio. This offer quickly spawned a satirical reference from Hip Hop artist Mad Skillz, who references the marketing ploy in his track "2005 Wrap Up" by stating "And I'm beefin' wit' Mickey D's man, y'all dead wrong, Talkin' 'bout payin' rappers to mention Big Macs in their song, We do rap from the heart, y'all better have some respect, Alright, Big Mac! Big Mac! Big Mac! Now where's my check?"



http://www.floweradvisor.com.sg/lifestyle/business/international_business/150540/the_advertising_of_mcdonald_s_big_mac/


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