McDonald's -- the nationwide fast food hamburger chain, is ostensibly a Chicago based institution.
Their corporate headquarters is just outside the city proper, in Oak Brook, IL. Its founder was a Chicago native, by the name of Ray Kroc, who cut his teeth selling paper cups to the Chicago-based Walgreen's Corp. He lived in suburban Northfield, IL. He built his first McDonald's on River Road in Des Plaines, IL. That is now the McDonald's museum.
I know this because I once worked for Golin/Harris, the Chicago PR firm that pretty much made McDonald's what it is today.
On this particular Saturday in Chicago, the moribund McDonald's corporation told the people of Chicago to, basically, piss off.
Why do I say this?
Because there was an historic football game in Chicago today. The first football game to have been played in Wrigley Field in 40 years. It was a contest between two storied Big-10 Chicago teams -- Northwestern University and The University of Illinois. It was an unusual, and oddly interesting game since the NCAA ruled, only yesterday, that the offenses must only align on one-half of the field - due to Wrigley's weird and tiny configuration.
So you would think that the 2,000 or so McDonald's in the Chicago metropolitan area would have had the decency and good business sense to have aired this on the flat screen TVs in all of their hamburger joints.
But what did corporate McDonald's air?
(I am not making this up.)
The Virginia Tech v. Miami game.
There must have been well over 3 people in the entire state of Illinois interested in this game.
When asked about this absurdity, several McDonald's franchisees and corporate managers apologized. They said there was nothing they could do about it since the decision was made by the McDonald's corporate lame-brains in the lavish Oak Brook McDonald's H.Q.
I guess if the Cubs ever make it into the World Series, all of the McDonald's fast food joints in Chicago will be airing the breathtakingly exciting Argentina v. Portugal World Cup Soccer match.
A decision by their Oak Brook McDonald's corporate nitwits, no doubt.
So much for McDonald's being a hometown Chicago firm.
So much for big-business flexibility.
Chicagoan Ray Kroc is probably turning over in his grave tonight.
Wow, they wouldn't air that football game? That's cold! They ought to know, better than anyone, how Chicagoans are about their hometown teams. Duh. Even I learned that much!
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