Free Republic

Amid a tumultuous past year for McDonald's, the world's biggest restaurant chain's CEO Don Thompson is retiring after two years on the job, effective March 1. The fast food is also getting a new CFO. The restaurant's Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Brand Officer Steve Easterbrook will replace Thompson, who is a 25-year veteran of the company, the company announced on Wednesday. Previously, Easterbrook served as president of McDonald's Europe and led the chain's "efforts to elevate its marketing, advance menu innovation, and create an infrastructure for its digital initiatives," it said in a release. The company's CFO Pete...

Once again the left is offended by a commercial, which shows the patriotism and the traditional values that exist in most main street towns in America. Airing this past Sunday during the Golden Globes, the McDonalds ad featuring their various sign messages is one of the best commercials on the market since the “God Made a Farmer” commercial done by Dodge for the 2013 Super Bowl. The company notes on its Tumbler page, "there's a story behind every one…that captures a moment in time and reflects the lives of the community it serves." Yet, almost immediately those on the left...

The National Labor Relations Board is expected in the coming weeks to weigh in on several high-profile labor cases with major implications on workforce and union issues, ranging from college football players to fast food restaurants. Business are bracing for a flurry of action from a labor board they’ve accused of taking on an activist, pro-union agenda. "We’ve seen the board become very active and aggressive under the Obama administration,” said Beth Milito, senior executive counsel for the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB). One of the most closely watched cases on the labor board’s agenda involves a bid by...

Venezuela’s leaders aren’t taking the ongoing McDonald’s french fry shortage in their country too well. Publicly sponsored news outlets, government officials, and even the country’s president, Nicolás Maduro, have all responded to McDonald’s unthinkable french fry shortage, which spans all 100 outlets in the country, by publicly criticizing the chain, and its french fries. One of the loudest responses came from Telesur, a state-sponsored news outlet, which wasted no time in getting to what it views as the heart of the issue. The outlet published a story headlined, “McDonald’s joins economic war against Venezuela,” not-so-subtly suggesting that the lack of...

Venezuelans not 'lovin' it' as McDonald's fries go scarce CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuelan fast-food lovers are mourning the disappearance of McDonald's golden staple: the french fry. A recent shortage at the U.S. fast food chain comes as socialist Venezuela grapples with shortfalls of basic goods ranging from medicines to flour due to strict currency controls that stymie imports. McDonald's restaurants are coping by replacing the spuds with salad or local fare such as fried yuca or "arepa" corn pancakes - but Golden Arches fans are none too happy about the new meal. "Hamburgers don't go with arepas and this salad...

For people who dislike and misunderstand capitalism (or free markets, or laissez-faire, or economic liberalism, or whatever you want to call it), the governing principle of market competition is the “Walmart effect.” According to this model of how the economy works — a model with very little basis in reality, but never mind that — big companies such as Walmart muscle into a market or a territory, use advantages of scale and predatory pricing (“predatory” here meaning “saving consumers money at the expense of relatively well-off business owners”) to drive out so-called mom-and-pop operations, lower workers’ wages, and then...

Not much to share, but this video is crazy... Surprised no one was killed with those violent swings with the chairs... And the sad part is the guy in the video at the end is laughing... I'm from this area, and I find it disturbing that this type of behavior is accepted today.. I'm also embarrassed with my city... and not just my city but the state of this country, but that's a whole other thread in itself... I wonder if any of them are having trouble breathing...

In The Trial, written a century ago in 1914, Franz Kafka paints a portrait of an unimaginably oppressive government with secret laws and trials in which the individual is crushed. Today, in 2014, Kafka would not have to invent these circumstances. He could find them in real life, at the National Labor Relations Board. It’s up to the 114th Congress to keep the NLRB in check.On Friday, just before the holidays, NLRB General Counsel Richard Griffin announced that he had issued complaints against McDonald’s franchised restaurants and McDonald’s USA, the parent corporation, as joint employers.  Workers complained that they...

“Police said Johnson placed a drive-thru order early Thursday, received his food and pulled away. He drove back through the drive-thru, complained about the missing cheeseburger and the manager asked him to park and said he would bring out the missing sandwich.” But Johnson had another idea. He parked his car, and proceeded to walk into the McDonald’s with a pistol, demanding his order be fixed.

McDonald’s and its franchisees illegally retaliated against employees for participating in union-related activities, the National Labor Relations Board’s top lawyer alleged Friday in a case with sweeping industry implications. NLRB general counsel Richard Griffin announced Friday he will issue 13 complaints involving 78 charges against franchises and McDonald’s USA, LLC. Though many of these alleged labor violations were committed by independent franchise owners, Griffin ruled earlier this year that McDonald’s can be held liable for those actions as a so-called joint employer, leaving the corporatrion — and potentially other franchisors — exposed to such claims. McDonald’s said the decision will...

She’s a mom on a mission. A single mother-of-two from the Los Angeles neighborhood of South Central recently went on strike against her employer McDonald’s. Maribel makes $9.35 per hour working as a server but that’s not enough to support her family (she shares a home with 10 other people including her children, grandmother, and niece). “I need fifteen to buy my babies diapers, their wipies, their clothes,” she explains. “Its hard with nine dollars per hour — you can’t do that. It’s really hard to pay rent.” On December 4, Maribel, along with a large group seeking $15 per...

What Ferguson Protesters Did To A Slain Police Officer Will Infuriate You By Kristina Hall Officer Jeremy Henwood was shot and killed while sitting in his police cruiser just moments after he bought a young boy his meal at McDonald’s, because the young man couldn’t afford it. Officer Henwood was a decorated HERO who served several tours of duty in both Iraq and Afghanistan as a Marine combat veteran. In those final moments when he took his wallet out and helped a boy from his community, it truly showed just what kind of man he was. After purchasing the young...

It turns out that people aren't eating as many McHamburgers as they used to, which is a big problem if your business is all about slinging meat. So McDonald's is hoping the novelty of its "Create Your Taste" ordering kiosks will lure some customers back in. The machines will be installed in 2,000 of its US outlets by the end of 2015.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has approved Idaho-based J.R. Simplot Co.'s new genetically modified potato. But one of the company's oldest business partners — McDonald's — hasn't. The fast-food giant says it doesn't use genetically modified potatoes, the Idaho Statesman reported. "McDonald's USA does not source GMO potatoes, nor do we have current plans to change our sourcing practices," the company said in a statement.

California woman is charged with fraud after she 'uses injury photos from the Internet' to claim she was severely burned by McDonald's coffee Selena Edwards, 38, of Victorville claimed she was burned on the hand by coffee from a McDonald's drive-through and was seeking $10,000 Photos submitted were taken from a hospital website, according to a state official investigating Edwards for fraud Edwards faces 21 counts of insurance fraud and workers' compensation fraud It was a case that echoed another famous lawsuit against McDonald's 20 years ago, but investigators are claiming this one's a phony. Selena Edwards, 38, of Victorville...

VETERAN FREEPER BUT BEEN OUT OF TOUCH LATELY ... WOULD LOVE TO GET FREEPER FEEDBACK IF MY THEORY ON THIS VIDEO MAKES SENSE ... Plenty of you have heard about or watched that bizarre breakfast brawl at the McDonald's in the City of Brotherly Love. Let's keep it real. Blacks Behaving Badly videos do really well on youtube and people make money off them. Black people watch them on World Star Hip-Hop and are like "dammmmmnnnn, girlfriend, you see this s--t?" ...

Philadelphia Police are searching for a man who stabbed a McDonald’s employee after an argument over the store’s closing time.The entire altercation was caught on the store’s surveillance cameras.The incident happened at about 11 p.m. on November 3rd inside the McDonald’s Restaurant located at 2851 Grays Ferry Avenue. The suspect and a companion were eating inside the restaurant when they were told the dining area was closing and they were asked to leave. The suspect became irate and began to argue with several employees. The suspect then followed one of the employees outside and continued to argue. When the employee...

Likened to 'packing foam' and 'gray IKEA furniture' the McDonald's McRib patty came under scrutiny last year after one was photographed on the production line minus sauce and pickles. But now the fast food giant is hoping to get people 'lovin" its seasonal treat again by showing exactly how the boneless, preformed morsel is made. A new behind-the-scenes video takes viewers inside the Lopez Foods production facility in Oklahoma City where giant chunks of pork are ground down - no packing foam in sight.

In a surprise move CEO Donald Thompson of McDonald’s Restaurants announced they had reached an agreement with the SEIU and would start paying its workers a “Living Wage” of $15.00 per hour the first of October. Mr. Thompson issued a press release stating, “As a company we realize we have been negligent in paying our employees a real living wage for the last 60 years, so in the spirit of social well-being, we have decided to comply with the wishes of the White House and the SEIU.” The Service Employees International Union spokesman, Seymour Pecunia, said that he “was very...

Here's what "food experts" have to say when they taste McDonalds under the pretense that it's organic food. (my favorite is the woman who says it tastes "more pure") Pretentious BS. I've thought this about so-called "foodies" for a long time now.It's food. Sure, there's good food and bad food, but we're in a bad place when people try to over-intellectualize it the way the people above and all of these chef reality shows do. We're basically treating food the same way we do abstract art now (half the time fancy restaurants even serve plates that look like it)If you...