McDonald's In The News
By Chuck Sudo in Food on Sep 22, 2005 3:05PM
In case some readers think that we fine folks at Chicagoist have been going overboard with the Macy Field's coverage the past two days, for your perusal today here is a gaggle of news from Hamburger U that has nothing to do with the nutritional quality of its food or its CEO suddenly dropping dead:
- Helping those affected by Hurricane Katrina will take years. The possibility of Rita hitting the Gulf Coast would only put the region in a very deep hole. So it's heartwarming to hear that McDonald's has created a 100-person staff tasked with locating and assisting Katrina-affected workers. 25 New Orleans McDonald's were damaged or destroyed by Katrina and half of the 8,000 McDonald's employees in the region are still unaccounted for. The staff, working from a hastily assembled phone bank on the third floor of McDonald's Plaza in Oak Brook takes calls from employees, connects them with people searching for them and helps them with paychecks, housing, and food assistance. McDonald's also has hundreds more employees on the ground in the Gulf helping out with relief efforts. Between the Golden Arches and Wal-Mart, who needs FEMA?
-In addition to Matt's post about the Chipotle IPO McDonald's also announced that it raised the company's annual stock dividend 22 percent, bringing the total dividend payout to $825 million. The 2K5 payout raises the annual cash payout to .67 a share, almost triple the dividend of 2K2. But if you have a lot of money invested in McDonald's don't go laying the foundation for that in-ground pool yet. After the Chipotle announcement McDonald's average stock price fell 3.7 percent to $31.42 as Wall Street wasn't bullish on the announcement.
- In its continuing campaign to combat the low-paying, dead-end stereotype of the "McJob" McDonald's last night launched an ad campaign featuring successful people whose first job was at a McD's. The first ads featured Gold Medal Olympian- and long-time McDonald's endorser- Carl Lewis and R&B singer Macy Gray. This comes on the heels of McDonald's announcement that it was looking at having popular urban fashion houses design its uniforms. Personally we're rooting for Roc-A-Wear to win the contract. Look at what they've done with recent NBA uniforms?