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| Europe |
| French resistance no match for Big Mac |
| 2006-06-26 |
 THE animosity between France and the United States has seen weighty arguments range between Iraq and the merits of fast-food giant McDonald's. But it appears that Ronald McDonald is having the last laugh. Sales continue to ride high despite the apparently sniffy attitude of Parisians. Seven years ago, José Bové, the tenacious farmer who campaigns against globalisation, bulldozed a half-built McDonald's restaurant in protest against Americanisation. |
| Posted by:lotp |
| #17 the McDonalds let you sit in the place for as long as you like for the cost of a hamburger or coffee. So old people know that in hot weather, they can be in AC for pocket change and avoid becoming part of a replay of the 15,000 heat deaths during the summer in France. WalMart has a similar strategy -- it does pay off in some additional business, but is also a genuine outreach to the poorer members of the community. |
| Posted by: lotp 2006-06-26 19:23 |
| #16 Quarter Flounder! Ha! ha! haa haa hee. |
| Posted by: 6 2006-06-26 19:11 |
| #15 Another factor in McDonald's growing strength in France is that ALL McDonalds are climate-controlled. Not a lot of public places in France are; plus, the McDonalds let you sit in the place for as long as you like for the cost of a hamburger or coffee. So old people know that in hot weather, they can be in AC for pocket change and avoid becoming part of a replay of the 15,000 heat deaths during the summer in France. |
| Posted by: Shieldwolf 2006-06-26 16:38 |
| #14 I took my wife to Maisonette for our first anniversary. Great meal . . . needed bank financing to do it, but it was a great meal! |
| Posted by: Mike 2006-06-26 16:36 |
| #13 The Maisonette only just closed this year. Mais, non! My dad's old boss, Sy, took my parents to dinner there once, and the waiter nearly choked to death when Sy ordered "a wedge of iceberg lettuce with 1000 Island dressing." LOL. |
| Posted by: Seafarious 2006-06-26 16:15 |
| #12 The Maisonette only just closed this year. It was the first restaurant in the US to earn five Michelin stars (in 1965), which honour it held until the end. Unfortunately, the current generation running the place didn't have very good business sense to go along with their exquisite wine celler and classic French cuisine (Zenster, you would have been in hog heaven!). When my Czech au pair went touring round Europe for a few weeks with her American soldier friends, she drove them crazy by insisting that on the road they always stop at the McDonalds -- she knew that she would find clean bathrooms and trustworthy food there. She explained that food poisoning is only tolerable when one already has a comfortable bed to sleep in -- an experience she knew too well growing up in the wilds of Communist Czechoslovakia. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-06-26 15:20 |
| #11 "José Bové, the tenacious farmer who campaigns against globalisation" They misspelled "communist." |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2006-06-26 14:34 |
| #10 One of the radio stations in Cincinnati used to have a parody commercial for "McMaisonette* Five-Star Drive Through" which had someone pulling his minivan up to the squawk box to order a Quarter Flounder with cheese, the "Es-Car-Got" McNuggets, two large Bordeax and a Chablis, and come McMousse for the kids. It was screaming hilarious. *At the time, there was a 5-star French-style restaurant in town called "Le Maisonette." |
| Posted by: Mike 2006-06-26 13:17 |
| #9 All your BigMacs are belong to us! |
| Posted by: DarthVader 2006-06-26 13:14 |
| #8 My (American) friends on holiday in Italy sought out McDonald's for the clean, free restrooms. Same thing in Australia. I used to have to take a long drive to a remote work site. There was a McDonald's at a town about halfway there. I'm not that wild about McDonald's, but I always wanted to stop there for the bathrooms. I'm sure my Australian colleagues rolled their eyes. Tough. |
| Posted by: Angie Schultz 2006-06-26 12:21 |
| #7 Jules: Do you know what they call a Quarter Pounder with cheese in France? Brett: No. Jules: Tell him, Vincent. Vincent: Royale with cheese. Jules: Royale with cheese. Do you know why they call it a Royale with cheese? Brett: Because of the metric system? Jules: Check out the big brain on Brett. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2006-06-26 11:31 |
| #6 My (American) friends on holiday in Italy sought out McDonald's for the clean, free restrooms. |
| Posted by: Seafarious 2006-06-26 11:05 |
| #5 France and the United States has seen weighty arguments range between Iraq and the merits of fast-food giant McDonald's And we're having the last laugh on Iraq too. |
| Posted by: 2b 2006-06-26 10:52 |
| #4 Typical French hypocritical lifestyles. They publicly hate us, at least in Paris, and secretly wish they were us. The French, always entertaining. |
| Posted by: 49 Pan 2006-06-26 10:46 |
| #3 In fact his grandmother died from a heart attack when she learned he worked at MCDonald's: she believed he played piano in a cathouse. |
| Posted by: JFM 2006-06-26 10:27 |
| #2 French resistance Oxymoron! |
| Posted by: Almost Anonymous5839 2006-06-26 10:01 |
| #1 And it's Halal too! |
| Posted by: bigjim-ky 2006-06-26 09:43 |