McDonald's response to obesity and public health concerns

¶ … Obesity at McDonalds/McDonalds: Issues Related to Fast Food

Situational Analysis

Stakeholder Analysis

Ethical Theory Analysis

McDonald's Corporation, can be found in 119 nations of the world. Over 68 million customers are served by 33, 000 locations daily. When we talk of McDonald's as a fast food industry and as a brand, the sales are huge, but the perception of the brand makes it hard to keep up with the pace. The public has a negative perception of the brand following its rating as the 6 thbrand in the world and thereby mounting expectations. Issues of unhealthy foods and obesity are the major factors that influence McDonald's public perception (Brannan et al., 2015).

Stakeholder Analysis

McDonald's first franchise was opened to the public on 1967 in Canada, the brand now has several thousands of franchises all over the world. The major stakeholders of McDonald's include Workers, Customers, Suppliers, Government Agencies, Trade Unions, and Communities (Weebly, 2015a).

The Customers will face both positive and negative effects. They will get the chance to eat healthier foods with the right ingredients. There will be fewer cases of mood swings as their bodies will only deal with healthy ingredients. On the negative light, the customers will have to face higher costs of food supplies. It is a normal happening for prices to increase as the quality of food items improves. Replacing cheaper meat supplies with healthier and hence expensive options means an increase in the cost of normal fast-food items. Suppliers on their part, will experience some negative effects in that they will be dropped as major suppliers in the company's attempt to offer healthier options. The suppliers are likely to lose considerable amounts of incomes or possibly become inoperative. Trade Unions on their part will also experience some negative effects of this change as the workers will be less likely to pay them to fight for their rights. With more money coming into the company's coffers, they are most likely to increase their workers' pay and there will be no need for the assistance of Trade Unions. Trade Unions will lose both income and customers. Government is the only stakeholder who is less likely to be affected negatively. The government will maintain its influence on McDonald's and even gain more from their increased income ( Weebly, 2015b).

Ethical Theory Analysis

One very common topic people easily relate with obesity is the alarming rate at which the fast-food industry is growing. You can find advertisements for restaurants like McDonald's and the likes all over the place. There are several radio, and TV jingles, newspaper ads, billboard ads, and magazine commercials promoting the fast-food industry. McDonald's, particularly, is known to promote its food massively despite the fact that it is quite unhealthy. Will placing a ban on the advertisement of fast-foods have any significant effects? Coming from a teleological perspective, it will definitely make a difference. This line of ethical analysis is based on the fact that actions ought to produce very little displeasures and more happiness. Banning these fast-food ads will make people happier ultimately, as a consequence as cases of obesity recede and will its attendant health issues to deal with (Hanafian, 2015).

There can be no social, moral, ethical, or even spiritual rationalization for aiming immature children via marketing and advertising. Obesity, drugs and a host of additional issues that have impacted both children and society, at large, directly link to advertising aimed at children, together with teenage sexualization, violence, smoking and drinking, unwarranted materialism as well as the wearing away of creativity (Brien, 2011). Consumers should also watch what they eat and make sure they choose only healthy options when they visit these fast-food outlets.

Issues relating to negative public perception and obesity have put MacDonald's in considerable negative focus. The situational analysis, the stakeholders analysis, and the ethical exploration analysis gives an insight into major areas that require more attention and changes. MacDonald's, being a global brand, requires to attend to and be responsive to certain social responsibilities, but the consumers have a role to play when it comes to unhealthy foods and obesity. This is because people choose what they eat. They are expected to make the right choices at all times. It is also important to make MacDonald's more accountable with regards to how the produce, market and sell their foods (Howard, 2015). During the 2012 Summer Olympics, MacDonald's took the advantage of advertising the 400 calories or less. Helping customers get adequate education shows them how much the company is concerned about the current issue of obesity. The implementation of this campaign can also help bring more customers to the company, especially those who have always seen the brand as a very unhealthy one. It is important they do it more often with a mix of some humor and originality (Kelly et al., 2012). Apart from this, it should equally pay attention to adding new healthy options to reduce negative public perceptions. Moreover, carrying out adequate analysis on food ingredients before choosing a supplier will help prevent the transmission of diseases.