McDonalds in India
India is a country that has not only banned beef but also a country where cows are seen as sacred. Therefore, when McDonalds, a brand inherently built on beef products, came to India it would be easy to assume that the chain couldn’t last in this country for too long. However, McDonalds along with Amit Jatia, the man who now owns the greatest number of McDonalds in India, ensured this was not the case.
McDonalds could almost be described as a different brand in India to the rest of the world. This is as the brand in India is not perceived as a fast-food restaurant where you grab a cheap meal and continue with your day. McDonalds in India is seen as a sit-down restaurant. Therefore, in India you can see things such as big family meals and get togethers as well as couples on dates in a McDonalds, something you don’t see very often in the rest of the world.
Of course, McDonalds did what it does when expanding to any new country, they came up with a completely new menu for India using Indian ingredients such paneer (Indian Cheese) and spices. Doing this made McDonalds far more appealing to the Indian Pallet. Additionally, something that Amit Jatia says in his interview with the BBC is that an important factor was to market a burger as a full meal, as people in India can be unfamiliar with what exactly a burger is. However, the above is not the essence of why McDonalds has seen such expansion in India due to growth and popularity.
This is as what attracts many Indians to this restaurant chain is the brand. This is as in India the target audience for McDonalds is not families with young kids like its global target audience but more teenagers and college students. It provides affordable sit down meals where people providing a place for people to gather while being a worldwide brand that signals towards American popular culture. Like in many countries in Asia, India has seen its influence with American media and culture which has resulted in the Americanisation of the population, especially the young population. This has resulted in a set clientele for McDonalds as it is almost seen as a restaurant that is ‘cool’ to eat at.
Therefore, McDonalds’ perception in India is extremely different to what it is in the western world. This allows McDonalds to be used by the population in an extremely varied way from sit down dinners to quick takeaways. Additionally, since the introduction of McDonalds in India, the country has seen a large change in the behaviour of its population. When McDonalds was first introduced in India the average person would go out to eat for three out of a hundred meals. Over the years that number has significantly grown to 9 out of every hundred meals (BBC). This is as McDonalds caused a culinary revolution in India. Soon after people saw the growing popularity of the restaurant chain, people noticed that there is a very large market for reasonably priced restaurants which people associate with America. This saw brands such as Chillies Subway sitting next to the McDonalds at almost every mall or food court in India.
However, this had a negative impact on McDonalds. This is as now in a country where there are so many competitors, the market share of McDonalds is heavily reduced and overtaken by brands such as subway and dominos. Although they are still the leading seller of burgers, other inherently ‘American’ brands have found ways to cater better for the Indian palette while providing that same relation to the western world that McDonalds initially provided. Therefore, this leads me back to my initial claim, McDonalds didn’t translate well to my home country for the food or drinks or service. It translated well because it was a famous American brand. However, unfortunately for McDonalds their competitors in the US caught on to the missing market which McDonalds filled and therefore rushed and joint them.
