Fastfood

Kevin Pederson

Fast Food

Hamburgers are a reasonably recent creation, they were only became mainstream in the early twentieth century. In 1916 the first hamburger chain was created by J. Walter Anderson. At his Witchita, Kansas store he sold hamburgers for five cents which

also came with freis and colas. White castle was a thriving business, but it and other fast food chains did not become really popular until after World War II.

In 1948 on a tennis court in San Berdino, California two brothers by the manes of Richard and Maurice chalked out the design for a new kind of fast food place from their point of view. Ideas that would help to decide exactly what went into their operation might have been making their business as efficient as possible, and they did this by reducing expenses which would in turn allow them to sell their hamburgers at a much lower price than their competedors. These ideas were suppose to have not only help with lowering prices, but the idea behind the lowering of the prices was to increase the number of costumers, which would in turn allow them to have a higher profit margin by selling in high volumes. This combined with another marketing strategy

of only selling a few items were very vital keys to their success.To test out all of their ideas they opened an octagonal shaped hamburger stand, run with only employees at the window instead of waitwresses which

greatly decreased their operating expenses.

Although all of their ideas had been great so far, the brothers decided that they had a few more tricks up their sleeves, and ofcourse these ideas were meant to allow guests to be helped faster and more efficiently. To do this they purchased eight multimixers (Machines that mixed six shakes simutinlusly). The McDonalds concept did not include any indoor tables or chairs, but this idea was to encourage the customer to purchase food at the window and eat it in their car or to bring it home. At first they onlt sold items such as shakes. Hamburgers, fries, and sodas. But all of their efforts to streamline the hamburger was what made it all pay off very well. In 1951 alone the grossed $275,000.

Eventhough business was going great, the brothers decided that they needed a new architecual plan for their restaurant. Richard decided that it would be a great ides to have arches go from the ground right through the roof of the restaurant. This was the birth of the "Golden Arches". These arches were to go therought the roof and slope towards the front of the resterant. Another great idea that the McDonalds borthers had was to franchise the business. Franchising their business would allow other operators to open more of the chain across the nation, based upon the design in San Berdino. The people operating the new franchised McDonalds were to pay the brothers a certain percentage of their sales and a fee to use their concept. In 1953 newly- designed Mcdonalds opened in Phenix, Arizona and Downey California.

With success comes others wanting to copy the successful one's ideas, and this was definetel the case in this situation. A man by the name of Keith Cramer began a restaurant named Burger King in Flordia which

was based on the McDonald operation. Three years after selling the Mcdonald's brothers the multimixers , Ray Kroc visited the operation and liked what he saw. In fact he was so impressed that he arranged with the McDonad's to sell him franchise,a ndhe then opened his own McDonalds in Des Plaines, Illinios and he streamlined the operation even further. In the years 1957 there were an estimated 37 McDonalds open, and by 1959 the total had reached over 100. In 1961 Kroc was so impressed woth the success of the business that he bought out the brothers and expanded it further through out the nation. In turn Kroc's success was viewed by others, and encouraged them to use the concept of fast-food in their own ways. Dave Thomas opened his first Wendy's restaurant in Columbus, Ohio in 1962. By 1990 their were almost 11,893 Mcdonald's, 6,298 Burger king's, and 3,721 Wendy's establishments in America.

Other fast food establishments were opened and also included items like chicken, tacos, pizza, and sub-marine sandwhich

es to their menus. Today, over 60 million American's are served in over 160,000 resturants daily, ans these businesses generate over 65$ billion annually.

Which brings us to the question of why have fast-food chains expanded so rapidly during the last 40 years? The rise of the fast food restaurant would not have been possible without radical changes in American culture. Beginning in the 1920s, thanks in large part to developments in technology and industry, the American lifestyle began to change. Formerly distinctive regional and ethnic cultures were now meeting up with each other, blurring differences in identity. More people were moving off the farm and into