Claire Everett
The world’s biggest McDonald’s is going to open in Stratford on the Olympic site and yes, as the Daily Mail puts it, oh the irony! (Daily Mail, 2011)
McDonald's has been involved in sponsoring the Olympic Games or catering to the athletes and spectators since the Moscow Olympics in 1980. The 2012 involvement will see the chain open four restaurants on the Olympic site, including one in the athletes’ village. The supersize restaurant will be 3000m2 – that’s bigger than 2 Olympic-size swimming pools – and seat 1500 people.
Usain Bolt’s pre-race meal of Chicken Nuggets at the Beijing Olympics made headlines (BBC, 2011) and whilst he has justified the unhealthiness of this choice by saying he wasn’t familiar with a lot of Chinese food and wanted something he trusted, I’m still inclined to believe that it was the wrong message to put out there to children. Another part of Bolt’s reasoning is the fact that his volume of training means he can eat pretty much anything he wants as long as he retains a balanced diet. The report in the Daily Mail estimates that a fifth of meals sold at the Olympics will be McDonald’s. So what will the other food outlets be and will they provide the chance to maintain this balance?
As a spectator at the Athens Olympics I was pretty horrified on my first day at the athletics stadium to find that the food choices were McDonald’s, pizza, or hot dogs. I’d like to think London can do better than this and indeed the organising committee has confirmed there will be a “diverse and full range of local food offerings” (Daily Mail, 2011). But there’s a problem... the exclusive deal with McDonalds as an official sponsor of the Games, means any other foods sold must be unbranded (Guardian, 2011). Of course, McDonald’s isn’t the only official sponsor, but with others including Coca Cola and Cadbury holding similar exclusivity deals, the ‘unbranded’ food suppliers are going to be really up against it to promote their products.
We also have to consider the impact on the local economy. McDonald’s has said it expects to sell 1.75million meals over the course of the games and in doing so 470 jobs will be created at the Olympic site and British farmers may benefit from the sale of beef, pork and eggs to the chain (Evening Standard). However, the overall profit is of course going to go into the pocket of the global brand. It would be interesting to see a comparison of how much money the equivalent number of meals from local food companies could inject into the local economy.
I think my next blog is going to have to be about the one major topic I’ve not managed to fit into this one...what would happen to participation in sport if sponsorship from global food brands wasn’t present?
