McDonald's, the world's leading food chain and franchise, reported last Tuesday that it has reached its lowest numbers since 2003 after a rocky month featuring a scandal with a Chinese provider. This follows a trend started last month, after a well-publicized problem with a Chinese provider that took to changing its products' expiration dates.
According to the report, global sales at stores over a year old dropped 3.7 percent last August, making it the company's worst month in "same-store sales" since the spring of 2003.
The biggest blow reported was in what the company generically calls its Asia/Pacific, Middle East and Africa region; there, same-store sales dropped 14.5 percent following the release of a video from one of the company's meat supplier, where it was shown the workers engaged in highly unhygienic practices such as picking up pieces of meat from the floor after they had fallen down and putting them back on the meat processor afterwards. In the aftermath of the scandal, McDonald's was forced to pull their meat products off sales in many China outlets.
The company expressed it was undertaking a new revamp in the region to regain customers' confidence after the scandal with their meat provider.
However, McDonald's isn't only taking a tough time overseas: it's also been hit hard at home. The August report shows that US same-store sales dropped 2.8 percent, due to the country's slow economic recovery; The Huffington Post reports that diners with low income just aren't as willing to go to fast food restaurants anymore.
Because of recent protests against low wages in fast food chains, McDonald's has actually suffered poor publicity and has been the main focus of said protests - party because of its status as the biggest chain in the market. However, the company has actually received its lowest share among fast-food restaurants since 2011.
Last month, McDonald's changed its president for U.S. business to Mike Andres, in a move that will hopefully turn the company upside.
