In response to Samantha Kho’s blog Going Veg.
I believe there is a huge ethical issue with these new restaurant openings near holy pilgrimage sites. Even though I was shocked to see this quote from a McDonald’s spokesperson, “In markets across the world, McDonald’s respects local cultures and has adopted our menu and dining experience to local preferences. The new restaurants in pilgrimage areas will be vegetarian-only because of the specific area and customer base,”.  This statement is contradicting and misleading. If McDonald’s really respected the local culture the company would have made these restaurants by these holy sites. Eating meat is sacred in these areas. What is McDonald’s? A burger joint. It is a disgrace to the people for even having the brand image of McDonald’s in their vicinity. The statement is also misleading in the fact that these words are sugar coated. ” respects local cultures and has adopted our menu and dining experience to local preferences”, this is not showing respect to local cultures, this is just trying to make profit. I would not disagree with the approach McDonald’s is making on expanding in the Indian market but showing respect to culture and changing one’s menu is two completely different things.
In easy terms, McDonald’s new restaurants is like a Manchester United fan walking into a local London pub filled with Arsenal fans, It does not match.