Big John and Ramblin’ Ray end the show by asking themselves, Executive producer Tony Lossano, Technical director Michael Garay, Associate Producer Kim Kaczmarek, and News Anchor John Dempsey: What did you learn today from the show?
Tag Archives: McDonald’s
File Your Taxes, then Snag a Deal – Companies Offering Tax Day Discounts and Freebies
Each year in an empathetic move, companies offer tax day deals to help lessen the blow of paying federal and state income taxes. Here are a few places to snag a deal!
Noodles & Company: From April 12 to 18, use the code TAXDAY17 with online orders and you’ll get $4 off a purchase of $10 or more!
Boston Market: For Tax Day, get a half chicken individual meal with two sides and cornbread plus a fountain drink and cookie for $10.40.
Sonic: Their website touts half price single cheeseburgers on April 18th.
McDonald’s: Buy one Big Mac or Quarter-Pounder and get a second one for just a penny!
Hard Rock Cafe: “Sing For Your Supper” on April 18 at participating Hard Rock Cafes. You will have to get on stage, sing a song, but you will earn yourself a free Legendary Burger.
Geja’s Café: Offering a Tax Relief deal of $20.17 off each Premier Dinner every Sunday – Thursday the entire month of
April.
Fairmont Chicago, Millennium Park: is offering guests overnight accommodations with 20% off the flexible daily rate (minimum two-night stay) and a complimentary room upgrade upon check-in. Accommodations can be booked now through April 18, 2017 for stays through December 30, 2017.
Blown Away: 15% off blowouts on April 18 to those who mention “Tax Day Special”.
Take a Hike!! This week is also National Park Week. The U.S. National Parks is offering free entrance for the weekends of April 15–16 and April 22–23. Welcome the spring and say goodbye to tax season by hitting the hiking trail.
The Huffington Post did a ton of work to put together a list of wins on Tax Day. Their list includes tax preparation services deals, food, beauty, and apparel!
Check out this article from them: 34 Tax Day 2016 Deals, Discounts and Freebies | The Huffington Post
McDonald’s to start using Fresh Beef
By Joseph Pisani, AP Business Writer
NEW YORK (AP) – Coming soon to McDonald’s: Fresh beef.
The fast food giant said Thursday that it will swap frozen beef patties for fresh ones in its Quarter Pounder burgers by sometime next year at most of its U.S. locations. Employees will cook up the never-frozen beef on a grill when ordered.
That has been the biggest selling point at rival Wendy’s. Yet there are larger forces at work that have prompted other menu changes at McDonald’s, known for decades more for the billions of people that it has served, rather than its culinary choices.
The world’s largest hamburger chain for some time has been attempting to improve its image as more people shun processed foods.
It has tinkered with its recipes, removed artificial preservatives from chicken McNuggets and it removed high fructose corn syrup from its buns.
The company is trying to stem a streak of adverse trends that led to an executive shakeup two years ago. The company brought in Steve Easterbrook as CEO to turn steer the company in a more promising direction. It’s an ongoing endeavor.
Earlier this month, McDonald’s acknowledged that it lost 500 million customer transactions in the U.S. since 2012, mainly to other fast food rivals.
McDonald’s Corp., based in Oak Brook, Illinois, tested the fresh beef Quarter Pounders at more than 400 restaurants in Dallas and Tulsa, Oklahoma, for about a year before rolling out the changes nationally. By the middle of 2018, the fresh beef will come to most of its 14,000 U.S. locations, except those in Alaska, Hawaii and some airport locations.
Disappointing sales figures for McDonalds
NEW YORK (AP) – McDonald’s is trying stage a comeback, but still has plenty of work to do in its flagship U.S. market.
The world’s biggest burger chain said U.S. sales dipped 1.3 percent at established locations for the final three months of 2016. Its performance was better overseas, and the sales figure rose globally.
The Oak Brook, Illinois company attributed the sales decline at home to a tough comparison from the year-ago period, when it introduced an all-day breakfast menu. The results nevertheless underscore the hurdles McDonald’s faces in its push to revitalize its image while facing broader industry challenges, including supermarkets and convenience stores selling more prepared foods and cheaper groceries encouraging people to eat at home.
Earlier this month, The NPD Group said it expects customer traffic for the restaurant industry to remain “stalled” this year, as it was in 2016.
McDonald’s isn’t alone in struggling to attract more customers. Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz has said the retail landscape would undergo a “seismic” change as people do more of their shopping online, leading to less foot traffic in general. The coffee chain’s transactions at established U.S. locations slipped by 1 percent in the previous quarter.
McDonald’s, meanwhile, has conceded that it failed to keep up with changing tastes and that it’s speeding up efforts to transform into a “modern, progressive burger company.” It recently introduced its Big Mac in different sizes, for instance, and has been testing fresh beef for some of its burgers.
Heading into 2017, McDonald’s said it would focus on growing customer traffic.
The U.S. sales decline for the end of 2016 snaps a streak of five quarters of increases. But those increases could have been the result of higher prices or people ordering different menu items. For all of 2016, McDonald’s saw guest counts decline 2.1 percent at established locations, according to a regulatory filing.
That marks the fourth straight year of declining guest counts at home. The company also trimmed its U.S. store base for the second year in a row after decades of expansion, ending the year with 14,155 locations.
David Palmer, an RBC Capital Markets analyst, said U.S. sales trends may improve for McDonald’s this year as it rolls out more changes like the different Big Mac sizes and value deals that can help draw customers.
Globally, McDonald’s expanded its footprint and had 36,899 locations at year’s end.
The company said its International Lead unit, which includes the United Kingdom, saw sales rise 2.8 percent at established locations. The High Growth unit, which includes China, saw sales increase 4.7 percent. Sales at established locations for the Foundational segment, which includes Japan, rose 11.1 percent.
McDonald’s Corp. said it earned $1.44 per share for the fourth quarter, topping the $1.41 per share that Wall Street expected, according to FactSet.
Revenue was $6.03 billion, above the $6 billion analysts expected.
McDonald’s Moves Headquarters from Oak Brook to Chicago
Jen DeSalvo, WLS-AM 890 News
(CHICAGO) In a surprise move (literally), longtime Oak Brook-based McDonald’s Corporation moved it’s global headquarters to Chicago. In June the company stated that the move to the new location at the former Harpo Studios would be completed by 2018.
… MORE
Suburban Chicago man sues over McDonald’s ‘value meal’ price
(CHICAGO) A suburban Chicago man is suing McDonald’s restaurants in two Illinois counties, arguing cheeseburger “Extra Value Meals” are actually more expensive than when the items are purchased separately.
James Gertie of Des Plaines tells The (Arlington Heights) Daily Herald that bundling two cheeseburgers, medium french fries and a drink at $5.90 is 41 cents more than when individual items are purchased.
Gertie, a bus driver, says his lawsuit filed this month is about principle, not 41 cents.
He seeks class-action status for a consumer fraud and deceptive practices lawsuit against McDonald’s operator Karis Management Co.
The complaint seeks an injunction to keep McDonald’s from pricing value meals higher than items purchased separately.
Des Plaines-based Karis operates McDonald’s restaurants in nine cities. Representatives from McDonald’s and Karis didn’t return messages.
Gertie joined John Howell and Ray Stevens on Wednesday morning.
Copyright 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Only 1 in 5 millennials have tried a McDonald’s Big Mac?
There’s no way that kids nowadays aren’t eating Big Macs, is there? Apparently, only 20% of people who fall in the Millennial generation (ages 18-34) have ever eaten at least one Big Mac in their lifetime.
The morning show discussed. Producer Bill Hopkins has never had one, and neither has traffic anchor, Jen DeSalvo.
Big John Howell and Ray Stevens said that they buy multiple at one time, so the men of their generation are making up for slacking sales in the millennial bracket.
Read the full story and poll here: Only 1 in 5 millennials have tried a McDonald’s Big Mac · Newswire · The A.V. Club
America’s Newest Hero is Unhappy with her McRib
Meet Carla, America’s newest hero: She posted a video on Facebook claiming she just throat punched a McDonald’s employee. She asked said employee for their offer of an extra McRib for a dollar with the purchase of a regular-priced McRib. The employees replay, prompting the throat punch? “Well it don’t look like you need the extra McRib.” Carla was obviously displeased with this response, exclaiming “McScuse me?” and knocking “her *ss down.”
Mayor Emanuel: Release Cop Shooting Video
By John Dempsey, WLS News
Mayor Emanuel has decided not to appeal a court order to release the video showing a Chicago Police Officer shooting a black teen to death. The officer shot and killed 17 year old LaQuan McDonald last October, firing 16 shots into the teen’s body. On Thursday, Cook County Judge Franklin Valderama ordered Emanuel to release the police dashboard camera video, which the Mayor had resisted. A few hours after the judge’s order, Emanuel released the following statement:
“Police officers are entrusted to uphold the law, and to provide safety to our residents. In this case unfortunately, it appears an officer violated that trust at every level. As a result, the city’s Independent Police Review Authority promptly sent this case and the evidence to state and federal prosecutors who have been investigating it for almost a year. In accordance with the judge’s ruling the City will release the video by November 25, which we hope will provide prosecutors time to expeditiously bring their investigation to a conclusion so Chicago can begin to heal.”
So far the officer has not been charged with wrongdoing, but the Chicago City Council has already approved a five million dollar settlement with McDonald’s family.
Now, some in the community are concerned about possibly rioting when that video is released.
City Council Black Caucus Chairman, Sixth Ward Alderman Roderick Sawyer, told ABC 7, “I just to make sure that people remain calm, be angry, be frustrated, but work within the system”. Meanwhile, Police Union President Dean Angelo told “The Big John Howell Show” on WLS, “There is a sense of concern throughout the entire department now, probably throughout the entire city, what are the plans? What’s going to go into effect? Is this going to be an emergency or a high alert type of concern?”
So far the police department is not saying what measures it might take to prevent unrest, in the days and hours before that video is released.
Angelo says if the officer is eventually charged, release of the video will make it harder to find impartial jurors for his trial, telling WLS, “Not only is it going to put out evidence that is going to be viewed hundreds of times by a potential jury pool, but where do you find someone that doesn’t have a pre-conceived opinion of what occurred?”
However freelance journalist Brandon Smith, who filed a lawsuit to force the release of the video, says it’s past time for the public to be able to see what happened, even if prosecutors are still deciding whether to file charges against the officer. ” Videos speak a lot louder than descriptions of videos, and it’s been over a year since this incident. If there’s such a clear record of what happened, it doesn’t make sense to investigate it so long and doubt what happened”
@ 2015 WLS News
