Week 5: "C'est ça que j'm" "I'm Lovin it"

 There are three reasons why I -- like most Americans -- continue to pump money into my local golden arches despite the well-known health risks.

Reason #1: Location

The McDonald’s in my town sits just off an exit for a major New York Parkway. If there are cars in front of mine as I exit the Parkway at least two out of every three cars will pull into McDonald’s. My house falls in the repeat customer zone, close enough to walk to and easy enough to grab for lunch/dinner on the go. McDonald’s isn’t something I seek out. It’s become a fall back plan, a stomach filler when I can’t think of anywhere better to go.

Reason #2: Over-Exposure

According to the Yale Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity – the average U.S. child sees 15 food commercials ever day, or about 5,500 per year – the most heavily advertised products are fast foods and high-sugared snack foods. As a kid I most likely spent more than 19 hour per week (the average for a person in the United States) in front of a television littered with ads of Ronald McDonald giving a convincing pitch for the Happy Meal and glorified collectable toys that come with it.  Smart marketing coupled with a convenient location makes McDonald’s something that kids seek out. Most of my memories of eating at McDonald’s revolve around the euphoria of getting the Happy Meal toy I coveted.

Reason #3: Money

In my teenage years I frequented McDonald’s because it was an inexpensive mid-day, or late night snack. The invention of the dollar menu clearly boomed sales within the teenage demographic and increasing service hours to beyond midnight made McDonald’s the only late night option around.

I’m partially a victim of a fast food nation. I live in a country that spends over $100 billion more on fast food then the nation with the next highest output. The only time I’ve left America was in 2002, when my family took a vacation to Montreal, Canada. We dinned in fancy French restaurants, tried escargot on pizza, shared Shepard’s pie and dared to taste anything the French Canadians put on our plates. Although we were north of the border, we couldn’t escape the reach of the McDonald’s empire. In bustling downtown Montreal there’s an upscale McDonald’s that was noticeably different then the one in my town. The façade of the restaurant blended in with the newer glass buildings downtown and there was noticeably less of the red and yellow that illuminated my hometown at night. The Happy Meal toys were replaced with hockey trading cards (welcome to Canada). This McDonald’s served the classics – McNuggets, Big Macs, Quarter Pounders – as well as gourmet sandwiches served on fancy dishes and coffees I’ve never seen in the United States. What we didn’t expect out of this McDonald’s was agonizingly slow service. We are used to getting our fast food within three minutes. After half and hour of waiting and one missed subway ride we became the stereotypical impatient, spoiled American tourists, complaining about not getting our food fast. Even in a high tech, progressive city like Montreal, there was no rush to produce or consume food. It’s meant to be enjoyed.

Fast food is American because it’s rooted in our culture, our way of life, more than any other nation. We are a corporation run country hooked on the over-indulgent foods that fit our schedules and make us happy, if only temporarily. And there’s no end in sight.