Apparatus of the Burger

Apparatus of the Burger or applied existentialism in the hall of the Mountain King. By John Caswell

“Existentialism. A philosophy that emphasizes the uniqueness and isolation of the individual experience in a hostile or indifferent universe, regards human existence as unexplainable, and stresses freedom of choice and responsibility for the consequences of one's acts”

[In East Germany] "…in town after town statues of Lenin have come down, and statues of Ronald McDonald have gone up." Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation

Obviously (I hope obviously), McDonald’s isn’t part of my regular routine. But sometimes when I’m travelling and it’s late, and McDonald’s is open. It might be in an airport, at that services area off the M4/M5 junction near Bristol. It might be at a truck stop in Ohio. McDonald’s - or something just like it – is everywhere these days.

I sit at the plastic table with my burger and fries and the coffee that’s supposed to keep me awake another 3 hours. (Rubbish) Being ever curious, I study who and what surrounds me. It’s also my job to observe what is actually going on, I discern the apparatus behind the burger. Here the supply chain, CRM, strategic planning, employee incentive schemes and advertising meet reality. Billions in technology and management investment encounter the world’s most significant people – the customer.

Also I noted on some billboard – “We’ve sold Billions of Burgers” Something somewhat unattractive about that slogan don’t you think?

I see: two alarming 13 year old Goth girls going table to table begging game pieces from the other patrons, a middle-aged black man in a neatly pressed security guard uniform sipping a cola, an indecisive elderly woman (who I hope is not homeless) being patiently assisted by a gangly teenage counter clerk and a young couple – like me, travelling – whose 8 year old son nods off over his Happy Meal. For me the whole scene not unlike a drive by shooting.

I often sit and wonder why I’m sitting here. It’s a bit of an out of body experience. I marvel at whether the enterprise really gives a rip about me or how I feel or what the experience is really like. I wonder how they figure out how it should work, how it might be better, who they are really aiming at. It’s tough though isn’t. How can they possibly give me the experience I want as well as those two Goths.

“Manage your business not as a collection of products and services but as a customer portfolio.” Professor Larry Selden, Wharton School of Business

In 2005, McDonald’s alone spent $2.2 billion (11% of revenue) on selling and administrative expenses (IT, supply chain, training, etc.). At the end of the day, this investment means nothing unless the customer says: “I visited your place. It was clean. The food was hot. I could afford it. Your people were nice. Just like in your ads. I’ll go back again and again. And bring my family.” I found it quite hard to see the result of all of that investment but I also find it hard to be too critical as this is perhaps the most harsh physical environment on the planet. Forget Death Valley. This is DFW and my flight is delayed. I’m hungry, tired and emotional.

All business comes down to the customer experience. You may serve the CEO, the citizen or surfer dudes, but your business equals those who buy your products and services. So why use our approach to improve your relationship with these your most important people? Because time and again we have shown organisations that they know more about their customer than they think they do.

"Consumers are statistics. Customers are people." Stanley Marcus, former CEO and Chairman of Neiman-Marcus

Visualization of these scenes is a big part of my life so being a witness to this is research for me. Perhaps that’s my excuse for a lot of the pain I put myself through.

Yep, we do a lot of this stuff, we draw the ‘day in the life’ of the customer to try and understand what its like being me at that plastic table in the airport. The ability to picture and narrate the end user experience as a story builds empathy between the enterprise and the human beings who make up its market. Empathy helps transform teams from apparatchiks to entrepreneurs.

In our sessions, we ask the participants to speak for those who consume their products and services. What do your customers say they need? What do they complain about? What do they want that we don’t offer? What do they say about you? What reasons do they give for coming back? Or not?

In almost every engagement we’ve done, our clients have been incredibly candid and often accurate about those they support with products and services. The magic though is getting the enterprise to wrap its own transformation and its supply chain around these insights and truly get it to work. That’s also the really tough bit. Imagine. We’ve illustrated a true requirement of countless different consumers arriving at the alter of big McD every single one of them with their own needs printed on their foreheads and imagine how many thousands of decisions and then moving parts that need to line up to ensure the whole ‘machine’ literally satisfies this demand.

"There is only one boss. The customer. And he can fire everybody in the company from the chairman on down, simply by spending his money somewhere else." Sam Walton, founder of Wal-Mart

So. Do I forgive them the lack of experience, the lack of excitement? Do I return for another Burger? Will I recommend them to all my friends? Well... Errr! I have a lot of respect for any enterprise that can deliver profits year after year. I’m not one of those who would see Big Ron removed forcibly escorted from Earth. I do find globalisation tiresome and dislike every English High Street looking the same. (Different Road Trip). But when you need to eat, well. Burgers don’t appear from nowhere. Products and services emerge from the context of the enterprise. The customer experience – the entire business – should be the engine of this apparatus.

McDonalds. 8 out of 10. But please try harder

Thinking from the successful on the customer experience:

“Consumers as a whole want simple and reliable things they understand”. Reed Hastings, Founder and CEO of Netflix

“We're far more challenged by our customers than we ever are by our competitors”. Mark Constantine, CEO of Lush Cosmetics

“People aren't going to listen to you unless you're part of their world”. Wenda Millard, Chief Sales Officer of Yahoo!

“Change the way people think about something”. Barry Soloway VP of Product Realisation of Novalux

“Communism won't work because people like to own stuff”. Frank Zappa, composer/performer

From the Minds Eye...