McDonald’s

Changing attitudes towards the world's best known brand

Sector: Food & Wine
  • Public Relations
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The Challenge

Fast food company McDonald’s is one of the world’s best-known brands.

communikate et al managed McDonald’s public relations needs in South Australia for a decade, from 2003 to 2013.

As a global brand, McDonald’s daily challenge was communicating the positive changes and contributions it was making as a business and employer and to meet customers’ changing needs.

Our Approach

Our ongoing communications strategy involved:

  • publicising new announcements including the new ‘healthy’ menu when salads were introduced
  • coordinating media briefings during CEO visits to SA
  • identifying speaking opportunities
  • speech and copywriting
  • leveraging national and local sponsorships through the media including McHappy Day and Clean Up Australia Day
  • issues management
  • publicising Ronald McDonald House Charities

We also created the McDonald’s Get Active Sports Awards, held in conjunction with Channel Ten’s Simply Footy. This program was designed to promote healthy active lifestyles among young sports people.

The Outcome

During our 10-year partnership with McDonald’s we were instrumental in helping to change the attitudes of key stakeholders towards the world’s best-known brand.

We worked closely with the licensee community, state marketing team and national public affairs team resulting in:

  • National initiatives being leveraged locally.
  • Positive media stories through our proactive approach including TV news stories, business stories and features in the Careers pages, in addition to regular segments on Ten News and in Messenger Newspapers through the Get Active Sports Awards.
  • Unprecedented media coverage.

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What our clients have to say

Working with the talented team at communikate we have the very best communication, marketing, design and digital expertise and resources at hand. Our brand is now integrated and seamless across everything we do.

Kristen​ Pellew
Head of Stakeholder Engagement, Australian Gas Infrastructure Group

communikate et al has become an important and trusted partner... They share our passion. We greatly value their flexibility, their responsiveness, their turnaround times, their honest appraisal of projects and their collegiality. Most of all we love the fact that they have supported our focus on achieving outcomes for older people.

Jane Mussared
Chief Executive, COTA SA

Following the successful development of our new website, communikate et al has maintained a proactive approach to the refinement and improvements of content and key messages in collaboration with our team. They embraced and supported us in all communication relating to the impact of COVID-19. They’re a friendly and responsive team with all requests being eagerly supported.

Nino DiSisto
Chief Executive Officer, Clayton Church Homes

We've worked with the communikate et al team for 18 months and they've played a pivotal role launching the Mineral Swim brand. They have successfully driven our influencer programme, managed our social media programme and generated leads resulting in sales. They are dynamic and professional, and it’s been a pleasure working with them and seeing our brand flourish.

Daena Bougoure-Latchford
Water Treatment - Business Development Manager, Maytronics Australia

We have been hugely impressed with the way communikate et al have immersed themselves in learning our brand and respecting our approach. It felt like they just ‘got us’ from the start! It has been such a pleasure working with their professional, smart and dynamic team.

Jocelyn Marsland
Manager – Communications and Marketing, Emerging Minds: National Workforce Centre for Child Mental Health

We love the Daily Moves branding that communikate et al created. It is friendly, flexible for different applications, and our marketing collateral stands out from the rest. We have received a lot of compliments from participants and stakeholders who love it just as much as we do.

Alyssa Hill
Daily Moves Program Coordinator, City of Unley

communikate were initially engaged to assist in rebranding and marketing. I was most impressed with the way they listened, interpreted our ideas and turned them into something the whole community took pride in…. Their strategy helped us to achieve strong enrolment numbers… I would highly recommend them if you are looking for a professional, innovative, talented and highly relational marketing (and more) agency.

Peter Daw
Former Principal, Mercedes College

Bec, Henry and the team understood our brand from the get go and it showed from concept to delivery. During an intensely busy time for our team, they worked seamlessly with us to develop and manage an integrated campaign... The results were outstanding and put the hotel in an excellent position to launch into a competitive market, with strong occupancy experienced. We really value our partnership.

Chris Curran
Director of Hotel Openings & Operations, Pro-invest Hotels Group

communikate et al were an integral part of the King William Road upgrade team from the initial community consultation right through to completion. The brand they created fit the project perfectly. They took the time to understand the complexities and always delivered with strategic oversight, ensuring things were done with purpose and meaning. Having them on board was invaluable.

Akarra Klingberg
Coordinator Business and Economic Development, City of Unley

communikate et al understood our uniquely commercial and political landscape to quickly become a valued member of our team. They’ve supported our major events and activations with great results… and navigated and mitigated risk when needed. Put simply, they’re responsive, supportive and just as invested in Rundle Mall’s success as we are.

Johanna Williams
General Manager, Rundle Mall Management Authority