“It’s been a journey”, she said.
Advertisement
“The vision and the commitment is here”.
Mike Andres, president of McDonald’s United States of America, outlined a series of changes aimed at improving the nutrition of the 25 million meals served each day at more than 14,000 locations.
On Monday, he and others outlined some of the newest moves meant to suggest cleaner foods that diners are asking for.
The company said that it was removing artificial preservatives from its Chicken McNuggets, pork sausage patties, and omelet-style eggs.
McDonald’s Corp has removed chickens raised with antibiotics that are important to human medicine from its USA supply chain months ahead of schedule, part of its drive to target increasingly health-conscious consumers.
Still, when McDonald’s reformulated the Egg McMuffin with simpler, more natural ingredients this past September, the company reported a double digit increase in sales.
Companies don’t have a choice when it comes to selling food that’s perceived as cleaner, says Jack Russo, senior analyst at Edward Jones covering consumer goods.
McDonald’s U.S. is making big changes to its food including scrapping artificial preservatives from several menu items and only using chicken that hasn’t been treated with antibiotics.
“We want to make the core menu the best it can possibly be”, Mr. Andres said. The company said that transition is complete.
He said different sizes of the iconic sandwich have been doing very well in Columbus and Dallas.
McDonald’s has made a number of moves on its menu in recent years that are aimed toward making it more health conscious.
The chain has pledged to make other changes aimed at showing that its food is less processed and more humanely sourced than consumers may realize.
McDonald’s has been continuously tweaking its menu over the previous year in an effort to drive up sales and improve the widespread perception that its food is unhealthy and overprocessed.
But convincing people it serves wholesome food is particularly important for McDonald’s, which has long courted families with its Happy Meals.
About 30 journalists and bloggers were invited to McDonald’s headquarters to hear the news firsthand, the topics a closely guarded secret.
Sugar, fat and salt are the three big nasties in our modern diet, and they’re lurking in junk food – those delicious treats we can’t resist.
While McDonald’s is not talking specifically about local sourcing, it is sharing stories from some suppliers. In New Zealand our McNuggets already do not contain artificial colours, preservatives or flavours.
Advertisement
[Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images] McDonald’s, meanwhile, had been signalling its plans for dropping corn syrup and other unhealthy elements of its menu since late 2014, the AP noted, when it announced that it was evaluating its cooking procedures and ingredients as part of its push to correct a series of dismal financial quarters.
