Ronald McDonald is coming to a town near you, just like us.
One minute it was waste ground, the next its a fully-functioning drive-in restaurant.
Big Mac is continuing to supersize Spain which begs the question, how do you feel when your town get its own McDonald’s?
Pleased, or dismayed?
Is this a sign of progress, or another indicator that Spain, like many other parts of Europe that the continent is becoming, in terms of food and the service industry, just one corporate identikit.
Recent figures show France has succumbed to Ronald McDonald and experts are now asking, some fearing, that Spain will surely follow.
Surprisingly, the country with the most McDonald’s outside of the US is France.
The US has 13,444 McDonald’s restaurants and next comes France with 1,536. Canada follows with 1,462, Germany with 1,425 and the UK with 1,397.
Spain comes in eighth, with 580.
France was once the bastion of the bistro and small cafe scene, yet many villages and towns have seen huge numbers closing (around 70%) as rural populations have depleted and there’s been a change in habits.
The local McDonald’s – effectively for some the only choice – has now become a local beacon, especially with the younger generations, who see them as adding to their social lives.
Having proved popular in urban areas, McDonald’s is actively now moving out into the quiet rural areas.
Even some of the surviving cafes and restaurants don’t see them as a threat, saying they cater for a different customer, mainly an older demographic.
Others are not so welcoming, including farmers who see them as a threat. One farmer’s union, based in the southwest of the country, sees the restaurant chain as the worst of junk food, industrial farming, tax avoidance and only offering jobs with little security.
Spain’s hospitality industry is struggling, as in France. Bars and cafes are closing at a rapid rate. Between 2021 and early 2023 there was a 17% fall in the number of existing bars.
On 1 January 2023, the country had 168,065 registered bars. In 2022, some 7,825 bars were shut, a 4.5% decrease on the previous year’s total.
Madrid has borne the brunt of the closures, with 5,900 between 2021 and 2023 – a 26% fall. The Castilla y Leon and the Galicia regions weren’t far behind, both down nearly a quarter.
On the upside, some observers believe this is the bottom of the cycle and that the hospitality sector is about to make a comeback as people adjust to the new, post-Covid normal.
But if the downward trend continues, Spain may well go the same way as France and begin to welcome more Ronald McDonalds into town.