McDonald's, world's largest fast food chain restaurant group, declared in Beijing that it will carry out a price-off promotion on 40 percent of its products for one year. This is the largest price-off promotion since McDonald's entered the China market, said Jeffery Schwartz, CEO of McDonald's China.

Feeling the impacts of the global financial crisis, the two largest foreign fast food giants, McDonald's and KFC, have each initiated frequent promotions in their restaurants in China. Shortly after KFC's price-off action, which lasted two months, McDonald's declared this promotional event, which is said to be the largest price cut ever.

In the fourth quarter of 2008, McDonald's experienced a 23 percent decrease in global profits. In response, while promoting in the US, its CEO Jim Skinner expressed that the company should try to attract more customers during the recession.

The large scale price-off promotion and the active expansion plans of McDonald's China are a solid step in its strategy to win through increased sales. In 2009, McDonald's plans to establish 175 new restaurants in China, 53 of which have already been established in January. Chinese mainland will become the region where most new restaurants are to be established in McDonald's worldwide market in 2009.

McDonald's owns over 31,000 chain restaurants in 118 countries throughout the world. In 1990, Macdonald's opened its first restaurant in Chinese mainland in Shenzhen. So far, in China, McDonald's has established a total of 1,065 restaurants.

By People's Daily Online