The creator of the Big Mac dies at 98

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as Delligatti’s sandwich spread to the rest of his 47 stores in Pennsylvania and was added to the chain’s national menu in 1968.

“He was often asked why he named it the Big Mac, and he said because Big Mc sounded too funny,” his son Michael Delligatti said.

Jim Delligatti said in 2006 that McDonald’s resisted the idea at first because its simple lineup of hamburgers, cheeseburgers, fries and shakes was selling well.

“They figured, why go to something else if (the original menu) was working so well?” Delligatti said then.

McDonald’s has sold billions of Big Macs since then, in more than 100 countries. When the burger turned 40, McDonald’s estimated it was selling 550 million Big Macs a year. Delligatti received no payment or royalties for coming up with the burger, the company said.

“Delligatti was a legendary franchisee within McDonald’s system who made a lasting impression on our brand,” the Oak Brook, Ill.based company said Wednesday in a statement. The Big Mac “has become an iconic sandwich enjoyed by many around the world.”

Ann Dugan, an expert on business franchises, said Jim Delligatti’s genius was simple: He listened to customers who wanted a bigger burger.

“In franchising, there’s always this set playbook and you have to follow it. Jim saw an opportunity to go outside the playbook because he knew the customer,” Dugan said. “He persevered and (McDonald’s) listened, and the rest is history.”

Delligatti headed M&J Management, a four-generation family business and McDonald’s franchise organization, for more than 60 years. He opened his first McDonald’s in Pittsburgh’s North Hills suburbs in 1957. In 1979, he co-founded Pittsburgh’s Ronald McDonald House, then the seventh such facility in the country, where families can stay when children travel to Pittsburgh for life-saving medical care.

Delligatti also helped introduce breakfast service at McDonald’s, developing the hotcakes and sausage meal to feed hungry steelworkers on their way home from overnight shifts in the mills, his family said.