American fastfood chain to introduce Pinoy meals

Golden Arches and Development Corp., the franchise holder of American fastfood chain McDonald's Corporation is set to introduce more Pinoy meals, in its bid to capture the taste buds of over 100 million consumers in the country.

This announcement was made by Cholo Perreras, McDonald's Philippines senior product manager, following the official Cebu launch of its "Mushroom Pepper Steak" rice meal, a unique offering of McDonald’s exclusively for the Philippine market.

Perreras said McDonald’s, with its over 500 stores nationwide, will offer more surprises for the Philippine market in the next few months.

"We always listen to the market, to be more relevant to them," added Perreras in an interview yesterday.

While the trend of introducing health-friendly meals is rising, Perreras said McDonald’s is also going in that direction, on top of preparing "feel-good moments" food servings with right price tags for the Pinoys.

Starting in 1981, it took Golden Arches more than three decades to reach 500 stores, while its closest competitor, market leader has about 847 stores of its flagship brand alone.

The McDonald’s store in the Philippines was first started by George T. Yang, a Chinese-Filipino businessman in 1981 in Morayta, Manila.

Worldwide, there are more than 36,000 McDonald’s restaurants.