Attracting millennials may not be easy for McDonald's

Robert Passikoff is the founder and president of New York-based Brand Keys Inc., a consultancy that seeks to predict consumer behavior trends and brand engagement. He questioned McDonald’s brand research in a recent article.

"If Google’s slogan is ‘Do no evil,’ McDonald’s unofficial corporate slogan seems to have been ‘We can do that, too,’” he said.

As part of its Loyalty Leaders list, Brand Keys asked 1,000 consumers in each of three generations, boomers, Gen X and millennials, about fast-food and fast-casual restaurants. Conducted in late 2014, the survey found recent declines reported by McDonald’s, Burger King and Taco Bell mirrored the downward loyalty shifts seen in the survey’s results.

Brand Keys’ research contained a few other McNuggets: a 20 percent year-over-year decrease in fast-food visitation among millennials (down 18 percent among baby boomers), 42 percent of surveyed millennials increased visits to fast-casual restaurants and 53 percent called McDonald’s offerings “dollar food”—not a compliment.

“They’re not necessarily suggesting that it’s good because it’s cheap,” he said. “Millennials are looking for value. Even if they don’t have a lot of money, they’re still looking for value.”