Attempting to escape chain restaurants and big box stores in the US can seem like an impossible task. On a recent road trip, artist Stephen Von Worley noticed that they were popping up everywhere, even in the middle of formerly barren landscapes.

Over the past year we’ve noticed experimentation in Starbucks’ marketing, a reflection of an identity crisis in the industry as “mass-market powerhouses” McDonald’s and Dunkin’ Donuts use the recession to rise from below. On the opposite front gourmet coffee startups are beginning to present the premium quality Starbucks once used as its primary selling point.

Dropping a total of $2.2 million dollars, South Korea’s Hyundai Card has bought out all media space in the newly opened subway station just outside their building.

A few months back, we wrote about McDonald’s “green” prototype restaurant in Chicago and now we see the popular burger chain is attempting to expand its positive, environmental footprint. In addition to the eco-friendly policies we previously mentioned – LED light fixtures, drought resistant plants and special hybrid parking – the new Golden Arches opening July 14th in Cary, North Carolina will feature an electric vehicle charging station, part of NovaCharge’s ChargePoint Network - a connected model that provides subscription-based access.
As the press release notes, this new relationship enables customers to enjoy a McDonald’s meal, while waiting for their vehicles to charge. [...]

Last Wednesday was National Beverage Day, a little-known holiday that inspired us to examine the new McCafé coffee line, from McDonalds.
Perhaps an unlikely chain vying for a piece of the caffeinated pie, but with this week’s launch, McDonald’s introduced an expanded McCafé coffee line, featuring cappuccinos, mochas and lattes. The specialty offerings are available at 11,000 locations (out of 14,000) nationwide. And taking a page from the coffeehouse playbook, McDonald’s customers can customize any drink with flavored syrups, steamed milk or whipped cream.
While Starbucks battles the stigma of the recession-unfriendly “4 dollar coffee,” a coffee run at McDonald’s will set [...]

While it’s hard not to ask “What’s the catch?” upon hearing news about big corporations adopting socially conscious policies, the fact remains that whatever the reasons are behind these changes, their footprints are often large enough to create a significant impact. To that end, fast food giant McDonald’s opened a prototype “green” restaurant on the south side of Chicago last year in an attempt to test out a number of environmentally friendly upgrades to their preexisting template. 
Though none of the features are particularly revolutionary – skylights to let in more natural light, recycling rainwater for use in plumbing and better [...]

Perhaps a little bit of both. We ran across these posters in Midtown Manhattan on Friday courtesy of a chain of “healthy” fast food restaurants called the Energy Kitchen. Their own ads (which we admittedly dismissed at the time) flank these spoofs and carry the tag line – “Fast Food Doesn’t Have To Be Fat Food.” Upon arriving at the company website, visitors are greeted with the following information – “Nothing Over 500 Calories” – but as we’ve seen before, calories only tell part of the story. So how does it really stack up to the competition?
Sticking with breakfast sandwiches – [...]

900 Calories (45% of daily value)
54 Grams of Fat (84% of daily value)
570 mg of Cholesterol (190% of daily value)
1840 mg of Sodium (76% of daily value)
Based on a 2,000 calorie diet.
Nutrition information courtesy of McDonald’s.

Flooded McDonald’s is an eerie film documenting the gradual flooding of a McDonald’s restaurant. Emptied of all staff and customers, the life size replica slowly fills with water as the furniture, food and machines float around, get destroyed and are eventually submerged. The film presents a strange calm destruction of the cultural icon, almost as it’s a natural part of evolution.
Flooded McDonald’s from Superflex on Vimeo
[via Wooster Collective]

While there’s a lot of companies promoting value in their promotions right now, we recently noticed a couple of fast food companies advertising the use of real ingredients in their advertising recently. One ad on US TV comes from McDonalds and describes the real ingredients found in the chain’s food (We can’t find the ad on YouTube – sorry). Meanwhile, with the slogan of “Choose Real Taste” Pizza Hut have launched their Natural pizza “to meet the demands of changing consumer taste.” The ad supporting the new product tells you that this range of pizzas don’t even have chemicals (but [...]