Product design in food industry - a McDonald’s case

McDonald’s is a well-established fast food chain globally however, this has resulted in numerous problems being faced. The decision-making problem being discussed in this report is that of food product design. An issue arose when customers began to question the meat quality of the chicken nuggets and burgers served by the chain. Consumers discovered that the meat being used was not 100% chicken breast and incorporated some less desirable cuts of meat. Overall, this fell as a food product design decision making problem by McDonald’s as they chose to use cheaper meat. Literature regarding the theory behind food product design will be evaluated and analysed in order to deduce quality function deployment (QFD) as a potential solution to the problem faced by McDonald’s. The QFD method will be scrutinised and both benefits and drawbacks of the concept discussed in order to demonstrate the value that this chosen solution could provide.