McDonald’s and me.
- Hans Ebert
- 6 hours ago
- 4 min read
When McDonald’s opened its first restaurant in Paterson Street in Hong Kong, my then girlfriend, who became my wife and I were there with a McConga line of people including Commercial Radio disc jockey Mike Souza along with the always attractive Rebecca Ng. Rebecca’s husband and co-owner of the franchise in Hong Kong, Daniel Ng, was busy mingling with guests and cutting various ribbons.
Being Creative Director with McDonald’s advertising agency Glenn Graphic, which evolved into Tse Needham before becoming DDB, we were there as cheerleaders and witnessing what was to become one of Hong Kong’s first real success stories and under the unorthodox leadership of the eccentric visionary Daniel Ng.
I have written enough about my friendship and great respect for Daniel in turning McDonald’s into the success it’s become despite naysayers warning him that “Chinese only like rice” and the failure of Burger King in the city.
So, why and how did McDonald’s succeed? Probably a combination of things like locations for the stores, pricing, the menu items and a marketing strategy built around QSCV- Quality, Service, Cleanliness and Value.
I was reminded of all this when seeing a full page advertisement in the South China Morning Post celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Golden Arches in Hong Kong and, of course, so much has happened in this time.
Daniel is no longer with us, new menu items have been introduced, and I believe that Ronald McDonald and his McDonaldland friends have been retired.
When we launched McDonald’s in the city, it was through a public relations campaign as there was only the one store before the second store opened in Repulse Bay along the beach front and then the third opened in Kowloon. The brand sold itself.
If there was any advertising, this was done on the back of the thousands of tray liners that were printed daily with the same theme line from the States- You Deserve A Break Today- and a half hour radio programme on Commercial Radio.
The advertising and marketing budget was sensible and extremely strategic. We were all learning as we went.
I learned very quickly not to ever produce a Ronald McDonald commercial in Hong Kong. Our first and only production was for Ronald McDonald calendars and it was downright creepy. We didn’t realise about the type of actor who could play Ronald- someone with a square jaw- whereas the character was a magical clown.
What we produced was a cheap looking commercial filmed on tape and an actor who had played a clown on local television station HKTVB cast as Ronald.
Alas, the actor didn’t have much of a chin and when the makeup was applied and he jumped around, he hardly looked “magical”. He looked scarily goofy.
After that debacle, we used the fairly big budget Ronald McDonald commercials produced in the States, and because of Rights issues, the character voices having to be done in Hong Kong. The job of copying the voices of Ronald, Grimace, Hamburglar, Mayor McCheese, Big Mac and Birdie were shared between disc jockey Rick ‘O Shea and myself.
With more and more stores opening quickly, DDB started to adapt commercials filmed in the States and the music tracks in English and Cantonese produced in Hong Kong.
When it came time to producing our own television commercials, Keith Reinhard, the then Head of Creative Services, came out to Hong Kong to guide us and oversee the shoots. His experience was a huge help, and I was chosen to be one of six people to be on his global Creative Team and where I learned so much by working alongside far more experienced creative directors.
It didn’t take me long to understand just how much working on the McDonald’s business taught us about strategic thinking and the business of advertising.
Those lessons have lived with me on every different career move.
Meanwhile, award winning Actress Maggie Cheung made her debut in a Michael Jackson inspired television commercial for McDonald’s shot in their store in Aberdeen and called “Steppin’ Out”.
Maggie had only recently returned to Hong Kong after going to school in the United Kingdom and was working as a salesgirl for Lane Crawford.
She went to the casting session for the commercial and, well, with her looks, how could she not be picked?
What’s amazing to think about is that during my over twenty years working on and with the McDonald’s creative product, I attended many marketing conferences in Chicago and enrolled in Hamburger University to learn more about the business.
I wrote a song called “The House That Love Built” for the Ronald McDonald House and which was recorded by top Hong Kong singer Jacky Cheung.
McDonald’s also gave me the opportunity to work with different music production houses, different commercials directors and, again, learning by spending so much time on shoots and editing sessions and some truly world class creative and marketing directors.
Most of all, it gave me the chance to meet and work with Daniel Ng on projects that had nothing to do with McDonald’s and everything to do with McDonald’s because that will always be my School Of Marketing and Advertising and Structure and I McLoved being enrolled in it.
Born in Ceylon, Hans Ebert is an award winning advertising executive whose powerful campaign to gain the Right Of Abode in the United Kingdom for ethnic minorities in Hong Kong won Gold at the London Advertising Awards.
He also helped launch McDonald’s in Hong Kong, created the Happy Wednesday brand for the HKJC, was part of the team to launch STARTV and MTV in Asia plus ran the International divisions of Universal Music and EMI Music in Asia.
As a journalist, he has interviewed every iconic personalities from Billy Joel, legendary music producer Quincy Jones, and actor Peter Sellers to working on music for David Bowie, Robbie Williams and Gorillaz.
He also coined the term Canto Pop when writing for Billboard magazine.
He has a penchant for women who remind him of Diane Keaton.
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