McDonald’s Rewards Canadian Coffee Fans
For the next two weeks, customers at Canadian McDonald’s locations will receive a
free small cup of its proprietary Premium Roast coffee during breakfast hours, with no purchase necessary.
The promotion runs April 20 – May 3, 2009. In a press release, McDonald’s Canada said breakfast sales in general and Premium Roast coffee sales in particular have been major contributors to business momentum in the past several years and that coffee sales increased by 1.3 million cups in February 2009 compared to February 2008.
McDonald’s is also featuring a social networking component to its Canadian coffee promotion. Customers can submit photos of themselves drinking Premium Roast coffee to the
McDonald's Mug Shots competition, and have a panel of judges select the best photos as finalists which will then be submitted for online vote by the Canadian public. The winner will receive 500 guest cards, each good for one free medium cup of coffee.
Last month, McDonald’s ran a limited-time
Canadian promotion featuring the chain’s signature Big Mac sandwich as a snack-sized tortilla.
McDonald’s is promoting Canadian coffee sales while coffee retailer Starbucks is showing signs of potential instability in the Canadian market. Starbucks recently
closed a restaurant in Richmond, B.C. and said it will close 100 more non-U.S. stores during 2009, though it is uncertain how many more stores, if any, will close in Canada. Starbucks opened 28 Canadian stores during Q1 2009 and operates more than 500 Canadian locations. McDonald’s operates more than 1,400 Canadian locations.
